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How I Cut My Cloud Storage Bill From $240/Year to $10/Year

#selfhosted #cloud #tutorial #lifetime

How I Cut My Cloud Storage Bill From $240/Year to $10/Year

Two years ago, I was paying for three cloud storage services at once. Today, I pay $10/year for one domain, and everything else runs on hardware I own. This is the step-by-step story of how I got here, what went wrong, and what I'd recommend.

The 2024 peak: $240/year on cloud storage

I had:

  • Dropbox Plus ($120/year, 2 TB) — for daily work files
  • iCloud+ ($36/year, 200 GB) — for iPhone photos
  • Backblaze Personal ($99/year, unlimited) — for backups

Total: $255/year. And the worst part? I was running out of space — Dropbox wanted me to upgrade to 3 TB for another $20/year, iCloud was constantly nagging me about being full, and Backblaze was uploading at 4 MB/s over my home connection.

Step 1: cancel iCloud, switch to phone-direct Nextcloud

iCloud's 200 GB was always too small because of Live Photos (each Live Photo is ~3 MB, so 1000 photos = 3 GB, and I take a lot of photos). Switching to Nextcloud with the official iOS app was straightforward:

  • Open the iOS Nextcloud app
  • Settings → Auto Upload → enable for Camera Roll
  • Choose "keep on device" for favorites only

After 3 months I had 47 GB of photos on my Nextcloud, all viewable in the iOS Photos app via the native share sheet. Saved $36/year.

Step 2: cancel Dropbox, move work files to WebDAV mount

This was the harder one. I had 10 years of work files in Dropbox and was deeply integrated with the Dropbox desktop client. The migration:

  1. Set up Nextcloud on my server (Ubuntu 24.04, Nextcloud Hub 9 in Docker)
  2. Set up ScsDriver to mount it as a Windows drive letter (Z:)
  3. rsync the entire Dropbox folder from ~/Dropbox to the Z: drive over 2 nights (~400 GB)
  4. Disable the Dropbox desktop client
  5. Use Z:\work\... paths in all my scripts

The ScsDriver WebDAV mount is the missing piece. Without it, the Nextcloud desktop client syncs one folder at a time, can't be remapped to existing paths, and is slow. With ScsDriver, the entire Nextcloud is just a drive letter.

Saved $120/year.

Step 3: cancel Backblaze, do real 3-2-1 backups

Backblaze was uploading my entire machine continuously, which meant my home internet was constantly saturated. The replacement: proper 3-2-1 backups.

  • Primary copy: on my home server (RAID 1, 16 TB)
  • Secondary copy: rsync nightly to a friend's house (8 TB external drive he keeps plugged in)
  • Tertiary copy: encrypted Backblaze B2 of just the truly critical stuff (financial documents, photos) — about 50 GB, costs $0.50/month

The 3-2-1 setup took one weekend and has been running for 18 months without drama.

Saved $93/year.

What I run now (annual cost)

Item Cost / year
Domain (scsoi.com equivalent, any TLD) $10
Backblaze B2 (50 GB critical stuff) $6
Home server electricity (25W × 24h × 365) $25
Total $41/year

That's a saving of $214/year vs the 2024 setup. And I have 16 TB of usable storage, which is 8x what I had with Dropbox Plus.

What I'd recommend for someone starting from zero

  1. If you have < 200 GB of data and a Mac, just keep iCloud+ ($36/year). Don't self-host.
  2. If you have 200 GB - 2 TB and you're a power user, self-host Nextcloud on a $200 mini PC. Use ScsDriver to mount on Windows.
  3. If you have > 2 TB, definitely self-host. $200 hardware + $10/year domain is unbeatable.
  4. If you have > 10 TB, you're probably already doing this — but the ScsDriver mount trick is the productivity multiplier that most setups miss.

The ScsDriver piece in detail

I keep mentioning ScsDriver because it's the part that most self-hosted cloud guides skip. Without a proper mount, the workflow is:

  • Open Nextcloud web UI → click file → edit → save → re-upload

With ScsDriver:

  • Click file in Windows Explorer → edit in any app → save → automatic

That second workflow is the same as Dropbox. It is what makes self-hosted cloud actually usable on Windows.

Pricing (overseas)

  • $1.5 / month
  • $5.5 / year
  • $5.5 lifetime (limited-time, was $9.99)

CN users: the lifetime price in China is ¥20, separately listed on the official site.

What I would NOT recommend

  • Syncthing only (without a mount). Syncthing is great, but you still have to set up a NAS at the other end.
  • Renting a dedicated server ($50+/month). At that price you're paying for someone else's hardware, and you might as well use Dropbox.
  • Using only the Nextcloud desktop client (without ScsDriver). The Nextcloud client is reliable but slow and clunky on Windows.

FAQ

Q: Is $10/year really all you pay for storage?
A: Yes. $10 for the domain, $6 for Backblaze B2 of 50 GB, $25 for electricity. The hardware ($200) was a one-time cost.

Q: What happens when the server dies?
A: RAID 1 means one disk can fail and I keep going. If the motherboard dies, I move the disks to a new box and import the ZFS pool (or mergerfs in my case).

Q: Is your data safer than on Dropbox?
A: Different tradeoff. On Dropbox, my data is on someone else's redundant infrastructure. On my setup, my data is in my house, but I have 3 copies. Both approaches are reasonable.

Q: Can I do this on a laptop?
A: Not really — you need something that's on 24/7. A mini PC or used desktop is the right form factor.

Disclaimer: I run all this on my own hardware. The ScsDriver link above is the public pricing page.

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