Is there any such thing as “Overkill” when it comes to storage?

In an on-line conversation earlier this week someone was asking advice about his own server needs; he’s a videographer and needs a lot of storage space. He was thinking about getting a NAS (Network Attached Server) with 8 or 16 Bays and a couple dozen HD’s for future use…

Another participant said that was “overkill.” I disagreed, respectfully.

Nobody knows your needs and budget more than you do. I have a slight clue because of my own line of work and interests but in the end you have to do what’s best for yourself. When it comes to audio and visual media there is no such thing as having too much storage. My advice is to buy a server with hot-swap bays and load up on hard-drives while you can. You can buy multi-terabyte drives for how much these days?

And if this is all for work and your career, how much of this expense can you deduct from your taxes?

Every graphic designer I know have gigabytes or even terabytes of files that include half-finished projects, pictures, tutorials saved from other websites and let’s not forget to mention our music collections. It’s a sad fact that 100% of all hard drives are going to fail someday and it would be tragic if anyone lost any data when the inevitable occurs. You can save your data on an off-site storage provider but there is nothing better than instant access via your own system.

You never known when you’re going to be in a pinch and be able to pull some half finished project out of your past and get some work done faster because you didn’t have to start from scratch.