Those are the only two ways I can think to do it, short of manually making DVDs or copying files on your own.
What options are there for backing up data besides RAID and synchronization software?
- Thread starter archcommus
- Start date
What? RAID is redundancy. Redundancy is backup.
In fact, for home users, RAID 0+1 is a great option for backup with improved performance.
Hence I said "home users." Desktop systems read primarily. Write performance is much more critical on servers than desktops. Anyway, the overhead wouldn't be that bad.
No, RAID is not a backup. The crucial difference here is that synchronisation is immediate and automatic. While it provides *redundancy* for hardware failure, it is entirely useless for all other purposes to which backups are put.
The most obvious being accountant bob clearing up space on his harddrive by deleting the windows folder.
Was that really called for? :disgust:
Qualify these statements:
1. Redundancy is backup
2. RAID is redundancy
3. RAID is not backup
What is RAID if not backup? Yes, RAID is backup primarily in the hardware sense, not the data sense (although it is capable of that), but backup nonetheless. The statement "RAID is not backup" is simply false.
I like GoBack, but it's not a true "Backup". Sure does save you time dealing with PC's you've built for people though. 
For "Backup" options, Check Here.
Retrospect has a good reputation for backup programs.
For "Backup" options, Check Here.
Retrospect has a good reputation for backup programs.
The only thing RAID protects you from is hard drive failure (at the expense of potential controller failure). It doesn't protect you from alot of important & common failures such as file system corruption, human error, etc. And it doesn't give you a historical record of your data, or offsite storage to protect from catastrophic destruction at the site. RAID is nice to have, but it isn't a backup solution in any realistic sense.
For the home user, I would reccomend periodic backups to a second harddrive (not RAID1 - you want a separate filesystem), and occasionally burning the important stuff to CD/DVD, and take a set to the office, safety deposit box, etc.
For the home user, I would reccomend periodic backups to a second harddrive (not RAID1 - you want a separate filesystem), and occasionally burning the important stuff to CD/DVD, and take a set to the office, safety deposit box, etc.
I use sync software to mirror my My Documents folder to a My Documents folder on an external hard drive. Is this the best way to be doing things?
Nothinman
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- Sep 14, 2001
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No, RAID is not a backup solution, it's only for hardware failure protection. The simple fact that if you delete everything from drive 0 and drive 1 gets cleaned out as well makes it just about worthless for that. On top of that there's no way to roll back a change to a file to a day or a week or a month ago, depending on how long you setup your rotation, because all changes are immediately commited to both places. You could use it as a backup if you had a filesystem that does file revisions, but I really doubt you're running VMS.
Tape is the best (imho) backup method. A small dat drive can be had on Ebay for 10-200 bucks, depending on size/needs. I have an Onstream ADR that I do backups every night to, and rotate tapes (2 at work, one at home).
1- Backup is redundancy. But, any redundancy is not necessarily backup.
A better question is "what is backup?".
Backup is a snapshot of your data you can use later to access your data the way it was when you made the backup. So, if you by mistake delete a file, you can use the backup to get that file back.
If you delete a file by mistake from a RAID1 setup, the file will be deleted from both drives. You cannot get that file back. That is why everyone is telling you that RAID is not backup. Because it cannot do what a backup can do.
On the other hand RAID can do something that backup cannot do. If you have a drive hardware failure, a RAID1 setup will keep your file system going and the IT guy can get a replacement drive and install it and the users of the file system never know that there ever was a drive failure. Backup cannot do that. RAID1 and its derivative is used where file system cannot be allowed to ever go down. For a typical home setup, RAID is useless.
There is a big difference between RAID and backup.
I am not familiar with that software. If it is a mirror, meaning that if a virus deletes a file on the main drive, the software mirrors this and deletes the file from the external drive, this is not a backup!
Of course it is. It will only make that change when I tell it to. So if I accidentally delete a file, I can go get it back before I sync again.
If you don't backup in this manner how else do you do it? And I mean an efficient way, not just making DVDs every now and then.
If you don't backup in this manner how else do you do it? And I mean an efficient way, not just making DVDs every now and then.
As I said, I am not familiar with that software.
You are saying that you have to tell it to sync. Instead of doing that, I make a backup using the XP backup utility and store it on my second internal hard drive. I also copy the backup file on a DVD/RW.
For the OS, I make an image of my C drive, which only contains the OS, using Drive Image and store that on my second internal hard drive.
This is good enough for me. It may not be for you.
It's no different than using, say, tape backup with only one tape.
Better than nothing, worse than a weekly/monthly cycle with offsite storage.
You've got to evaluate your needs vs the cost.
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