The best way to backup

[vishavg]

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to get some insight on how I should back up my new macbook pro. I know there are cloud services out there, I was looking at getting 50GB of iCloud storage. I mainly need it for all my photos (around 20GB) and documents. I should only need around 50GB of storage.

I've heard that running iCloud in the background can make the system extremely slow? I know another option would be to have an external drive and upload on to that every now and then. But ideally a cloud service would ensure that I don't forget and everything is always backed up.

Thanks

 

[ISKOTB]

I been using TM for a few years now, get an external drive wired or wireless and use TM or CCC

 

[bethpapa74]

time machine or carbon copy

 

[Eldiablojoe]

Would these suggestions still be best-case practices if I want to ensure I never lose my 250GB (on a 500GB external HDD) of photos and music?

I operate off the external HDD whenever I am backing up photos or music. I've tried making a CCC clone of that external HDD, but for some reason, I have not had success with the two HDD's simultaneously plugged into my 2009 MacBook to do the job. (?).

 

[protoxx]

Best Practices?
Have two backup disks. Keep one at another location. Home/Office, Home/safety deposit box aka offsite aka relatives, etc. If offsite swap them on a semi-regular basis. Home/Office just plug in at both of them when you are there regularly.

What happens if house burns down and destroys both or someone steals bag with both laptop and backup drive?

Time Capsule is nice if 2 or 3 tb is enough. Whenever your nearby it backs up. Also backup to attached disk. Recovery from Time Capsule is slower because of wireless.

 

[Howard2k]

I use multiple Time Machine drives and try to keep one off-site. Just in case.
Quick and easy. Not perfect, but I've had a HDD failure before and it was about 4 mouse clicks to recover once the new drive was in.

 

[belvdr]

I use CrashPlan without issues. If you have friends with CrashPlan, you can backup to each other. Otherwise, purchase a subscription and backup to their systems. With the latter option, the backup occurs every 15 minutes.

 

[iTeachMath]

Similar to others, I use Time Machine at home to backup about 325 GB of music, photos, Ipad/iPhone data, and other documents. Also I keep an external drive at work that I back up to whenever I get a chance (once every month or 2).

 

[mrex]

if you are planning to get TC, better to get a nas with two bays that can be configured to run raid1. that is way better backup solution than having just a single drive (TC).

i have a nas but i also make a backup from the nas to another harddrive. if one of those two drives in the nas get broken, there is still the another drive and you can replace the broken one - no data lost. if your TC hdd get broken, you loose everything.

 

[jerryk]

Is there any settings that should be used on the network with Time Machine? When I backup to my Time Machine running on my NAS (ReadyNas Pro) with an Ethernet connection it takes about 20 minutes for 40 GB. But if I do the same backup over wifi it takes 2-3 hours. However, it I transfer a 5 GB worth of files to the NAS over Wifi it takes the same time as transfering them over Ethernet.

 

[MattSeven]

Just pulled the trigger on one of these:

Gonna mirror 4TB, accessing it over wireless AC. Not ideal speeds, but I will no longer be plugging in drive-->run Time Machine backup-->unplug drive. This NAS does everything, and let's me access files over the web from anywhere.

I'm getting a 15" 2016 MPB with 1TB because I shoot plenty of video and my music library is about 100gb by itself.

 

[Howard2k]

USB3 interferes with wifi in some instances. As do microwave ovens, fluorescent lights, other wifi networks, bluetooth devices, some wireless telephones, and other things that transmit in the 2.4GHz space (wireless guitar interface, for example). So it's a bit tricky, but the best and first thing to consider is ensuring that you're using 5GHz space. That's probably far less crowded. Do you have that option?

 

[jerryk]

Just pulled the trigger on one of these:

Gonna mirror 4TB over wireless AC. Not ideal speeds, but I will no longer be plugging in drive-->run Time Machine backup-->unplug drive. This NAS does everything, and let's me access files over the web from anywhere.

I'm getting a 15" 2016 MPB with 1TB because I shoot plenty of video and my music library is about 100gb by itself.

I love my NAS. But remember, no data is backed up until you have it in 3 places. I also use AWS glacier to backup the NAS.

 

[vishavg]

Thanks for all your suggestions. I will be relying on TM. I have never used TM before so, how does it work? Does it back up whenever you connect the external drive? or something else

 

[lsh]

I have TM on a local (USB) drive and my Synology disk station. Lately, the Synology tells me that it needs to start a new backup for integrity reasons. ... rather frustrating. I haven't figured out how to solve that.
I also have Carbon Copy Cloner on a separate local hard drive so I have a copy of my data should I need it short of a reinstall on a repaired mac.

 

[Howard2k]

I have TM on a local (USB) drive and my Synology disk station. Lately, the Synology tells me that it needs to start a new backup for integrity reasons. ... rather frustrating. I haven't figured out how to solve that.
I also have Carbon Copy Cloner on a separate local hard drive so I have a copy of my data should I need it short of a reinstall on a repaired mac.

I use TM to a NAS too and on occasion it will so that. Typically when that happens I shut down both the NAS and the MacBook and restart both and it works.

But if not you can google "troubleshot NAS time machine" and you'll find some good tips.

Or nuke it and start again.

TM to NAS is part of my backup strategy, but I also use TM to some external USB drives too.

 

[imorton]

I have a dual SSD installation in my 2012 MB Pro, and use the 2nd SSD for a CCC clone. When I use a Hengedock when I'm at home/office this gives me a TM backup. When I am out an about, my primary SSD does mobile TM backups which get replicated when I dock it in my Hengedock. I also use BackBlaze for a complete off-site backup. This way, I am fully covered for the EVENTUAL COMPUTER FAILURE...