What are the advantages of different storage devices?
  Photo files take up computer file space in a hurry. Plus, you will want to keep back-up copies for peace of mind, remove files to take to another location, and even keep certain files stored separately. There are several storage devices important to photographers:

  Hard drives. Hard drives offer a lot of storage for the money. You can buy very large hard drives (multiple gigabytes) quite cheaply. Most computers have the space and wiring to allow for another hard drive. They are not hard to install, however, they do require you to open the computer case, which not everyone is comfortable doing. You can have most electronics stores install them for you. Hard drives give you fast, convenient, high levels of storage, but they are not removable.

  Removable disks. Zip drives offer 100-250 MB of easy to use, convenient storage that can be removed and taken to another computer or a photo lab. Almost all labs will accept Zips. Other popular media for taking images from one place to another include flash media, like keychain USB drives, and portable hard drives.

  CDs. CD’s are inexpensive storage media with capacities of 660 MB. They are more permanent than magnetic media (Zips, hard drives, etc.) and are expected to last 30-50 years (unlike magnetic media which may fade in 8-10 years). They are easily read by most computers. They are less flexible than magnetic media (you can’t read an image from one, work on it, then record it back onto the same disk). CD-R disks are writable CD’s, meaning you can write data to them once and that is all. CD-RW disks are rewritable, meaning you can write data to them, erase the data, and write again. CD-R drives handle only CD-R disks, while CD-RW drives can do both. 

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