Best way to have password protected backup on external HD?

[benmadrid]

Hi,

I have a full back up of my macbook on an external hard drive using SuperDuper!

If anyone stole this they would get all my data. I would really like to have an incremental backup solution that was totally password protected.

I use Mozy for an online version of this, but really want a home hard disk protected back up too. Any ideas on the best solution?

 

[super_kev]

Create a password-protected .dmg on your external drive, than use Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper to backup your HD to that .dmg.

 

[blodwyn]

Create a password-protected .dmg on your external drive, than use Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper to backup your HD to that .dmg.

Agreed, but make it a sparseimage

 

[benmadrid]

Thanks. Does that mean that I have to make a complete backup every time, rather than just a top up, and what is a sparseimage?

 

[blodwyn]

Thanks. Does that mean that I have to make a complete backup every time, rather than just a top up, and what is a sparseimage?

With a disk image .dmg, you specify the size you want and it always occupies that much space regardless of whether or not it's full or empty. If you create it as a sparseimage, you specify the maximum size you want it to be, but the actual sparseimage only occupies as much space as the contents take up. So it grows towards the maximum size as you fill it.

With either, you create them using the Disk Utility, and select which type you want from the drop down options.

I don't use CCC, so I can't comment on doing incremental backups with that, but with the paid-for SuperDuper version, you can specify a smart update, so only the changed files get updated when you run it. SuperDuper will automatically mount the disk image or sparseimage when you run it.

Your other option instead of full backups, is to backup and sync specific files and folders with a sync application like Chronosync. This would also work with either disk images or sparseimages as the destination.