Historian™ is a powerful desktop program that helps you organize, edit, and protect your photo memories within a secure cabinet (or "vault" if using Historian 4). While Historian keeps your memories safe during regular use, a solid backup plan is essential in case of hardware failure, theft, or as an extra protection when transferring to a new computer.
💡 Why Backup Matters
Your photos are irreplaceable. If your hard drive crashes or your computer is lost, everything in your Historian cabinet could be gone—unless you’ve backed it up. Experts recommend following the 3-2-1 Backup Rule:
✅ 3 copies of your important files
✅ 2 different formats
✅ 1 stored off-site (e.g., upload to the cloud or keep an external drive at a different location)
⚠️ Important: Your backups must be stored on a different drive than your main Historian cabinet.
- If your cabinet is on your computer, store backups on an external drive.
- A second internal drive in the same computer is not a secure backup.
📋 Backup Options Overview
Below is a list of available backup options, with pros and cons to help you decide what combination works best for you. This includes:
🔁 Shadow Copy (Automatic Backup)
💾 Full Backup (Manual Snapshot)
🧩 Incremental Backup (Changes Only)
☁️ Cloud Backup (Third-Party Services)
🏛️ FOREVER® Permanent Storage
Remember, you don’t need to choose between backup methods – you should choose several different methods!
🔁 Shadow Copy (Automatic Backup)
A Shadow Copy is a mirrored version of your Historian cabinet that updates every time your cabinet closes to give an accurate recount of your current working media library.
🔗 Learn how to set up or reconnect a Shadow Copy
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✔️ Pros:
- Automatic – no manual work once set up
- Runs in the background
- Exact duplicate of your cabinet
- Easy to restore
- Historian warns you if Shadow Copy is outdated
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❌ Cons:
- Must be connected to your computer
- Vulnerable to the same disasters (fire, theft, malware)
- Requires an external hard drive
- If disconnected, the Shadow Copy stops and must be restarted
- Deleted files in Historian will also be deleted in the Shadow Copy
💾 Full Backup (Manual Snapshot)
A Full Backup saves your entire cabinet at a specific point in time.
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✔️ Pros:
- Exact copy of your cabinet in that moment
- You can create multiple backups for the ability to recover from earlier versions
- Historian tracks backup status and warn you when it's been a while
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❌ Cons:
- Manual process – easy to forget
- Takes time to complete, as your cabinet gets fuller the time will also increase
- Requires large storage space for each backup
🧩 Incremental Backup (Changes Only)
An Incremental Backup only saves changes since your last incremental backup, saving time and space.
🔗 Learn how to create or reset an Incremental Backup
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✔️ Pros:
- Faster than Full Backup
- Uses less storage space for more backups
- Ideal for regular updates
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❌ Cons:
- Manual process – must be done regularly
- Slower to restore, as multiple steps are needed
- Still time-consuming for large collections
☁️ Cloud Backup (Third-Party Services)
Cloud backup services such as Backblaze, Carbonite, or Crashplan protect your files by uploading them to secure servers.
⚠️ Warning: This does not include sharing services like Dropbox, OneDrive, Facebook, etc. – those are for sharing, not secure backup.
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✔️ Pros:
- Automatic once configured
- Usually a low cost
- Runs silently in the background
- Can back up your entire computer, beyond Historian memories
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❌ Cons:
- Requires internet access
- Ongoing subscription cost
- If the cloud provider fails, data may be lost
- Potential risk of security breaches
- May slow down or interfere with other software (e.g., Artisan®) unless paused
🏛️ FOREVER® Permanent Storage
FOREVER is the only service offering guaranteed long-term storage of your most valuable memories, with seamless integration with Historian.
🔗 Get started with your Permanent Storage
🔗 Learn how to back up your Historian memories through Valet
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✔️ Pros:
- Long-term digital preservation with the FOREVER® Guarantee
- Secure and backed by a financial fund
- Keeps edited image info intact
- Direct upload/download to and from Historian
- Upload everything through Valet to keep your organization
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❌ Cons:
- Requires purchase of storage
- Internet required for access
- Not an automatic backup method
📝 Final Reminders
- No single backup method is enough, use multiple strategies to protect your memories.
- Back up regularly – set a calendar reminder if needed.
- Store at least one backup off-site as a redundancy for peace of mind.
🛑 Computers fail. Drives crash. Websites go offline. The only way to truly protect your photos is to back them up often, in multiple places, and with care.