Yes, this is another rant thread.But thanks to Jeff Bezos and co, I haven't just lost on years of memories on DPReview, but also all the benefits I received from Amazon Drive.Amazon Drive allowed unlimited photo storage for all Prime members. That included RAW files, which made it the default home for all my photography storage ever since I started taking photos (which was, ironically, which a Panasonic compact that I purchased after discovering DPR and extensive review here).I would often take 5000+ photos on a longer outing, so it made little sense to store it all offline (cost of hard drives). I kept all the important vacation photos as local copies but all the rest (most of my 'practice' photos) went to Amazon Drive.Well, last year Amazon announced that Drive will be shut down in 2023. I have been downloading RAW files as time allows between work and family life. Amazon has made it harder (and infuriating) by placing a 1000 photo / 5 GB limit per download. 🤬After many months, I'm still not done. I've had to purchase a Dropbox subscription and extra hard drives to find space for all those terabytes. This time, I'm keeping local copies of everything. But I want cloud backup just in case I lose the local files for some reason.Once all that is done, I will be canceling my Prime subscription. Drive was my reason for keeping it and I would rather buy stuff locally or on EBay anyway. I've never purchased any photography stuff on Amazon except for lens hoods / caps etc. Too much risk of fraud.So great job, Amazon. You've wasted so much of my time and caused so much heartache that I will never buy another thing from you. Nor will I have any financial incentive to. 🤬Dear friends:I bought my first camera thanks to DPR, long before it was owned by Amazon. I have used it since for research - mostly the forums, which have been a wealth of information. I learned so much about photography and M43, which is the format that I fell in love with. When I knew enough, I made sure to contribute to this forum to share advice with other members as a way of paying back this community.I am also on Mu-43.com, FredMiranda and BCGForums. My username is faunagraphy everywhere.I tried joining the new forum (cameradiscussion) but apparently I'm a known spammer.I believe it's because I use VPN and I'll have to contact an admin to sort that out.Anyway, I use Mu-43 most frequently and I recommend it. The community is nice and welcoming. Although they probably would not appreciate the contentious, high-octane discussions that are sure to transplant there from this forum.Thank you all for the lovely memories!

I did not hear this from AmazonI use Amazon photo for "unlimited" photo storage. It's where i put the jpgs i upload to social media and send links to friends who don't do social.I have Amazon drive but i haven't loaded my raw files, i use another paid cloud service.However, i remember when I was not willing to spend $$ to join Prime, it was the promise of unlimited photo storage that swayed me to join. Granted, while most Prime members don't even know about this, it's a case of "bait and switch.". I don't blame you for de-Amazoning.

Huh, I hadn't heard about this... Seems they're closing it to focus on Amazon Photos (which I hadn't heard about either), kinda odd given how heavily they'd promoted it as a Prime perk for years. I'd intended to use it as a cloud backup solution for RAWs for years now but had never gotten around to uploading more than a handful of folders, glad I didn't waste my time ugh.Guess I'll be paying extra for some Dropbox or Google Drive space in the near future, just as well, they've got better apps and search. Between this and the DPR debacle Amazon has managed to alienate me pretty heavily, it's hard to ignore them as a store but I was about to add several smart cameras to my home and now they'll be anythingbutAlexa/Ring devices.

I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model.  I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBs

lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsI looked at Pcloud briefly but not in depth. Why did you choose it over Google Drive or Dropbox? There's still time for me to switch cloud storage and I'd like to do it right this time. Thanks!

a photo hoarder that put all his 🥚🥚🥚 in one  🧺  commonly  known as a 🧺🧳

What’s wrong with Amazon Photos ?If you have a Prime account then you should get unlimited raw photo storage.I’d certainly be using it if they offered the unlimited storage in my country - we only get 5GBPeter

I think it cost less but don't remember the calculations. I also remember uploading raw files in the free /introductory versions of a few services and some did not offer raw previews in their apps.  I figured if I have emergency need for specific files I want a preview. They have kept up raw support.You'd have to do your own comparison, i have been happy with PCloud, at some point I bought more space If they don't offer the amount you need on the website, you can message them & get quote. I opted for the "one payment" for life deal.

Messier Object wrote:What’s wrong with Amazon Photos ?If you have a Prime account then you should get unlimited raw photo storage.I’d certainly be using it if they offered the unlimited storage in my country - we only get 5GBPeterFor one, you cannot create folders or subfolders in Amazon Photos. You can only have photo albums. What that means is that all photos are in one "heap" once uploaded, and you have to select them to create albums. You cannot make Amazon Photos albums if a folder on Amazon Drive has subfolders, and you cannot make albums from any subfolder at all.So for example, I have a folder called "2022 birds" with 80+ subfolders for birds that I photographed last year. And I won't be able to create albums from any of them. I'll have to move each of them individually to a 'top level' location, then create 80+ albums with names like '2022 Birds - American Goldfinch' and so on.But above all, it's been a breach of trust on part of Amazon and I do not want to trust my hard work and memories with a company that can change their service offerings and TOS and leave you stranded.

Amazon been going down hill for sometime. Let ignore the treatment of their staff but this is the main reason why I try to avoid using Amazon.Their search engine is often rubbish and half of the items are not what I requested in my search. Some of them are sponsors but the rest were not and this make it incredibly difficult finding stuff I want. I even bought a chain with two hooks, only to turn out it for a toy car.Since their website is mostly garbage, I now use other retailers most of the time.As for DPreview shutting down. For me it's another example of either corporate greed or hiring useless people. For example Amazon paid a billion dollars for a single season of Ring Of Power, which not only ignored pretty much the source material but also nothing really happened in season 1. Which beg the question how did each episode cost 120 million dollars each? Now Dpreview is paying the price of miss management. After all, the chap who did House of The Dragon for HBO, originally did Conan for Amazon but it was scraped for more female centric canasta and hence why we got Ring of Power and the excellent House of the Dragon.Like I said you got famous pop culture franchises being miss handled by talentless writers/producers and being run to the ground. Best example is Star Wars. You have computer games now basing their games around gambling mechanics and live services so they no longer fun to play. It just one thing after another.

lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsUnfortunately pCloud does not render the .orf thumbnails from the OM1…(yet?)

isn't all off line storage a risk, a risk worth taking maybe but a risk never the less.

faunagraphy wrote:lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsI looked at Pcloud briefly but not in depth. Why did you choose it over Google Drive or Dropbox? There's still time for me to switch cloud storage and I'd like to do it right this time. Thanks!My question would be .. why online? And why Google or Amazon? Why?Always asking my friend and relatives to NOT put photos of my family on these sites .. Why would you give them access to your treasured personal pictures? WHY?!?

C Sean wrote:Amazon been going down hill for sometime. Let ignore the treatment of their staff but this is the main reason why I try to avoid using Amazon.Their search engine is often rubbish and half of the items are not what I requested in my search. Some of them are sponsors but the rest were not and this make it incredibly difficult finding stuff I want. I even bought a chain with two hooks, only to turn out it for a toy car.Since their website is mostly garbage, I now use other retailers most of the time.As for DPreview shutting down. For me it's another example of either corporate greed or hiring useless people. For example Amazon paid a billion dollars for a single season of Ring Of Power, which not only ignored pretty much the source material but also nothing really happened in season 1. Which beg the question how did each episode cost 120 million dollars each? Now Dpreview is paying the price of miss management. After all, the chap who did House of The Dragon for HBO, originally did Conan for Amazon but it was scraped for more female centric canasta and hence why we got Ring of Power and the excellent House of the Dragon.Like I said you got famous pop culture franchises being miss handled by talentless writers/producers and being run to the ground. Best example is Star Wars. You have computer games now basing their games around gambling mechanics and live services so they no longer fun to play. It just one thing after another.The Ring of Power was vile. I stopped watching it after 3 episodes for sake of my own sanity. Awful, just awful. Unwatchable even as a bad comedy.Disney has been doing something similar with Star Wars, using a franchise and culture that they do not understand to push a corporate agenda and sanctimonious messages that they thought would gain them a bigger and more loyal fanbase. That blew up in their faces and angered lifelong fans (like me).The projects that Disney management has been hands-off have done well. The Mandalorian is great - it's fan service but fan service done right, and honors all the original nerdy source material, from The Clone Wars to older Star Wars literature. Not surprisingly, the least hyped show is by far the best one - Andor. If you haven't seen Andor yet, I highly, highly recommend it. I was shocked at how good it is. The first couple of episodes are a bit slow but if you stick with it, you'll be impressed. It's what Star Wars always should have been. Many haven't bothered watching it after the disappointment of Boba Fett and Obi Wan Kenobi but it's amazing.

gaul wrote:faunagraphy wrote:lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsI looked at Pcloud briefly but not in depth. Why did you choose it over Google Drive or Dropbox? There's still time for me to switch cloud storage and I'd like to do it right this time. Thanks!My question would be .. why online? And why Google or Amazon? Why?Always asking my friend and relatives to NOT put photos of my family on these sites .. Why would you give them access to your treasured personal pictures? WHY?!?A single hard drive can crash and you'd lose years of photos. Multiple backups stored in your house can be lost if the house burns down or if there's a bad storm or earthquake or similar such disaster.Also, when I started photography, storage was expensive and the smaller 64 GB or 125 GB hard drives would have quickly filled up. High capacity drives are cheaper now so that isn't as much of a concern.Amazon Drive offered the convenience of having unlimited free storage while paying a small monthly fee that offered 2-day shipping for all sorts of things. I agree with your point about privacy - same reason I do not store my photos on Google and once they're removed from Amazon, they won't be going back to any provider that isn't a dedicated cloud storage company.I'm also considering buying a high capacity drive (say, 5 - 10 TB) and Backblaze which costs $70 per year. Backblaze isn't like Dropbox or Amazon Drive, in that you cannot easily view and manipulate files online, but it is a backup option that you can use if your local drives fail.

gaul wrote:faunagraphy wrote:lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsI looked at Pcloud briefly but not in depth. Why did you choose it over Google Drive or Dropbox? There's still time for me to switch cloud storage and I'd like to do it right this time. Thanks!My question would be .. why online? And why Google or Amazon? Why?Always asking my friend and relatives to NOT put photos of my family on these sites .. Why would you give them access to your treasured personal pictures? WHY?!?In my case, I like to have off site backups and a cloud service is more convenient than schlepping a hard drive back and forth and managing the backup manually. I'm not overly concerned with the privacy side or whatever but I'm only 40 so probably just a different mindset. If Dropbox isn't much more expensive than Google Drive I might go with them (for RAW backup), tho I still upload JPEGs to Google Photos for the indexing/search.Heck if Amazon Photos isn't completely horrible I might still try it, since I'm already paying for Prime (unavoidable really given the dearth of many kinds of stores where I live and the shipping costs from other alternatives), but I'm less inclined to do so after all they've pulled lately. Backing something online shouldn't mean instant public access, tho security breaches can always happen, same way anyone can break into my home.

Nothing in the world is for free.

rienm wrote:lescrane wrote:I did extensive research and wound up using a Swiss company called PCloud. The interface renders most RAW file thumbnails, reasonable pricing with the one payment model. I have Google and Dropbox also but not for multiple TBsUnfortunately pCloud does not render the .orf thumbnails from the OM1…(yet?)You are 100% correct. I check to see that my designated folders are syncing but didn't see the lack of thumbnails

Your story is very sad, but Amazon is not going to account for our individual likes and dislikes. The decision to shut down DPR was probably made by someone that doesn't know the difference between a lens and a speedlight.

absoluutbeginner wrote:Nothing in the world is for free.If it is free, it won't be for long.