r/datastorage

Following up after going through a few suggestions and testing some options.

At first I was looking into both self-hosted setups and paid cloud storage, but I realized I don’t really want the ongoing maintenance that comes with managing my own server.

I ended up trying pCloud and so far it’s been fine for my needs. Nothing complicated, just works in the background across my devices without much effort.

I mostly use cloud storage for a mix of personal projects and freelance work, so I need something stable that doesn’t become unpredictable in pricing as storage increases. Cross-device syncing and easy sharing are also pretty important for me.

Over the years I’ve tried a few different providers, but most of them tend to run into friction once you rely on them daily, whether that’s speed, limits, or sharing workflows.

Curious what others here are using long-term. What’s been the most reliable setup you’ve actually stuck with for a few years?

Hey yall. New here. Comp Sci student. I really want to find a viable storage solution for my homework and personal projects. I'm tired of usb thumb drives failing on me so quickly. Looking into portable external ssd options. Anyone have some suggestions? I'm not broke, but I'm also not trying to spend $300+.

Let's face it, this is tough, but objectively, which manufacturers would you say have the most reliable drives for storage? Asking for the publics experience.

Thank you.

Hi all,

I have a large personal photo/video collection built up over the years and want to make sure it’s properly protected. Right now everything sits on two external HDDs, and I’ve read that drives have a limited shelf life, so I’m looking to build a more reliable long-term system.

A few things I’d love input on:

The 3-2-1 backup rule: I understand the basic idea (3 copies, 2 different media types, 1 offsite), but how do people actually implement this in practice for a home photo/video archive? What’s your setup, brands, models, and how it’s all connected?

File formats: should I be converting anything, or keeping the original format?

Backup methods: NAS vs. cloud vs. cold storage HDDs vs. optical media (M-DISC, etc.)? What’s actually held up well for you over 5-10+ years?

HDD lifespan: how often do you actually need to replace/refresh drives, and how do you monitor drive health before something fails?

Specifics/cost: if you’re using a NAS, which model, how many bays, and what did it cost to set up? If cloud, which provider and what’s the monthly/yearly cost for your storage amount? If cold storage HDDs, which brand/model do you trust, and roughly how much per TB?

Would really appreciate hearing what’s worked (and what hasn’t) for people who’ve been doing this a while, including rough costs so I can budget properly.

Hey all troubleshooting a dead SanDisk Ultra 32GB and hit a wall on controller identification. Data doesn't matter, I'm fine with destructive recovery attempts. Posting full diagnostics in case anyone's dealt with this exact chip.

Drive:

- SanDisk Ultra, 32GB nominal / 28.6 GiB usable

- VID:PID = 0781:558A

- Serial: 03018817100220090548

- Marking on casing: BM201067713W

- USB 3.x capable, currently negotiating at 480 Mbps (USB 2.0 speed)

Symptom:

Kernel and every tool I've tried report the device as hardware write-protected, not just filesystem RO:

sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is on

sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 43 00 80 00

lsblk shows RO=1. blockdev --getro returns 1. hdparm -r0 /dev/sdb is rejected outright — reports back "readonly = 1 (on)" even after the "set" command. This is coming from the controller's Mode Sense response (byte 0x80), not the OS.

What I've ruled out:

- Not a filesystem-level flag , chmod/mount -o rw/fsck won't touch this, the SCSI layer itself is refusing writes

- sg_modes -p 0x1a → "invalid field in cdb," page not supported

- sg_readcap -l → fails with "Read-only file system"

The actual problem — controller ID:

This is where I'm stuck. Genuine SanDisk Ultra drives on this VID:PID apparently use SanDisk's own in-house controller, not a merchant chip (Phison/Alcor/SMI), so the usual identification tools come back empty. From what I've found searching around, ChipGenius and Flash Drive Info Extractor report "Controller: Unknown" for this exact VID:PID on other people's genuine units too ,not just mine.

What I'm hoping someone can help with:

1. Has anyone actually identified the physical controller marking on a genuine SanDisk Ultra 558A PCB (not a rebadged/counterfeit one)? Willing to open the case and post a photo of the die/chip marking.

2. Is there any known MPTool or recovery utility that works on SanDisk in-house silicon, even semi-official/leaked? I know Phison/Alcor/SMI all have community tools, has anyone found an equivalent for SanDisk's own controllers?

3. Given the "Write Protect is on" bit is coming from Mode Sense and won't clear via hdparm/blockdev, is this consistent with NAND spare-block exhaustion putting the FTL into failsafe, or could it be something else at the controller level I'm not considering?

Drive is fully expendable — happy to try destructive low-level commands, vendor-specific SCSI opcodes, JTAG/UART probing, whatever. Just trying to figure out if there's a real path forward before I write it off as dead silicon.

I’ve been trying to settle on a cloud storage setup that actually feels reliable long term, but it’s been harder than expected to find something that just works without constant tradeoffs.

Over the years I’ve used a few different services, but they all seem to have their own issues once you start using them daily, whether it’s performance, pricing changes, syncing quirks, or awkward sharing flows.

What I’m ideally looking for is something that:

• works smoothly across PC and mobile
• doesn’t become expensive as storage grows
• handles file sharing without too much friction
• is stable enough to stick with long term

I’m not really trying to over-engineer anything anymore, just want something dependable for personal use and some light collaboration with others.

For people who rely on cloud storage regularly, what do you stick with these days and why?

Also curious if switching providers actually made a noticeable difference for you, or if most of them end up feeling pretty similar in practice.

I'm looking to buy a 256 Gb SanDisk ultra micro sd card, is it good for just extra storage for like photos and videos?

The other day my wife was attempting to update her phone (iPhone) and it would not let her. After some investigation she had over 200GB of photos and no room for anything else. I have been attempting to cull her phone of these pictures but she refuses to lose a single photo from her device. My first attempt started with a google photo transfer but doesn’t keep the app in the background and the photos never end up transferring (or transfer so slowly it’s not helpful). Today, I tried transferring them all to an external hard drive but something keeps giving an error and will not let me move them all (only lets me move ~5,000/17,000.

My next attempt was to set up iCloud plus for one month, move the photos from her iCloud to the hard drive, then cancel it.

Does anyone know of an easier option? I’m terrified I may lose some of her pictures.

I have around 1 TB of vacation photos and videos spread across my laptop and phones. All of my devices are now running out of storage, so I need to move this data somewhere else and then free up space on my devices.

I was initially considering buying external hard drives, but I keep reading that hard drives may only be reliable for around 5–10 years and would eventually need to be replaced or copied to new drives. Since these are mostly vacation photos and videos, I expect very little day-to-day usage—I mainly want to store them safely and access them occasionally.

My main concern is long-term preservation. Ideally, I’d like a solution that can keep my data safe for at least 60 years.

I’m reluctant to use cloud storage because of the ongoing subscription costs, but I’m also wondering whether cloud storage is actually the safer option since I wouldn’t have to worry about a physical hard drive being lost, damaged, or failing.

Given my situation, what would be the best storage strategy? Should I use external hard drives, cloud storage, or something else? I’d really appreciate any advice on the safest and most practical approach for preserving these photos and videos for decades.

Is it possible to use USB flash drives to store games, from like roblox, minecraft, valorant, to overwatch, marvel rivals, gta. I'm not talking about using an external ssd its using a USB flash drive. If so which ones are possible and which ones are not?

SK hynix reportedly lacks replacement SSDs for warranty claims and may offer refunds based on the original purchase price. With SSD prices rising sharply amid a storage shortage, customers may struggle to afford an equivalent replacement.

I’m currently using a 4TB HDD as my secondary drive for documents and games, with a 1TB SSD as my boot drive. The HDD has started getting noticeably slow, and I suspect it’s on its way out, so I’m planning to replace it with a 6TB HDD.

What’s the best way to move all my data over and swap the drives without causing issues?

I have a 2‑bay HDD dock that supports cloning. Can I simply clone the old HDD to the new one and then assign the same drive letter, or is there anything else I need to do?

I know there is probably no hope but I recently lost my SD Card with a few thousand photos and raw files for a film project I'm working on and I'm wondering if anyone knows if there is any way that copies or backups or anything is still lingering on my main device. I work off of a 2023 Macbook Pro and used the programs Davinci Resolve and Darktable (for video and photo respectively) literal minutes prior to losing the card. I haven't found any way to access anything but I figure it couldn't hurt to ask. I'm really only looking to salvage the files I was working on just prior to losing it (about two weeks of content, 10 video files and 500 photo) since I did backup most everything else prior, though I have more than learned my lesson about the importance of regular backups. If anyone has any ideas that could help, they would be incredibly appreciated.

Good Day Datastorage Community,

Mods, please remove this post if it does not adhere to your rules.

Due to this community being datastorage I thought my application that I have developed would be a perfect fit for this subreddit.

Ultimate File Manager Pro is an all-in-one file manager for Android TV and Mobile, on Google it has over 30k+ downloads and a 4.8 star rating.

The FOSS version has currently 87 stars on GitHub.

If you are interested to see how the application looks like and what features it has, you are welcome to have a look at the official sub reddit r/UFManagerPro or the official website www.kilowatch.co.za

If you want access to the GitHub Link: Kilowatch/ultimate-file-manager-pro: Ultimate File Manager Pro

If you have any questions or queries, please reach out as I am the developer of this application.

If this post is not suitable for this community then I do apologize for the inconvenience.

Thank you and kind regards

I've got around 30TB of data in cloud storage right now, and the monthly bill is starting to hurt.

Most of it is just media and personal files. I don't need to access all of it regularly, but I also don't really want to delete it or have it sitting in only one place.

I'm thinking about getting a NAS and moving most of it back home, then keeping another copy on some external drives somewhere else. The problem is that once you get into 30TB, even the "cheap" options start adding up pretty quickly.

For those of you with 30TB+ of data, what are you doing for backup these days?

Would you just bite the bullet and build a NAS, or is there a cheaper cloud/offsite option I'm missing? Thanks in advance!