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Home backup solution for 2-3 macs

C

CtotheP

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 15, 2011
149
18
Silicon Valley
So I read a bunch of posts on the board, so I did use the Search functionality before posting :) I have a Mac Mini, Mac Book Air, Hackintosh, and multiple iOS devices. I'm looking for a centralized backup solution that they can all use Time Machine (OS X machines) to backup.

I've read a ton about Synology, I also realize just purchasing External drives is an option. With remote access and constant streaming becoming more and more of a need, I thought some sort of entry-level NAS would suffice.

Does anyone have a recommendation of something other than Synology, or should I start there?
 
Or Netgear perhaps....

How many Terabytes are you looking for? that may help folks give you suggestions.
 
It depends on how much you're willing to spend vs how many disaster scenarios you want to protect against. The more you protect against, the more it costs.

A simple solution is to add a big external drive or array to the Mini and use it as the destination for all the other devices. Just add the server app for $20 and it works smoothly. However a fire or theft could take out both the computer and the backup.

If you have the bandwidth, an online service like CrashPlan is valuable. More expensive but a good off-site solution.
 
The number of Macs does not directly indicate the storage needs. How large is the total storage for all the devices? I use a LaCie 6TB 2Big unit for my external library and a LaCie d2 6TB drive for TM backups. My wife has multiple TB file system and backup as well.

If there is relatively little data on each Mac, a Time Capsule with 3TB or 4TB drive might be OK.
 
Apple has not approved Synology or QNAP boxes for time machine backups although many of the technicians around here seem to work around that. I wonder how many are breaking with the yositime update. I always had issues using time machine to backup to a synology, but CCC works just fine.

If you want to run that mini 24/7 like many do, put a DAS of your choice and use the mini as the household TimeMachine destination. Plenty of flexibility and scalability. I started with a synology NAS and quickly outgrew it and found no growth path. Much happier with a mini and a OWC thunderbay enclosure with a couple drives. Use disk utility to RAID0 if you need larger than 6TB volumes. You could use any Mac.

Otherwise a timecapsule with a large enough external USB drive if necessary works seamlessly for backups. I back up four Macs to a 3TB TimeCapsule (backups alternate between the mini and TC). Three of those have ~300GB drives, however.
 
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I like the idea of just using the server version on the Mini and adding an external drive. My wife just needs to backup typical documents, media, etc where the mini stores all of our family photos, music, movies, etc.....
 
CtotheP said:
I like the idea of just using the server version on the Mini and adding an external drive. My wife just needs to backup typical documents, media, etc where the mini stores all of our family photos, music, movies, etc.....
Click to expand...

If you use the Mini with Server installed you can't actually back up the mini using the software as you can't select the Drive.
I ended up creating a partition on the drive to use for TM, so unless you have lots of machines you may be better creating a partition for each mac on a large external drive...
 
Might be old fashioned, but 1 drive per sys instead of all on 1.
If one system is the most critical, add a second backup.

Networking is cool/nifty and all, but why risk the jewels on one rig?
Feel the same way about software. Experiment with CCC or SuperDuper.
Time Machine has drawbacks.

Just a thought ;)
 
glenthompson said:
It depends on how much you're willing to spend vs how many disaster scenarios you want to protect against. The more you protect against, the more it costs.

A simple solution is to add a big external drive or array to the Mini and use it as the destination for all the other devices. Just add the server app for $20 and it works smoothly. However a fire or theft could take out both the computer and the backup.

If you have the bandwidth, an online service like CrashPlan is valuable. More expensive but a good off-site solution.
Click to expand...

+1 to this. The simplest would be to connect an external drive to the mini, share the drive and let every Mac in the house use it for TM backups. What I would do though, is partition the external drive into 3 volumes with sizes that make sense, so that each Mac has its own partition to use for TM.
 
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Or use something like CrashPlan, Although TimeMachine also put you MAC back as it was rather than just backing up files.

I also like a bootable external drive with a partition for each MAC. I take a regular disk image using CCC then if the worst happens you can boot or restore from that image if you need the system working quickly.
 
keeper said:
Or use something like CrashPlan, Although TimeMachine also put you MAC back as it was rather than just backing up files.

I also like a bootable external drive with a partition for each MAC. I take a regular disk image using CCC then if the worst happens you can boot or restore from that image if you need the system working quickly.
Click to expand...

I use Crashplan in addition to my local backups. For me it was the most cost effective offsite option. I have 4 computers being backed up to it, about 2 TB of data, all for a cost of $100 per year.

I use a 3 tier approach to backups. First is time machine which is great for stupid user tricks like deleting or overwriting a file. Second is CCC for significant equipment failures. I can plug my CCC drive I to my wife's computer and it's like I'm back on mine. Third is CrashPlan for when the house burns down or similar tragedy. I feel confident that I can recover from any significant failure.

Last but not least all backup systems need to be tested regularly. If you haven't verified that your backup works, you don't really have one.
 
In most areas crashplan will choke on files larger than 3 or 4 GB (Like home videos). They told me their service is not intended for that use case and to go somewhere else. Otherwise it does takes forever to backup or restore.

What many large do for disaster is to rotate backup disks off site, i.e physically put the backup drive somewhere else, like a friends house. Both TM and CCC can be setup to support.

Larger businesses will contract with a service company.
 
ColdCase said:
Apple has not approved Synology or QNAP boxes for time machine backups although many of the technicians around here seem to work around that. I wonder how many are breaking with the yositime update. I always had issues using time machine to backup to a synology, but CCC works just fine.

If you want to run that mini 24/7 like many do, put a DAS of your choice and use the mini as the household TimeMachine destination. Plenty of flexibility and scalability. I started with a synology NAS and quickly outgrew it and found no growth path. Much happier with a mini and a OWC thunderbay enclosure with a couple drives. Use disk utility to RAID0 if you need larger than 6TB volumes. You could use any Mac.

Otherwise a timecapsule with a large enough external USB drive if necessary works seamlessly for backups. I back up four Macs to a 3TB TimeCapsule (backups alternate between the mini and TC). Three of those have ~300GB drives, however.
Click to expand...

Yosemite doesn't appear to have broken anything. I backup using time machine on my own debian server running netatalk - the transition to Yosemite was seamless time-machine wise.
 
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