Advice on added backup security

[TheDane]

Hi all,

I need an advice for a backup option.

The current setup i have is the following:

- iMac with iTunes and Aperture (these 2 are app 200GB)
- iMac is backed up via Time Capsule 1TB
- Time Capsule has 3TB WD MyBook attached to hold movies, executables, some ISO's etc…

Now - i want to have more security around my Music, Aperture - and with personal documents it is around 300GB. TC can be good - but not when it becomes crucial (theft, fire, etc).

More security for me means, an external place (physically) to store these data. The only two options i see are:

- Onlline backup ($$$ - pricy (and slow))
- Extra external disk to copy to - lets say every month, and take it to my drawer at work….
- is there are 3rd option for me?

With a risk based approach I recognized that loosing the movies are not fatal (although extremely annoying).

Loosing all my music and obviously all pictures and personal documents would be fatal though.

What do you think - just buy an 1TB external disk for the Office drawer? What would you do?

Thanks!

 

[kylera]

One thing for sure is that no matter how many options you use, you can never completely eliminate the risk. You can minimize it, but there will still be something that CAN (not always will) go wrong.

Having said that, an additional external wouldn't be a bad idea. Personally, I have two hard drives set up to RAID 1 which means that one hard drive is completely mirrored by another one, and when I copy or delete stuff, the other hard drive is automatically modified. Even in my situation, if both my hard drives crap out, **** hits the fan. It's improbable, but not impossible.

Not trying to discourage you, but I just want to make sure you're aware.

 

[throAU]

The cheapest way is as you suggest just to get another (ideally TWO) external drive(s) for critical data and keep it off-site.

Backup weekly to these, and rotate so you have one off-site and one on-site (in case the building burns down while your backup is running overnight - backing up that much data will take a while).

RAID is not a backup - it provides fault tolerance only.

If you have an application error, operator error, or theft/destruction of your devices, it will not help.

Off-site backup is the way to go - if you can't afford two externals of required size, maybe go smaller and only back up the data that you would REALLY be screwed if you were to lose (financial/tax info, security certificates, etc - and perhaps data you have created yourself like home movies, personal photos, etc) in your off-site backup.

Losing your media library if your house burnt down would suck, but they can be re-downloaded (or claimed on insurance, seeing as you bought them, right? ) - losing data that you can not re-create or retrieve from somewhere else is another story entirely.

 

[willieva]

A third option would be to have a drive offsite and do something like rsync to it. You could do an initial copy locally then take the drive to the remote location and keep it updated via rsync.

I use superduper to a local drive. Every so often that drive gets swapped with one I keep offsite. Worst case scenario would be fire or theft which could lose me a few weeks worth of stuff. Not a big deal in my life.

How current your offsite backup is will be based on how important your data is to you, and how often it changes.

 

[TheDane]

Thanks for your replies.

I think I will go with just one external - having it at the office. It should not take that long to update that with a sync tool of some sort like Carbon Copy. If I understand it correctly, the reason for the suggested 2 external drives, were the copy time, right?

 

[LadySelene]

Qyusetion about Backing up

God Evevning,
I have my Time Cap. plus I just got a WD 6TB duel w/cloud access. I also have Carbonite, I did my initial backup, now I would like to restore my MacBook and upgrade it. I have a lot of Photographs that I can't loose. What are your suggestions? Do you think I'm safe enough to restore & upgrade?
Thank you for your assistance
LadySelene