Backup Questions

[maxvamp]

I was wondering what Backup apps people have used with OS X, and their satisfaction levels with them, AND how people are backing up databases such as MySQL, SQLite, Oracle, etc.

Max.

P.S. This might be a good topic for a Mac Admin group. Moderators, is there any such group here?

Max.

[grapes911]

I use Carbon Copy Cloner to make a full bootable backup of my entire hard drive. Not a single bit gets left unturned (including Oracle).

[mklos]

For my backup, I use .mac's program called Backup 3.1. Its only for .mac members ($99/yr). It works really well. It has scheduled backups and many other features. You can back it up to an iDisk, external HD, 2nd HD or any other place you would want to back it up to. You can also select the files you want to backup as well.

There is also some other programs as well. Carbon Copy Cloner will copy everything and I'm not sure if you want to copy everything every time you backup.

If you're looking for a heavy duty backup program there are things like Retrospect by Dantz. If you do a google search for OS X backup programs you will get a list of them.

[maxvamp]

I use Carbon Copy Cloner to make a full bootable backup of my entire hard drive. Not a single bit gets left unturned (including Oracle).


This does not seem like a good daily solution.

Max.

[maxvamp]

I was wondering if there was something good for Small to Medium businesses.

I have used retrospect, and to be honest, I was not impressed with it before EMC bought it, and less so afterwards.

Thanks all for the ideas however.....

Max.

[Mr.Texor]

depending on what you want, you might be able to use rsync to back up stuff.. I use it to back up both my local computers and servers.

rsync comes with macs, but usually is used thru the console. So, it might be a little scary

[maxvamp]

It definitely sounds like there may be a gap in this software space.

Max.

[brop52]

I've heard about Synchronize X Pro:

http://www.qdea.com/pages/pages-sprox/sprox1_vtbnr.html

No idea if it's any good. Native on intel, runs on Tiger and Panther. Bootable backups. Free 7 day trial. Updates only changed files. It's $100 and makes new versions/upgrades free for 2 years. After that it's $50 for another 2 years of upgrades.

[furious]

SuperDuper (http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/22126)

[socks]

depending on what you want, you might be able to use rsync to back up stuff.. I use it to back up both my local computers and servers.

rsync comes with macs, but usually is used thru the console. So, it might be a little scary

rsync gets my vote. I use it to create a mirror of my home folder, then I can just run it to update the latest files to the backup drive.

Those frightened by the terminal, http://archive.macosxlabs.org/rsyncx/intro.html is a GUI version that'll help you use rsync.

[grapes911]

This does not seem like a good daily solution.

Max.

I do it on a weekly (sometimes even biweekly) basis. My data is not important enough to get upset about loosing a few days of work.

[hayduke]

This does not seem like a good daily solution.

Max.

It is, in fact, an excellent solution. CCC takes 1-3 hours to run depending on drive size, so best to run it at night. If you are talking about backing-up an enterprise system then this probably isn't the best forum. CCC is great for bootable copies. IMHO SuperDuper is better and also creates a bootable volume. You can schedule it to do a "smart" back-up which takes ~20 minutes for my 750GB drives (~400GB data).

Maybe you can be more specific about your needs. There are dozens of solutions, each with its own caveats. If you read various reviews on-line however, you be hard pressed to find a fault with SuperDuper.

[slooksterPSV]

For MySQL try this: http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/15874

As for Oracle & SQLite... I'll try to find a solution for those.

[savesteve]

SuperDuper (http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/22126)

I'm another vote for SD :). I have it clone the boot volume of my Mac Pro to an image file on another internal drive.

[joshysquashy]

super duper is great.

first time you run it, it copies the entire disk to an external hd (you can even boot from it!)

then, every time after, you can have it only copy new/changed files across, so it remains up to date, but only takes like 5 mins to backup!

[Grampa Joe]

I bought SD. I set it to backup every night at 9:30. I put my iMac G5 to sleep before this. I can't see that SD has done a backup. Am I doing something wrong?

[hayduke]

I bought SD. I set it to backup every night at 9:30. I put my iMac G5 to sleep before this. I can't see that SD has done a backup. Am I doing something wrong?

Yup. A sleeping machine won't run processes. You could set your machine to back-up and then sleep after 30 minutes. That is, start the back-up process and set the Energy Savings panel to sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity. You can also probably launch a post-flight that will put the machine to sleep, but I'm not sure how to do that.

[tuqqer]

Another fan of SuperDuper. One of the frustrating things of many backup apps is their lack of a clear interface: you often don't know if what is being done is what you're trying to do. SD spells each step out very clearly. I set my G5 tower to come on at 4am, SD starts up and backs up to a second drive in the G5. I also back up to DVDs that are out of the office, twice a month.

[jeremy.king]

It definitely sounds like there may be a gap in this software space.

Max.


Apple recommends a few enterprise scale solutions under the Sys Admin section of the Apple Server Resources page.

http://www.apple.com/server/resources/#k

[maxvamp]

Apple recommends a few enterprise scale solutions under the Sys Admin section of the Apple Server Resources page.

http://www.apple.com/server/resources/#k

MONDO COOL!!!!

Thx.

Max.