re: Time Machine
No, you're technically correct about that... RAID arrays are not really insurance against data loss, since writing corrupt data to one means a defective backup, period.
The point is, assuming the software is working properly, backups via Time Machine to a NAS using RAID makes it VERY improbable that a hard disk failure will be the source of data loss. Don't forget, even if 2 or 3 drives would fail simultaneously in my NAS, rendering it inoperable? I'd still be just fine as long as I replaced those drives and got it back online before another drive failed inside one of my Macs.
Personally, I've never been a fan of sleep mode, whether it be a PC or a Mac. I've just seen too many issues related to wake from sleep. For example, new HP Elitebook laptops we issued people at my workplace are causing headaches all the time for people with external speakers attached to the docking stations. Apparently, if you take the machine home with you and put it to sleep before bringing it back into work in the morning, when it wakes back up on attaching it to the dock, it doesn't always figure out it has external speakers to use. So audio gets output through the internal laptop speaker until you do a full shutdown/restart.
So yeah, I configure all my Macs at home to never sleep, except for laptops when they're NOT attached to AC wall power.
I've found Time Machine pretty handy *because* it keeps all those previous versions of files, though. I've had several occasions where I was able to use it to bring back a document I created months earlier, before I made "permanent" changes to it, falsely thinking I'd never want the earlier revision again. I agree it has to hurt performance, but I think it's intelligent enough not to take a lot of processor time when a system isn't idle? I know when it kicks on on this machine, I barely notice it -- and I've never noticed a slow-down in gaming I could attribute to it. (Does it postpone running at all when CPU/GPU intensive tasks like games are running? Almost seems like it to me.)
Don't bet on that. The very software in question in this thread, not to mention Apple's own little Mountain Lion "sleep" bug screwed quite a few RAID arrays in the past year, leaving the owners HOSED beyond all recognition. That can't happen with a CCC volume that isn't even attached (and in the Windows world not being attached means no chance of infection). One can always plug a CCC volume in to restore a program that gets hosed without having to restore the entire volume (it just mounts as a regular file drive, after all).
In fact, I personally see no use for Time Machine AT ALL and have never used it even once. Why would I need 50 copies of the same program? Why on earth would I need backups every single hour for the rest of my life? That's got to affect system performance in a negative way. You could NEVER play an intense game since it's going to be constantly backing up. That alone is why I never used it. There are NO controls to set backup times to when you're not using the computer, etc. It's just awful. It's for people that don't know how to work something like CCC on their own. But then I have to wonder if those same people will be able to restore something when it goes wrong since it's much simpler to backup with Time Machine than to restore.
CCC does have options to archive older files and you can schedule it (at your leisure, not Apple's) to backup as often as you want if you prefer to keep a backup drive connected. I simply see no advantage to Time Machine other than it's automatic for people that don't know how to use a computer.
I've had my PPC machine get hosed before with an error that made it unbootable. I just calmly booted off my external CCC backup and then copied back to the internal with CCC and then rebooted and removed the external drive. It was simplicity in itself and had no lengthy re-install OS times + restore. It just copied itself and i was done and back where I left off on the last backup. Yeah, you could lose stuff if you don't backup very often, but that's a scheduling issue not an application issue.
