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General discussion

Best method for Backup on multiple computers/drives

Apr 3, 2011 11:50PM PDT

Hi,
Looking for some help with my backup situation.

I have 2 computers (desktop & laptop), both running XP.
Hard drives are fairly small on both (about 80 gb)
I also currently have a 500gb external that is just about full.

My needs for data storage are about to get much greater for 2 reasons.

I have just had a son, and my wife and I are shooting a lot of HD video. I am also backing up my entire music collection in FLAC format.

I'd like to get a 1 tb drive for my music and laptop backup, and designate the 500gb drive for photos/video and desktop backup.

On top of that, I was considering getting a 2tb drive to serve as a backup for these 2 externals and both computers.

Is this an incredibly dumb idea? Is there a better solution?
Also, is it better to use automatic backup software on a regular basis (recommendations welcome, besides the included western digital package or Norton's included backup software) or just do a good old fashioned copy/paste once/month?

Knowing USB 3.0 is available how important should that be in my purchases?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Discussion is locked

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Storage methods
Apr 4, 2011 1:41AM PDT

Read the forums here and the horror stories on any ext. HDS. While you can store to ext. HDs don't plan on extended periods or make it permanent. You've been warned.

Yes, you can use ext. HDs and other media for super critical storage. However, the only safe method is to use discs, like CD/DVD/BD. That way at least you can have some saved if the worst happens. Make multiple copies as well. Many users are now into "online storage" provide the cost isn't too much, like Carbonite(sp) and similar. You can also check NAS type storage for a simple home setup as well. Since, you plan to do alot of saving, please consider that too much is too much, so plan what you need to keep. Checkout the storage forum for other methods od more details plus review the requests for help.

tada -----Willy Happy

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Simply . . .
Apr 4, 2011 2:49AM PDT

One copy of any file is doomed to loss. Period! Multiple backups is the only safe measure. In my case, I have a clone of my entire hard drive in a box. I clone once a month. I also have other "stuff" duplicated and stored on an external USB3 SATA hard drive. Thus, two copies. In the case of my web site (on my home server) I have the original on the server, a copy on an internal slave drive, and a third copy on DVDs. I also have a clone of the drive.

Am I paranoid? Nope. I just see too many posts here from people who have their only copy of irreplaceable data suddenly disappear. For you, simply, one copy is never enough. How you manage this and with what hardware is up to you.

USB3? Yep. I added a USB3 PCI card and my external case is USB3 with a SATA drive. For moving large video files this is the only way to go. I download large one Gig video files. Moving them to the older USB2 case took about two minutes. With the USB3 and the SATA drive it now takes about 45 seconds. And you must use a USB3 cable as it has the extra conductors to get USB3 speed.

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NAS
Apr 21, 2011 7:10AM PDT

Wouldn't the obvious option be to buy a NAS (Network attached storage) with something like 4 1TB drives configured in RAID 1. That would sort all your problems out and if you get NAS with hot swapable drives you can always upgrade the amount of storage in the future?