It has finally hit the stage (probably well past it) that I need to organize and properly store my data, and i will never turn down advice and recommendations from others who have more knowledge than I do. So I come hat in hand asking what your plan of action is would be if you were in my situation. So here is the run down.
SHORT TERM GOALS:
Have centralized, secure, searchable, & organized place for my pictures, video, manuals, text docs, and several other file types mostly reference material, but nothing excessively large.
Backup tons of old email but also needs to be sorted and deleted.
The ability to expand as needed, I plan on starting to save back ups of info, mostly text/pdf for offline use. and I currently do not have tons of confidence in the stability of information on the internet and there is tons of info I would not want to be lost to me or others
Have data auto upload to same location off al sources if possible
Have safe backups of all
LONG TERM GOALS:
Build my own server that I could possibly connect to from any PC
Back up all my physical media of DVD,BR, 4k movies, old CDs and 1000s of film photography pictures with negatives and/or slides.
Possible Plex server but I have so little knowledge of this I am not sure.
Download websites that I am afraid will not be there in the future. nothing huge like youtube or anything close to that.
KNOWLEDGE:
Basic computer knowledge but as far as Network and server knowledge I know just enough to know I don't know a damn thing
DATA LOCATIONS:
I have data scattered across:
Home desktop
Work desktop
Laptop personal/work
Workshop/studio laptop (not connected to internet at all times)
iPad
iPhone
Several old HDD (3 or 4)
Google drive
iCloud
I know for certain there is duplicate of a lot of things that could have been renamed or revisions at some point so that’s something to deal with as well.
It is also worth noting I am guessing I have less than 5 terabytes but 1000s of different files
CURRENT PLAN OF ATTACK:
Purchase a external hard drive and copy all needed files from all sources (partially in hopes that it weeds out some duplicate files)
Sort all files. With this i truly don't know where to start. My current guess is just going file by file and sort by broadest subject and file type and just keep going down by steps but I feel like this will take a very long time and have a high possibility of ending up with duplicate files in different locations.
Once all files sorted copy it to two separate hard drives. One installed in my desktop, one as just a detached backup, another copy zipped and saved in some cloud storage.
RESOURCES:
Other than hardware listed above not a lot.
I do have a couple hundred dollars in best buy points from CC rewards
I couple hundred dollars in cash to be able to spend on this project immediately. but definitely willing to spend a pretty reasonable amount more in the future.
Willingness to learn and figure things out.
Several old hard drives that work (not to say I trust them) and external hard drive reader.
IN CONCLUSION:
So I think that is all the pertinent information, but feel free to ask questions and I will promptly answer.
So how would you go about tackling this project?
Any software or hardware that could make this easier or better?
Any common pitfalls of people in similar situations that I should keep an eye out for?
Thanks in advance.
