My pandemic project was to get a hold on my data and preserve it.
I got all my hdd from multiple locations into one spot some as old as 20 years, new hdd, setup freenas on hardware with ecc ram. I extracted everything into fresh RAID.
It was like, 10 tb.
Then, one particularly long weekend alone, I looked over it all, and I started deleting...
I didn't need system backups for hardware I don't even have I didn't need old torrent downloads under 720p, they hurt my eyes tbh I didn't need backups of steam folders I didn't need research and downloads and homework for high school and college
I was down to 6tb
Then I got serious: incomplete seasons, movies that I didn't see myself watching again, non-sentimental files over 10 years old, all the ISOs for software I can't even run in modern windows or have found modern software to replace.
down to 4tb
I put music on one hdd, and everything else (photos and file) I wanted to save, and it came out to 1 tb. I uploaded that archive to a cloud, and a local copy, and a cold storage copy, and I immediately regretted doing everything I did to setup a FreeNAS on purpose built hardware. It wasn't worth all that for 1tb of data. However, now I see that if I hadn't done all that, I wouldn't have everything I wanted to keep in a safe place.
I recently moved and got new hardware, I downloaded that archive and updated it with the new files and pictures I wanted to keep, and reuploaded it. Done, and I don't have data anxiety anymore.
Thanks! I'll def incorporate this