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☖ Forums → Discussion Forum → Backups
Backups
2009-04-11, 3:41 PM #1
I realized that even though I should be, I never back up my hard drives unless I'm retiring a computer and migrating data to a new one, or something of the sort. I've never had any disk failure of catastrophic data loss before, so I guess it hasn't "hit" me how important it is. I was thinking about beginning to do so, but it seems so cumbersome. What's a good/routine/convenient way to do it?

Also, if you do, how do you do it? Incremental? Full images every time? Just copy important files/folders?
一个大西瓜
2009-04-11, 3:59 PM #2
I've had many hard drives fail on me, but I also have far too much data (several terabytes) to back it all up. So what I do is back everything up that can't be replaced - i.e. all my digital photos, documents, etc. I keep backups on two drives on my desktop, on my laptop, and on my webserver.
Stuff
2009-04-11, 4:04 PM #3
The frequency of backups depends on how much has changed. If I've done a lot of work then I'll back up those files whenever I feel that it would be painful to redo.

I do a combination of incremental and whole folder backups to a separate partition, a usb stick and less often to a dvd. I do it manually at the moment as I only have to type a few commands and then let the computer do its thing while I do something else.
2009-04-11, 4:16 PM #4
I've lost some pretty cool stuff in Hard Drive crashes...but still haven't learned my lesson.

I do make backups to a flash drive of important documents though.

Now, as far as my company data goes, I still do routine manual backups of important application files and documents to redundant hard drives. The client files have backup files automatically saved to redundant hard drives. As we grow, I'll probably invest in some type of great grandfather on and off site automated backup system.
2009-04-11, 8:27 PM #5
Originally posted by Shayol:
The frequency of backups depends on how much has changed. If I've done a lot of work then I'll back up those files whenever I feel that it would be painful to redo.


This. And I also maintain two backups of my computer, one on and one off site.
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2009-04-13, 3:32 PM #6
I maintain about once a month Amazon S3 copy of my photo collection, ~25 Gb of pictures now, and its going to get worst now I've secured an Canon 50D...

Then I also maintain a full disk backup via rsnapshot to an external 750 gb drive, every few weeks to month.

My biggest issue is I don't have an second array to run a live backup to... and I have too much crap to reasonably backup to Amazon S3 (1.5 TB!)
Echoman: If I can create energy from stupidity, the world's power supply will never end...
2009-04-13, 3:34 PM #7
Basically whenever a friend of family member's drive dies and it occurs to me that I'd be screwed if the same happened.

My Dad's died this weekend. Funny how it seems to happen often around tax time.
Steal my dreams and sell them back to me.....
2009-04-13, 4:12 PM #8
For anyone curious: Massassi (as well as the rest of the webserver in whole) is backed up every other day or so automatically, via an incremental backup.

To protect from drive failure, the latest backup available is uploaded to Amazon S3 once a month.

As for at home, I have a full drive backup of my fresh Vista install, a backup of my user folder to an external, and then on my laptop, I have a Time Machine backup of that whole thing. I wish I could backup everything, but I simply don't have the space to do it.
2009-04-13, 4:50 PM #9
When I format I throw saves and stuff on a DVD, but since i have 2 HDDs now i just save all my crap on one.
2009-04-13, 4:53 PM #10
I've got SyncToy on my important directories to my formerly-external hard drive, whenever I feel like it. I've got a couple CD backups, which might get made every year or two, and there's also a couple USB keys with important stuff as well.
$do || ! $do ; try
try: command not found
Ye Olde Galactic Empire Mission Editor (X-wing, TIE, XvT/BoP, XWA)
2009-04-13, 5:06 PM #11
Wow, what a huge coincidence. I just found out about SyncToy from a friend and am going to set it up to sync Desktop <-- Flash drive --> Laptop. Awesome stuff.
一个大西瓜
2009-04-13, 5:10 PM #12
I never back-up anything. I like living on the edge.
SnailIracing:n(500tpostshpereline)pants
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2009-04-13, 5:12 PM #13
For some reason, I've never had a hard drive on ANY computer/device crash or otherwise fail on me. I also don't do backups because I never have anything irreplaceable on my computer.
Looks like we're not going down after all, so nevermind.
2009-04-13, 5:14 PM #14
Originally posted by ECHOMAN:
I never back-up anything. I like living on the edge.


You would make a fine TC developer.
Looks like we're not going down after all, so nevermind.
2009-04-13, 5:18 PM #15
Yes. That's why I'm in charge of JK:Source.
SnailIracing:n(500tpostshpereline)pants
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2009-04-13, 10:01 PM #16
I think the last back-ups I made onto CD were in 2005.

I lost all my JK development files once in a hard drive crash back in like 01', which was caused 100% by me.. but I lost so many hours of work I cried :(
"Nulla tenaci invia est via"
2009-04-13, 11:37 PM #17
Manually, every quarter or so. In the past I've had a drive go **** up on me, and I found I caught the symptoms quickly enough to get all the data off before it went totally south.
2009-04-13, 11:41 PM #18
My Seagate external is making clicking sounds that are making me nervous, but I can't tell if it's the click of death >_<
一个大西瓜
2009-04-14, 12:52 AM #19
I just hope my computer doesn't completely crash :\
Fincham: Where are you going?
Me: I have no idea
Fincham: I meant where are you sitting. This wasn't an existential question.
2009-04-14, 3:32 AM #20
I copy across to my external hard drive my music and important stuff that would be hard/impossible to replace (pictures, coursework, etc.). I guess it's not ideal since I'm just relying on another hard drive not to break, but the chances of them both going around the same time has to be pretty low. I've been a lot better about keeping my backups up to date since I had to reformat my desktop before Christmas last year completely out of the blue and lost a whole lot of stuff :(
2009-04-14, 8:59 AM #21
My rule of thumb is to backup anything I can't find on the internet after an hour of searching for it. I usually back up my own works (digital photos, documents) in triplicate (put on a CD, USB, and upload it somewhere on the net).

Certain things like my lab files with my data I literally have seven places that I keep them (external HD, Laptop, two USB's, two desktops, and a CD image made monthly).
2009-04-14, 9:44 AM #22
Music and pictures are in several places. Everything else is ~5tb so, yeah.
gbk is 50 probably

MB IS FAT

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