Cloud storage for photos. Google Photos, or something else?

LiGhTfasT · 1 May 2016 at 21:00

facebook.

traveyb · 1 May 2016 at 21:13

Didn't Microsoft pull the unlimited/1TB storage from O365 users?

Caged · 1 May 2016 at 21:15

I didn't realise iCloud was now competitively priced for storage.

Not sure I'd want to rely on it for photo storage though, Apple keep screwing around with how the Photos app works and pulling features that people use.

Street · 1 May 2016 at 21:39

Scottland said:
If you don't want to pay for the storage, you can become a local reviewer on Google Maps and earn 1tb of storage free

That's what I've been doing.. I'm a quarter of the way there in a week!

Skeeter · 1 May 2016 at 21:56

I'm not after just a cloud storage, I have plenty of that. I'm after a photo management app that integrates with Android and Windows that I can use to store my photos and access anywhere, while also giving me loats of storage.

Minstadave · 1 May 2016 at 21:57

traveyb said:
Didn't Microsoft pull the unlimited/1TB storage from O365 users?

No they reduced the free account capacity but the 1TB is still good. It's what I use.

Scottland · 1 May 2016 at 22:02

Skeeter said:
I'm not after just a cloud storage, I have plenty of that. I'm after a photo management app that integrates with Android and Windows that I can use to store my photos and access anywhere, while also giving me loats of storage.

I've yet to encounter anything as good as Google Photos, paid or otherwise (and I have looked into it quite a bit) - especially since the revamped it and removed it from Google+ as a stand alone platform.

The Google Photos interface on the web supports drag and drop upload for uploading non phone pictures - although this is a small app from Google that will monitor a specified folder and upload them automatically if you frequently take in pictures from an SD card for instance.

Skeeter · 1 May 2016 at 22:12

Does the desktop app put photos into albums based on folder names, or does it just upload them to a root folder?

Scottland · 1 May 2016 at 22:19

I think it just uploads them, but I've not used the app in a while so not sure. Although if there's a Geotag embedded it might create an album for you.

Macro · 1 May 2016 at 22:22

1TB Onedrive with O365 for me, works well, doesn't mess around with my photos, syncs nicely and I don't have to worry about the exif data being scanned, aggregated and sold to advertisers :/ Dropbox would be my second choice but it's a little too pricey considering the Onedrive option.

Scam · 1 May 2016 at 23:59

I used Dropbox with free space for ages (I accrued about 45gb over time) but once that ran out I swapped to Google. Dropbox doesn't do a 100gb package, its 1tb or nothing and that was overkill and too expensive for me. £1.79/month for 100gb Drive is perfect. Android integration is perfect, Drive etc works great. I'm firmly in the Google ecosystem (gmail, music etc) so it all works for me.

Energize · 2 May 2016 at 00:32

I'm looking for an online storage solution myself as an extra backup, does O365 allow me to just upload whatever files I want via ftp or smb?

Kronos · 2 May 2016 at 02:14

Pawnless Endgame said:
I find Dropbox easier because it's already on your hard drive (plain ol' Win Explorer), and other collaborators can upload to it and vice versa.

Another one for this, I am not keen on Google Drive as I have all my photos in folders which works perfectly with Dropbox.

AHarvey · 2 May 2016 at 02:32

Google photos.

Their free unlimited photos will accept anything up to the equivalent of a 16MP photo and anything above it limits down to 16mp Takes videos as well up to 1090p and must be under 10gb in size.

I had some trouble with the auto backup app but I was trying to back up just over 24,000 photos.

Ended up doing it manually for the first 12 thousand, now it's chugging along doing the rest.

I find the image gallery amazing to browse though compared to normal folders.

Although I've not really looked at the other options you can create albums, collages and I would imagine there will be other things coming such as facial recognition.

Albums are the same as folders on your PC, easy enough to set up and use. I would suggest you all try it and see

Skeeter · 2 May 2016 at 08:46

Energize said:
I'm looking for an online storage solution myself as an extra backup, does O365 allow me to just upload whatever files I want via ftp or smb?

You use the OneDrive client on your PC and apps on phones. Its baked into Windows 10 now.

Scottland · 2 May 2016 at 10:14

AHarvey said:
Google photos.

Their free unlimited photos will accept anything up to the equivalent of a 16MP photo and anything above it limits down to 16mp Takes videos as well up to 1090p and must be under 10gb in size.

I had some trouble with the auto backup app but I was trying to back up just over 24,000 photos.

Ended up doing it manually for the first 12 thousand, now it's chugging along doing the rest.

I find the image gallery amazing to browse though compared to normal folders.

Although I've not really looked at the other options you can create albums, collages and I would imagine there will be other things coming such as facial recognition.

Albums are the same as folders on your PC, easy enough to set up and use. I would suggest you all try it and see

I don't think they can turn on their facial recognition in the UK/EU due to some EU privacy laws. But other than that their image searching is really good; "skiing photos from 2015" etc.