Backup strategy - advice needed

[Sigi]

Hello,

I am a hobby photographer, work on an Intel-based imac with a 500 Gb internal drive, on Tiger. In addition I have a 160 GB external FW harddrive which is completely full with my pictures. I have already asked some questions on this forum and done some reading and came up with the following.

1. I want to use my 160 GB as a bootable backup - just my OS + apps - should be on this drive
2. I get a Drobo with 2x 750 GB drives where all my datafiles are backed up

I know that I am not protected against fire etc but at least I want to get started. I could always buy another 2 external drives, use the Drobo and then take them to an offsite location.

It looks a bit too simple and I guess I am missing something. I am not a computer expert and need a simple solution that I can manage without an IT-consultant.

Thanks for your help

Sigi

[DarkPenguin]

http://handbook.outbackphoto.com/section_a...ving/index.html

[Morgan_Moore]

Hello,

I am a hobby photographer, work on an Intel-based imac with a 500 Gb internal drive, on Tiger. In addition I have a 160 GB external FW harddrive which is completely full with my pictures. I have already asked some questions on this forum and done some reading and came up with the following.

1. I want to use my 160 GB as a bootable backup - just my OS + apps - should be on this drive
2. I get a Drobo with 2x 750 GB drives where all my datafiles are backed up

I know that I am not protected against fire etc but at least I want to get started. I could always buy another 2 external drives, use the Drobo and then take them to an offsite location.

It looks a bit too simple and I guess I am missing something. I am not a computer expert and need a simple solution that I can manage without an IT-consultant.

Thanks for your help

Sigi
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Simple is good, two copies of everything on two seperate HDs in two seperate locations

leave em unplugged from the mains and the machine to protect from virus and voltage surge

fire up the offsite on occasion to check it out

when these are full get two more

I file stuff by date - ie an HD could be march-july 2008

I think of my images being on a conveyer belt, on the machine HD and the Back up one then on the back up one and back up two

also you can have problems of how/where to store retouches re-processes of old images

Of course you can find images by date but you need to know what date you shot stuff to find it

A simple solution get a Gmail account and e-mail yourself what you shot every day - searchable and backed up by the power of google !

Simple is good - Ican tell you that from the days or tape backup with 'retrospect' what a nightmare

of course you can get more sophisticated with raid or whatever but that is not simple - simple is good

Raid is not backup it about keeping a machine online - eliminatiing the risks of loss of that days work when your pooter goes pop - just dont format your CF cards until the images are safely on an HD - you can rotate through a weeks worth of cards while you shoot

of course you need to back up more than your images - like your copy of PS etc and e-mails (auto forward all to gmail?)

S

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Sam,

Excellent advice. I'm planning to post a big sign over my monitor that says "Simple is good", just as a reminder when I get tempted to play with "RAID" or other nonsense.

-Eric M.

[budjames]

I have a friend who owns 2 Apple retail stores and he stopped selling the Drobo because of terrible tech support and lots of problems with the device (DOA and corrupted files). Pass on the Drobo. A RAID 1 device that provided redundant back up may be a cheaper and faster alternative.

Use SuperDuper or equivalent to weekly clone your iMac HD to a similarly sized external HD. This way you will have a ready bootable backup. Opt for FW800 over USB for the best transfer speeds. For data files and more frequent backups, based on your current HD size, using an external drive as a dedicated Time Machine backup is a great way to "set and forget" your data files backups.

I suggest that you check out Other World Computing (OWC) for highly rated, excellent quality external HD that support triple interfaces (USB, FW400 and FW800). You can buy the single drive units with up to 1TB of storage. If you are handy, you can buy the enclosure and then shop the web for the best deals on internal HD's and then assemble the unit yourself and you can save about $75. I built 4 such enclosures using only Seagate Barracuda drives of the latest generation. I've found great prices on these from www.newegg.com. Knock on wood, I never had a failure with these units. I previously used Lacie drives and I experienced a number of failures on the electronics and powers supplies, but not the HDs.

One final note. Always, always, always have an external backup that you rotate to a different location just in case you have a fire or flood. I use a safe deposit box at my bank which is about a 10 minute drive from my house. I rotate 3 1TB drives through to have offsite backups of all of my images, videos and personal documents, statements, etc. (scanned images).

I hope you never have to rely on this, but if you do, you will be glad that a lifetime of images are not lost forever. You can always buy new "stuff", but the photos (and videos) are priceless.

Good luck.
Bud

[Jack Flesher]

I have a friend who owns 2 Apple retail stores and he stopped selling the Drobo because of terrible tech support and lots of problems with the device (DOA and corrupted files). Pass on the Drobo.
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I suspect you are repeating old data...  I have a new FW800 DROBO and it is outstanding so far.  Moreover, I had a firmware download glitch, contacted CS and got an almost immediate response and fix.  Finally, OWC that you mention above now sells DROBO units themselves...  

I run Mac and use Carbon Copy Cloner (similar to Super Duper) and do regularly scheduled back-ups to it from my working image drive.  For PC users I recommend they take a look at Mirror Folder for a very elegant back-up software solution.

Cheers,

[revaaron]

I have a "USB" tower at home with paired 500GB that use SynchToys (windows power toys) to synch between pairs. then I sneaker net the files back and forth to work and synch them with another 500GB for every 2x500GB I have at home.
2x500GB = photo I
2x500GB = photo II
2x500GB = mp3s
2x750GB = other storage
2x500GB = videos

then I carry around with me 3x250GB which I use as a pipeline to the 500GB.  Right now, I'm worried about EMP from a nuke or aliens so I started shooting film and will start storing to BDR once they are 100GB for $25.  $25 to permanently store 2-4 months of photos sounds good to me.