mail-complaints-to="news_AT_tioat_DOT_net"   
   From: "Doug Bissett"    
      
   On Wed, 10 Nov 2010 23:22:06 UTC, Victor Bien  wrote:   
      
   > ivan wrote:   
   > > On Wed, 10 Nov 2010 10:28:25 UTC, Victor Bien  wrote:   
   > >    
   >    
   > [cut...]   
   > > The simple way to get a RAID setup is to use something like the D-Link   
   > > 323 or 343 NAS.  With the 343 you have up to 4 disks and can have a    
   > > pair in RAID and the others as JBOD.   
   > >    
   > > Remember RAID is NOT for backup!!   
   > >    
   > >    
   > > ivan   
   >    
   > I know RAID is no substitute for backup but it would save me from the bad   
   effects of a disk collapse!  Of course for example it can't save me from   
   making a wrong delete; or some chaos creeps into the ini files etc.   
   >    
   > Backing up has become more and more a problem here basically because   
   everything is getting bigger and bigger.  I am thinking a variety of   
   approaches and strategies to try to avoid losing data.  One difficulty for me,   
   that has nothing to do with computing, is simply time.  As computing is   
   getting more and more powerful and bigger and bigger it is taking longer and   
   longer to deal with issues which are more likely to happen and which take   
   longer to think and work through when they do.  So what happened a few months   
   back was that I was heavily fixated handling an issue that I took my chances   
   that the computer would not fail on me but it did!  The HD was relatively new,   
   Feb 2010 (re-certified repaired though)so I thought it was a safe bet and I   
   lost what I had in a "temporary" folder where I had my files for that issue (I   
   got a lot of it back from various ways but there was a hard core of painful   
   loss).  Now if I had a RAID 1 setup I would not have had all my eggs in one   
   basket (   
   > disk).   
      
   Not entirely true. Even with RAID, you can lose it all. Think fire, or   
   theft.   
      
   > I'm stuck with using Back Again 2000.  The difficulty is that backing onto a   
   file on a HD (the only practical medium for me these days) one is limited to   
   2.1 GB.  If through lack of sufficient attention the backup exceeds that size   
   you get a hang sometimes requiring a restart, very disruptive... which takes   
   up even more time...  So I have to think carefully what and how to backup,   
   more time...  Well since I now have the old HD with the data I had up to a   
   certain day in May I now can and have specified backups to backup only files   
   more recent than that date which makes it a bit easier to manage.  However, I   
   still have to divvy up what to backup not to exceed the 2.1 GB.  I then use a   
   mixture of Full and Incremental backups but the management of the backups   
   start to take up too much time.  As the months roll by I get more and more   
   increments so it then becomes time to take another Full backup but then the   
   volume of data has built up and there is that 2.1 GB limit.   
      
   BackAgain/2000 is totally out of date, but it is still useful .   
      
   > I know that with tape BA2k would have no 2.1 GB limit but tape drives cost   
   more than what is in my pocket!   
   >    
   > Any thoughts welcome!   
   >    
   > Victor Bien   
      
   I use RSYNC to do a nightly backup to my USB disk drive (1 TB Samsung    
   Story Station). I have many gigs of data backed up there, but the    
   backup takes only a few minutes (done at 4 AM, using the chron feature   
   of DragText), after the initial backup, which does take quite a while.   
    It is just a copy of what is on my disks, so recovery is as simple as   
   copying it back to where it came from. Of course, that isn't my only    
   backup, I use RSYNC for my data and program disks. I still use BA/2K    
   for my boot drives, because that works well even when I am booted from   
   the drive (and boot drives should be small - I use 1.5 GB). I put the    
   BA/2K backups onto the hard disk, and that gets put onto the USB drive   
   when RSYNC does the rest. Then, weekly, I burn the boot drive backup    
   to DVD+RW, along with another BA/2K backup of my really important    
   stuff, alternating two DVDs. In addition to all of that, once per    
   month, I burn another CD, with really really important stuff, and    
   store that offsite.   
      
   I really should replace the DVD backups with another USB drive    
   (actually, an eSata drive, or a NAS drive, would be better), but I    
   haven't got around to doing it, yet. I find that DVDs are likely to be   
   physically damaged over time, even with careful handling. They can    
   also be damaged if they are left where the sun can get at them. True,    
   portable disk drives are also likely to be damaged, if not handled    
   carefully. At least the media isn't sitting out in the open like it is   
   with CD, DVD, or tape, media.   
      
   Hope this gives you a few ideas...   
   --    
   From the eComStation of Doug Bissett   
   dougb007 at telus dot net   
   (Please make the obvious changes, to e-mail me)   
      
      
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