Highest availability.....raid or manual backup???

[user3657]

ok here is the deal, i have a personal server.. i plan on building a new one, im running out of hd space and its kind of acent. the server is my file server, and i also host a few personal websites of mine and also host some biz sites for a few local biz/friends.

i dont know if i want to go with mirroring drives or get a second drive and just manually back up the files once in a while.

for mirroring i came up with:human error, i can delete a file by accident and be screwed. im not worried about this, so this isnt an issue for me. my biggest issue is the server getting a virus/hacked. if i cant get the data back, im screwed. i dont know how large of an issue this is. the server, is just a server. no one personally ever uses it. it just acts as a file server/web server/router. one of my sites is a alexa 200k site, so it is pretty active and gets alot of traffic.

now if i just get a second drive and manually back things up(like ive been doing for years), would a virus or hack attack wipe out both drives. naturally id only have one drive that would be serving the web pages.

what do you all think? whats the best way to go? i know the best is mirroring plus manually backing up, but im not looking for all that.

 

[Captante]

RAID 1 or mirroring only protects against mechanical drive failure ... while it does provide a measure of data security, it will not protect against virus infection, hacking or human error like deleting critical files because whatever happens to the data on one drive happens quickly to the other as well.

Regular backups to an external drive which is disconnected from the server or at least powered down between uses are far more effective at keeping your data safe ... the best of both worlds is of course to combine the two, however if its a choice I'd go with the second drive option.

 

[user3657]

if i go the second drive way, it would prob just be another cheapo int drive. same thing as i have now. right now i have 80g main then another 60gig as a backup. i would prob just keep the 80 as a backup and then get a new 500g next time i see one on sale.

 

[Sunner]

RAID is for availability.
Backups are for data protection.
If I had to pick one, I'd go with backups, unless availability is very important to you, in which case you should make sure to afford both anyway

I have something like that setup at home, using an external USB drive for backups, not perfect in any way, but it works well enough for what I do.
Don't know what system you're running, but if it's any kind of *NIX, have a look at Backup Manager.
http://www.backup-manager.org/
Easy to configure and can do most anything you need for basic backups, such as dumping MySQL DB's, backups to a remote host through SCP, etc.
Will save you the trouble of doing it manually, which is good since people tend to forget such things

 

[Blain]

Use something like GoBack and roll the whole thing back each day... week... etc...

 

[user3657]

its win2k3.

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: Captante
Regular backups to an external drive which is disconnected from the server or at least powered down between uses are far more effective at keeping your data safe ... the best of both worlds is of course to combine the two, however if its a choice I'd go with the second drive option.

:thumbsup:

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: Captante
Regular backups to an external drive which is disconnected from the server or at least powered down between uses are far more effective at keeping your data safe ... the best of both worlds is of course to combine the two, however if its a choice I'd go with the second drive option.

That's my choice. I put all my data on an internal RAID 1 array, and then back that up to an external HDD as necessary. That also allows me to port over the data files to another computer via the external USB "sneaker net."