Questions re: setting up a DAS in Raid 0 and backup

[cpac54]

After some reading and help from these forums, I've decided on a storage and backup setup for my 13" 2014 MBPr, which serves as my main computer.

I have a 245Gb internal SSD on the MBPr, which I plan to use to keep my programs, school and personal files (MS Office type stuff on) and Lightroom catalog files on. I may or may not also keep my music on the laptop (about 70 Gb).

I'm looking at picking up a 4Tb Thunderbolt Duo (DAS) as my storage drive for Movies, and my Photographs and using it in RAID 0 to allow good speed when working in Lightroom. (NAS isn't really an option for me atm due to not having a Gigabit router).

Lastly, I need to backup the RAID 0 and the MBPr of course. This is where I have some questions:

1) What would be the best way/process to back up the RAID 0 and my MBPr for my uses? (ex: Could I use TimeMachine to back up both to one single, larger capacity external drive, like a My Book Studio, or do I need to do something else?)

2) Is Time Machine the best thing to use to backup the RAID 0 and the MBPr? I've seen lots of people mention CCC, but I really don't know the difference here.

I apologize if this is a bit pedantic, I'm not overly knowledgeable on this stuff (yet!). Appreciate the help, and any other tips for my situation!

 

[ColdCase]

Time machine will back up any mounted local drive to another drive. Under the time machine preferences pane are drives on the exclusion list. Just include the drives you want to backup. Time Machine will also rotate backups between destination disks, handy if you want two backups of your OS and frequently changed files.

Since I'm a belt and suspenders type guy, I use both CCC and Time Machine on OS and user files. CCC is not picky about destination and will reliably back up to any NAS device, does not need to be an Apple approved device. For my large drives, 2TB+ I just use CCC, having more confidence in it.

I also use the TimeMachineEditor app to schedule daily TimeMachine backups instead of the more frequent Apple defaults.

 

[cpac54]

Time machine will back up any mounted local drive to another drive. Under the time machine preferences pane are drives on the exclusion list. Just include the drives you want to backup. Time Machine will also rotate backups between destination disks, handy if you want two backups of your OS and frequently changed files.

Since I'm a belt and suspenders type guy, I use both CCC and Time Machine on OS and user files. CCC is not picky about destination and will reliably back up to any NAS device, does not need to be an Apple approved device. For my large drives, 2TB+ I just use CCC, having more confidence in it.

I also use the TimeMachineEditor app to schedule daily TimeMachine backups instead of the more frequent Apple defaults.

Thanks Coldcase.

Two questions to that:

1) When you say "OS backup" what exactly does that mean? Is that simply backing up the files on my laptop, or something else?

2) If I am backing up the RAID 0 to one single ext. HDD, do I need to do anything special, or will the files appear on the single drive just like normal, allowing me to pull them off if/when needed (ex: in the case of failure of the RAID setup).

 

[65535]

Thanks Coldcase.

Two questions to that:

1) When you say "OS backup" what exactly does that mean? Is that simply backing up the files on my laptop, or something else?

2) If I am backing up the RAID 0 to one single ext. HDD, do I need to do anything special, or will the files appear on the single drive just like normal, allowing me to pull them off if/when needed (ex: in the case of failure of the RAID setup).

1) Time Machine will back up every volume on and connected directly to your computer that is not listed under the exceptions in the Time Machine preferences Options menu.

2) As far as Time Machine and UI level systems are concerned a RAID volume is still a single volume so it will be backed up as such and can then be restored to any other single volume RAID or not.