For my late 2012 Mini, with the basic 1TB drive, I have a WD My Passport attached to a USB3 with incremental backups daily via Time Machine. I have a lot of ripped DVD's and music on my HD that I absolutely do not want to do over again. So I just ordered a 1 TB Seagate MyBackup Plus for Mac that I will use with my T-Bolt Go Flex adapter and using SuperDuper, I will make a copy of my hard drive about once every 2 weeks. Overkill? Of course, but it makes me feel good.
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My Backup Plan
- Thread starter jimbo1mcm
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I am not sure I understand the point of having two local backup drives?
If you want have a truly strong backup solution - you should backup at least your most critical data offsite (either cloud based or keep your backup in a separate location). Otherwise, you can still lose your data in an event of a fire or burglary..
If you want have a truly strong backup solution - you should backup at least your most critical data offsite (either cloud based or keep your backup in a separate location). Otherwise, you can still lose your data in an event of a fire or burglary..
Simple - Redundancy. Although i do agree with the rest of ctyriders post, you've obviously made some good steps in setting up a solid backup but you do need some sort of offsite/cloud backup to be completely bomb-proof.
To do this you can keep a hard drive away from your home or you can set yourself up with a cloud backup service. I actually use two cloud backup services just in case one of them doesnt work/goes bust (Crashplan and Backblaze) i would recommend them both as reliable.
The best way to look at backups is never to put all your eggs in one basket, it's better to be over-prepared than not prepared enough. Here is my backup setup:
- Dropbox - Syncs my projects, documents and photo library to 2 other machines.
- Carbon Copy Cloner - creates a bootable usb clone of my boot drive once per week (which contains my dropbox, itunes library file, kindle downloads and Applications)
- Time Machine - runs from a 4 bay Drobo, backs up my boot drive and another external which contains my software iso rips and iTunes media.
- Backblaze and Crashplan - Does continuos cloud backups of everything already mentioned, plus about 5TB of my DVD/Bluray home rips (which are also on disc, but would be easier restoring from the web than reripping stuff)
Hope this gives you some ideas on where to go next
That's a good strategy, assuming you're disciplined enough to swap these drives on a consistent basis. Of course, even then, you still risk losing up to 2 weeks worth of data, in an event of a home disaster (may or may not be a big deal depending on what you do..)
My strategy is fairly simple:
- Nightly incremental backup to 3TB NAS at my house (I use ChronoSync, as I am not a fan of TimeMachine for a variety of reasons)
- Dropbox sync for ~25GB of my critical / irreplaceable files (no, movie rips don't qualify
)Offsite storage, like Backblaze, Crashplan, Carbonite are okay, but how do we know these outfits are going to stay in business? I don't mind paying $5 a month, but more than that, I can buy a new 1TB every 10-12 months. I like to rely on myself rather than a third party we don't know will be around when we need it.
Good point, we don't know these services will be around forever, but on the flip side a locally stored hard drive WILL eventually break down like every other mechanical device. I'm not advising you not to use one, all I'm suggesting is that its unwise to rely on a single solution.
There is no perfect way to backup data and each has drawbacks, all you can do is plan for each possibility of data loss.
Any company can go belly-up... If you follow your logic regarding all backups you wouldn't use an external drive as a backup because eventually it will fail.
I've been using CrashPlan for 2.5 years and the company seems to be going strong. I don't have to mess with keeping external drives offsite and risk losing data that hasn't been backed-up to the offsite location. I plan on renewing my three year subscription (it's the least expensive option).
Here is my backup scenario:
1. Time Machine backing up to a designated partition on an external drive.
2. SuperDuper! for maintaining a cloned volume on a designated partition on an external drive. SuperDuper! at $29 is now a lot cheaper than CarbonCopyCloner since CCC switched from being free to $40. SD! has been problem-free; when I have a question the tech support response is often within minutes.
3. Automatic CrashPlan backups of my Mac and attached external drives. My iTunes music files and Aperture image files reside on an external drive with a second external drive as an onsite backup.
I've been using CrashPlan for 2.5 years and the company seems to be going strong. I don't have to mess with keeping external drives offsite and risk losing data that hasn't been backed-up to the offsite location. I plan on renewing my three year subscription (it's the least expensive option).
Here is my backup scenario:
1. Time Machine backing up to a designated partition on an external drive.
2. SuperDuper! for maintaining a cloned volume on a designated partition on an external drive. SuperDuper! at $29 is now a lot cheaper than CarbonCopyCloner since CCC switched from being free to $40. SD! has been problem-free; when I have a question the tech support response is often within minutes.
3. Automatic CrashPlan backups of my Mac and attached external drives. My iTunes music files and Aperture image files reside on an external drive with a second external drive as an onsite backup.
Yeah, I'm disciplined enough to do it since I had to grit my teeth when I bought 2x1tb Passports purely for backup purposes. I like spending money on tech but spending it on these was like spending on toilet paper, booooring, so I make a point of making good use of them. Still, worth the premium over powered externals for the convenience factor.
As for the 2 week thing, as you say, that'd be terrible for certain people, but in my case my mac is largely a recreational device, not a work tool. The most precious thing on there are photographs, which I've got backed up several times over and in different locations anyway. After any significant event/photo's I make a point of cycling them asap. Equally, I've also got a powered 2tb external which I backup too once every month or so just for extra piece of mind.
Nothing is guaranteed in life, but the probability that something like Dropbox will "go out of business" at the exact moment you need to restore your backup is about zero.
By backing up your critical data into the cloud, you remove the single point of failure that your house ultimately is.
My Backup Plan: Post Script
Had to add one more thing. I had a lightning strike a few years ago that took out everything, tv's, computers, sprinkler systems, garage door openers, etc. So I make sure that my HD clone is physically removed from anything electrical and kept in a safe place. Of course we all know lightning can't hit twice in the same spot, right?
Had to add one more thing. I had a lightning strike a few years ago that took out everything, tv's, computers, sprinkler systems, garage door openers, etc. So I make sure that my HD clone is physically removed from anything electrical and kept in a safe place. Of course we all know lightning can't hit twice in the same spot, right?
Tell that to people like Kyle Goodwin, who had video footage (which he shot himself) on Megaupload, when it was shut down.
Yes, MU may have been a questionable host, and he should have had at least one other copy, but these things do happen.
However, I'll agree that the chances of your house catching fire or being burgled at the same time as your off-site server gets closed down is certainly approaching zero. ;-)