Storing Photos

[annieigma]

Hi,
is there a secure web site where I can store photo's? i have hundreds of them, and they are slowing my computer to a standstill.
thanks.

[Prudie]

Lots I think. I use Dropbox but I also have them backed up on an external drive.

[ChuckFickens]

"i have hundreds of them, and they are slowing my computer to a standstill."

No they're not.

[maggiebee]

I keep my photos on memory sticks.

[jno]

I suppsoe you could put them in places like Photobucket, but I'd second Prudie's suggestion of getting a separate hard drive - the size of a paperback and you just plug it in to your PC when you want to see stuff on it.

[annieigma]

If they are taking up all my memory, the hard drive is almost full, will that not slow the computer chuck?

[Buenchico]

As Chuck indicates, it's extremely unlikely that having a large number of photos on a computer would slow it significantly.

You should NEVER trust any website to store your photos without a physical back-up somewhere. (Companies go bust!). A single DVD can hold around 10,000 photos (at the file size that a typical digital camera might produce); so why not just burn them to a DVD?

[ChuckFickens]

No.

As long as you have sufficient space left on your hard drive for important system "stuff" then storing thousands of photos won't make any difference to the speed of the system at all..

"sufficient space" is a bit of a vague amount... but if you have over 1GB free it's not the photos that are causing a problem.

[Buenchico]

>>>the hard drive is almost full, will that not slow the computer?

In the 'olden days' (of a decade or so ago!) many computers lacked sufficient RAM to perform complex tasks without needing to temporarily borrow some storage space from the computer's hard drive. So it was possible that a lack of space on thre hard drive could slow things down. These days, most computers have ample RAM and perform the vast majority of tasks without calling upon the hard drive other than very briefly. (Watch the hard driver light on your computer while performing routine tasks. You'll hardly ever see it come on).

If your computer is running slowly there's either something taking all of its processing power or something hogging the RAM. Press Ctrl-Alt-Delete to enter the Task Manager. Click the 'Processes tab' and look down the 'CPU' column. All of the figures (other than 'System Idle Process') should normally be very low. If anything is particularly high, that's the cause of your problem. If 'System Idle Process' is the only high figure, look under 'Mem Usage' to see if there's a figure which is frequently changing; again, that could indicate a problem. (For example, if 'Mem Usage' is constantly changing alongside 'MsMpEng.exe, it indicates a problem with the Microsoft Security Essentials update engine).

Also run a full anti-virus scan and an anti-malware scan with the free version of Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware:
http://www.malwarebytes.org/products/malwarebytes_free/

[jno]

I used to find that opening Photoshop slowed my computer a lot - apparently it somehow brings all the photos into use, or so I was told, even when I wasn't actually working on them. Closing Photoshop again solved the problem. I don't know if this happens to everyone or if I just had a wonky programme.

[ChuckFickens]

Actually Chris, the more ram you have the more "free" space you need on the hard drive, windows will create a swap file of about 1.5 times the ram size regardless of it needing to use it or not.

[VHG]

Back your photos up to CDs or DVDs, and make two copies of each CD or DVD.

Then delete them from your computer.

[bazwillrun]

depending on how may GB, get flash drive or external HD

The only thing that might be slowing things down if you have "hundreds" (which is a tiny small amount these days is the software your are using to catalogue them and view them, although i'd be surprised unless its something ancient