Lock away/Hide Time Machine Backup

[mjsmke]

Hi, I can't find any other threads regarding this. I've finally got round to setting up Time Machine with my old external 2TB WD HD. My worst fear is being burgled and someone stealing my Macs and external backups.

Does anyone have any ideas for locking down an external drive so it cannot be taken? I really don't want to keep unplugging and taking the drive with me to work each day.

I'm thinking about making a wooden box with ventilation and screwing/glueing it under my desk.

Any ideas would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[r.j.s]

What about locking it to the desk with a notebook cable? Most drives have the security slot.

 

[mjsmke]

Ive got one but it's so easy to cut through. And the hole it locks onto is plastic.

 

[maflynn]

The easiest solution is to buy an external portable hard drive. Use Carbon Copy Cloner to back up on to that drive and take the drive to work.

Its great you want to protect yourself from theft, but what about other calamities that locking up the drive won't help, such as fire.

 

[mjsmke]

I completely forgot about fire. I guess i could make a weekly copy of my time capsule and leave it at work. So in the case of a fire i loose a weeks work at the most. Just don't have time to do this every evening.

 

[dazed]

cant you use online storage like mozy for the most inportant stuff ?

 

[maflynn]

Online storage works as well, but I've read that people who used this and then needed to restore ran into problems. I'm not sure if its because they were on a mac or just design issues.

Anyways, hundreds of gig of data could pose a problem upload/downloads.

Personally, I like to trust my own backups rather then a service to do it.

 

[mjsmke]

Ive set time machine to back up my system drive (OS + Apps) and my working files. When i finish a project i move it to an internal storage drive and back it up on another external drive which is hidden in the property but i'm beginning to think i should move this drive to a different location in case of fire/flood. I only need to move work to this drive every month or so.

 

[Honumaui]

if you are gone and someone breaks in ? who knows a small lock is not going to stop them ?
you could do a NAS box and have it hid somewhere ?

I would say a combination of off site and offline is most secure

send HDD to family somewhere once in a while ? and keep online

if I had to back up from a major burglary or fire ? that will be the least of my worries really and be glad I could get back at all ? even it takes a while ? at lest I know it would be safe

they do make media safes for fires ? they are basically fireproof HDDs ?