On-Line Backup Service

[peety3]

Paranoia is good, in that it keeps you aware of what you're doing.


I have dreams of a home/office setup using Apple's XSan, a large, flexible, robust (though very expensive) system with an off-site colocated XSan site, using Apple's Time Machine software to automate all of the backup tasks as needed. Someday, Pete, someday...

[thunder]

I'm using Mozy home. Works like a dream. It took a while first time I backed up everything. Now I've 119 GB of data backed up at mozy. I've a 10/10 Mbit internet connection

http://mozy.com/home

[mbaltrusitis]

After losing a good bit of data one time i am pretty strict with my back-up storage. I have a RAID 1 setup for my photo library only. Then I have a 1.5TB drive for a Time Machine back-up as well as my music back-up (music is kept on a portable 500GB "media drive"). Once a month, I take a different portable hard drive and backup my entire photo library. This drive stays off-site in a fire proof, pressurized, dehumidified safe. Even after all THAT, I am still worry about the off-site drive failing but just don't have the money to pony up for a G-Tech mini-RAID1.


I haven't really thought about online back-ups, but I think I should when I start getting into audio recording for my interviews. I was looking atthese guys. What should online storage pricing look like with a library ~150GB?

[peety3]

...a G-Tech mini-RAID1.

Admittedly, I don't know this product whatsoever, but much like camera wars I wouldn't expect any one particular product to be truly better than anther in the drive/storage market. The strength is in numbers; hot-spare drives, and replication to other drives/arrays.

I haven't really thought about online back-ups, but I think I should when I start getting into audio recording for my interviews. I was looking at[url="http://www.rsync.net/]these guys[/url]. What should online storage pricing look like with a library ~150GB?
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I just checked out their site. You'd be looking at $96/month with them (150GB * $0.80/GB - 20% volume discount). Jungle Disk would be $22.50/month. Rsync.net customers sign up for a disk quota, and you pay for your quota. JungleDisk bills based on the space consumed, period; there's no rounding-up or incremental size tiers that you have to pay for.

[bob williams]

I wanted to bump this thread and let you guys know about a new backup service I recently signed up for. I was useing MOZY for several months, but when they changed thier pricing structure and doubled thier cost for me, I dropped them earlier this year. Since then I have been contemplating an NAS raid box of at least 2 TB But, but preferably 4TB but the cost for a decent one is in excess of $300. So I went back to looking for online services and found the reviews of "Just Cloud" solid across the board. Unlimited backup for $9.95 a month---and cheaper if you buy a year or two in advance.

Just cloud's interface is extremely easy and has run flawlessly on my Windows 7---even while I do other backups, manipulate photos and video and surf the web, Nothing seems to bother it---It just keeps on running. It also has an option for a sync folder which will sync all files in it across multiple machines, i.e. desktop, labtop, phone, pad etc.

So, for the moment, I am extremely happy with this service: Just Cloud

My backup scheme currently consists of this:

One onboard backup drive for all of my documents and pictures and other files set to backup daily.
One desktop 2 TB raid box for weekly system backup
Just cloud for offsite daily file backups
and I also have a 1tb mini drive that I backup up my pictures and files on about once a month and I keep this one in a fire-proof safe.

So for the moment, I am confident that I can recover most or all of my files in the event of disaster.

Bob

[Joel Eade]

My back up routine:

All finished and processed images are backed up X 3 : Lacie External HD / SanDisk Thumb Drives / Zenfolio Site ($100/yr)

I only save RAW images that I finished, these are backed up X 3 : Lacie External HD / SanDisk Tumb Drives / DVD

[HDNitehawk]

jrw, you have a point with security. Today GoDaddy was down for several hours, some claimed they were hacked some said otherwise. It was kind of ironic because I watched their video yesterday about how safe and secure their site was. I wouldn't use GoDaddy for storage because the price is to high but still, its kind of a scary thought that if you backed up all you're files on a site that gets hacked someone could go through every file you had ever saved.

[bob williams]

jrw, you have a point with security. Today GoDaddy was down for several hours, some claimed they were hacked some said otherwise. It was kind of ironic because I watched their video yesterday about how safe and secure their site was. I wouldn't use GoDaddy for storage because the price is to high but still, its kind of a scary thought that if you backed up all you're files on a site that gets hacked someone could go through every file you had ever saved.

I agree with both you and JR, But I normally weigh the risks over the benefits----In my case, I don't backup financial data, not even my taxes. So most of what I have wouldn't be really usefull to a hacker. I also look at it this way: If they can hack GoDaddy, they can certainly hack my own personal machine so I don't see any greater risk with useing the online storage. Frankly, I am more concerned with someone tapping my wireless network, even though it is password protected, I don't really consider it "secure".

My biggest reason for going with online storage is convenience and cost. I can get 3 years of online storage for the cost of one nas raid device. And with the online storage, I am confident that a local lightning storm or house fire won't meltdown my data.

About 3 years ago we had a large power surge at work----it melted the power strips to the floor, killed 24 of my classroom computers, a copier, and set a fax machine on fire. Even our UPS protected network switch was killed. Needless to say, I don't have a great deal of faith in surge protectors, UPS's or in commercial or residential fuse/breaker protection. If it's wired, it can be killed with lightning or power surges.

I do like the idea of simply storing a device in another location, but then I have to remember to re-acquire that device and periodically run my back-ups. I no longer have the discipline or memory to reliably carry out such operations. It's an age thing.


So, for me, online storage only costs per month what I spend on one fast food lunch and is much easier and has less overall risk than most of the other options.

[djmorgan]

It's easy to be negative with these things, from my experience 'a' secure back up is away from original files, by example if your house burns down then all HDD are lost in the fire so you could have a few back up methods such a NAS of external HDDs' but they would be gone in a fire, flood etc.

So I looked at a cloud solution (justcloud) seemed good until I realised that to move my archive of RAW images to the cloud would take 7.5 days at 8Gb/24 hrs speed, that's JustClouds best optimisation.

Then you consider downloading 30Mb for a single file it gets time and money consuming.

So in the end I sprang for a 4Tb NAS Raid 1, high initial cost but in the end will reach break even, all I have to remember now is to grab it when the fire starts

David

[bob williams]

It's easy to be negative with these things, from my experience 'a' secure back up is away from original files, by example if your house burns down then all HDD are lost in the fire so you could have a few back up methods such a NAS of external HDDs' but they would be gone in a fire, flood etc.

So I looked at a cloud solution (justcloud) seemed good until I realised that to move my archive of RAW images to the cloud would take 7.5 days at 8Gb/24 hrs speed, that's JustClouds best optimisation.

Then you consider downloading 30Mb for a single file it gets time and money consuming.

So in the end I sprang for a 4Tb NAS Raid 1, high initial cost but in the end will reach break even, all I have to remember now is to grab it when the fire starts

David

You are right about being slow---I am in to my third day and I am only at 26%. I remember similar speeds when I had Mozy. But once the initial upload is complete, the daily's are usually fairly quick and take place after midnight so I rarely noticed them. But again, That first big upload is PAINFULLY slow.