[Leica] Storage options: Amazon Simple Storage Services

[dlridings at gmail.com (Daniel Ridings)]

On Thu, Dec 3, 2009 at 9:23 PM, Tina Manley <images at comporium.net> wrote:
> ?The SmugMug vault through Amazon costs 22 cents
> per gigabyte per month, plus 30 per gigabyte data transfer in, and 51 cents
> per gigabyte data transfer out, plus a $1 per month service charge. ?I'm
> afraid that would add up in a hurry.
>

I don't go through anyone else, but have an account with Amazon
directly. It's not free, but neither are local disks (and backups of
local disks, kept off-site) :-)

> About your switch to Mac - I'm considering the same thing. ?Other than keys
> being in the wrong place, have you found any other stumbling blocks with 
> the
> Mac? ?Is it more stable than your old Windows machine? ?That's all I'm
> interested in - stability. ?I want to turn it on and have it work.

It's stable, no doubt about that. But my Windows XP machine was very
stable too, so I can't say it's more stable. That one command-key to
the right of the space bar is absolutely terrible for those of us who
need the alt-key for various international characters, but I'm sure
super-glue will do the trick.

In all seriousness, the only stumbling block I have run into is that
there is no good bookkeeping program for the Mac. There are some
programs, but they're pretty low-class. They're more interested in
bells and whistles and "user friendliness" (and bookkeeping is not
user friendly since you have to get your mind wrapped around
debit/credit ... someone from the LUG helped me out on those terms)
... user friendly, yes, but I want a program that is IRS-friendly.
Push the button and get my tax-forms printed. My PC-program does that.

Otherwise, I don't miss the PC at all. Since you have so many files,
you might find it worth your while to do some things on the
command-line. The Mac now has a very, very competent command-line.

Frankly, there's not much of a difference. I run Lightroom exactly the
same way I ran Lightroom on the PC. I use Open Office on both of them
so I didn't have to learn new office programs. I have Firefox on the
Mac, but Safari is pretty nice and I use it most of the time. It's
kind of like Chrome for the PC. Mac starts faster than my XP machine
did, a _lot_ faster.

No disadvantages at all. Not a hell'uv'a'lot of advantages either, for
a normal user. I greatly appreciate the command-line, but I'll admit
to being on the fringe in that case.

I'm not real comfortable with installing and uninstalling programs.
Deep down in my heart I know you can't just throw things into the
trash-can to unistall them. So I make sure I only install what I
really want.

Now when I say "Windows", I mean XP (even Windows 2000), but not
Vista. Vista is a virus. Windows 7, from what I understand, is back on
track and is good.

Daniel