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Backups
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mattyb
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Nov 30, 2008, 03:21 PM
 
Sorry, not sure if this is the right Forum for this.

A mate of mine had his PC nicked (among other things) and he said that the worst thing was not having a backup of his photos outside of his house - they nicked the DVDs that he had backed up the photos on. SO ... I'm revisiting my backup solution and wanted feedback / advice / criticism.

I've got an external (WD MyBook) hooked up to the iMac and using TimeMachine. I'm going to buy 2 portable external hard drives (probably WD Passport Studios) and I'm going to backup all important files once a week (eg on Thursday) and then take the drive to work. The other drive will be used with either Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper for a clone backup. When Thursday comes, I'll backup the important files and then swap the drive with the one at work.

Unless I've miscalculated I should have covered all bases : Time Machine backups on the permanently attached MyBook. The hard drive at work will have a copy of all my important files, and the second portable hard drive will have a clone that I can boot from if the internal hard drive dies.

So, what would you guys and gals recommend for the 'clone' backups? CCC or Super Duper?
Am I missing something in my backup solution?
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Doc HM
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Nov 30, 2008, 04:10 PM
 
I would look at Jungle disk for some cheap off site backup. Given that you will not be generating a large amount of changed file data day on day, even having a nightly upload shouldn't break the bank, and if it looks like it might you can always schedule a weekly upload instead.
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mattyb  (op)
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Nov 30, 2008, 04:19 PM
 
I have Jungle Disk with Amazon S3 behind it and from my experience its too long. I'm not sure if its because I'm in France, but when I tried doing the iTunes library it took longer than a weekend. And my library has grown since. I have 200G of data that needs backing up now.
     
OreoCookie
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Nov 30, 2008, 05:02 PM
 
I use Synk Standard for that.
I have a second external harddrive at my parents' home that I update once a month. It doesn't just clone, it does incremental updates.
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turtle777
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Dec 1, 2008, 02:17 AM
 
Ok, so I just found out that Dreamhost now allows 50GB for personal backups. Great deal.

See more in my thread here.

-t
     
zro
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Dec 1, 2008, 02:31 AM
 
Right now the only data I truly fear losing is photos. So I keep a (sometimes) weekly backup of iPhoto in the car in an encrypted sparseimage on an iPod. But I just used AppleScript Folder Actions on the Volumes folder to run rsync (sometimes) automagically when the iPod connects. Nothing fancy. But for some reason I sometimes have to run it manually.
     
besson3c
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Dec 1, 2008, 02:34 AM
 
Originally Posted by turtle777 View Post
Ok, so I just found out that Dreamhost now allows 50GB for personal backups. Great deal.

See more in my thread here.

-t

Yeah, if your data isn't all that important.
     
turtle777
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Dec 1, 2008, 02:41 AM
 
Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
Yeah, if your data isn't all that important.
It's a secondary backup to my primary backups, which I keep on Time Machine.

Chances are slim that my primary computer and Time Machine both fail, and Dreamhost loses the data at the same time.

-t
     
besson3c
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Dec 1, 2008, 02:54 AM
 
Originally Posted by turtle777 View Post
It's a secondary backup to my primary backups, which I keep on Time Machine.

Chances are slim that my primary computer and Time Machine both fail, and Dreamhost loses the data at the same time.

-t

That's cool, although I'm not sure how practical it would be for me and my ridiculously slow Comcast upload speed. I'd rather stuff a hard drive into a spare computer and rsync to it, although maybe someday I ought to look into buying more bandwidth from Comcast. I don't like the idea of giving Comcast more money, but it would be nice to have.
     
turtle777
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Dec 1, 2008, 03:18 AM
 
The problem with your backup strategy: if you don't physically remove your HD from your home every time, you are not safe in case of a fire or theft.

-t
     
mattyb  (op)
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Dec 1, 2008, 08:06 AM
 
There will be one external hard drive physically attached all the time. This is being used by Time Machine. The two other hard drives will swap from being : at work and at home but with either a Super Duper or Carbon Copy Cloner backup on it. Once a week I will backup all important files to the home-based external, erasing the Super Duper or CCC backup and I will take it to work. The hard drive at work will then come home.

I won't be using a 'cloud based' backup solution because (in my experience) its too slow - I need the important file backup to last no more than 9 hours.
     
OreoCookie
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Dec 1, 2008, 08:19 AM
 
Super Duper doesn't do incremental backups, I recommend you use another software for that (e. g. Synk).*

* Note that many people use incremental backup in the wrong sense: they think of `quick updates,' i. e. only files which have been changed are copied. An incremental backup saves older versions of your file (this is not the case with Super Duper).
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mattyb  (op)
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Dec 1, 2008, 10:05 AM
 
OreoCookie, cheers looks like Synk Standard is what I'll use.

Of course if I have any problems then I'll PM you
     
OreoCookie
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Dec 1, 2008, 10:15 AM
 
Hehe, ok, no prob. Synk is quite cheap (if you take the cheapest version, I have the Standard edition). In theory, you can have it scheduled, the Pro version even allows 1-to-N backups (you could back up to two harddrives simultaneously.

Edit: Oh, I've also found a free software called Mathusalem which is supposed to do the same thing. It's hosted by google and looks like a decent project. You may want to have a look at that first.
( Last edited by OreoCookie; Dec 1, 2008 at 10:30 AM. )
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Simon
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Dec 1, 2008, 10:34 AM
 
Disk Utility's Restore is free. Its clones are rock solid. Partition a big disk into several smaller chunks to which you clone to. That way you get bootable clones, with some history. It's a great addition to a TM/TC backup. And it's free too.

It's part of every OS X installation. It's even on the OS XS install disk, IOW always available.
     
dcmacdaddy
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Dec 2, 2008, 10:42 PM
 
Originally Posted by mattyb View Post
Sorry, not sure if this is the right Forum for this.

A mate of mine had his PC nicked (among other things) and he said that the worst thing was not having a backup of his photos outside of his house - they nicked the DVDs that he had backed up the photos on. SO ... I'm revisiting my backup solution and wanted feedback / advice / criticism.

I've got an external (WD MyBook) hooked up to the iMac and using TimeMachine. I'm going to buy 2 portable external hard drives (probably WD Passport Studios) and I'm going to backup all important files once a week (eg on Thursday) and then take the drive to work. The other drive will be used with either Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper for a clone backup. When Thursday comes, I'll backup the important files and then swap the drive with the one at work.

Unless I've miscalculated I should have covered all bases : Time Machine backups on the permanently attached MyBook. The hard drive at work will have a copy of all my important files, and the second portable hard drive will have a clone that I can boot from if the internal hard drive dies.

So, what would you guys and gals recommend for the 'clone' backups? CCC or Super Duper?
Am I missing something in my backup solution?
Should thieves of Apple hardware be castrated?
I've been using CCC forever as my backup solution. I tried Super Duper but it seemed to have too many hiccups that prevented reliable (e.g.: I don't have to think about them) backups. and the 3.x versions of CCC have a nice scheduler feature built-in that works like a champ. Every day at 08:00 I do an incremental backup of my /Users directory and on Sunday at 0800 I do a full backup of the whole internal HD.

One problem I had that might effect you is that CCC uses disk name and/or disk id to find the backup disc. There is a setting in there that lets you use just disc name only so that you can swap out discs and not have the backup fail.


<edited to add>
I have my incremental backup copy files that changed *without* doing a backup of the previous version. CCC does offer the option to do an archive/save of changed files on the backup disc but that is not important to me. If I work on something where versioning is really important to me I accomplish that task with saving the versioned copies of the files separately. (For example, my thesis has 11 different versions on my computer so if I want to go back to a previous version I have the older, separate file as a reference.)


And yes, my suggestion does not take into account fire or theft. If the house burns down I lose my iMac and my backup.
( Last edited by dcmacdaddy; Dec 2, 2008 at 10:49 PM. )
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jmiddel
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Dec 2, 2008, 10:56 PM
 
My solution is to carry a small USB external 2.5 drive case with a large laptop HD in it with me any time I'm not at home. They now have 500G ones for $99. I use SuperDuper, but will maybe revert to CCC, my first BU utility, after reading some of the posts. BTW, if you are using a USB hub, make sure it is externally powered.
     
chris v
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Dec 2, 2008, 11:03 PM
 
Yeah, I was paranoid enough that I moved virtually everything to work on an external drive. Fire/theft odds are as good as drive failure or lightning strike.

I don't update the offsite storage often enough, but I wouldn't lose EVERYTHING.

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mattyb  (op)
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Dec 3, 2008, 09:21 AM
 
Bought myself a 320G WD My Passport Studio which has both Firewire 400 and USB. I'll fool around with it tonight.

Cheers for the replies, keep the suggestions coming!
     
jretzner
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Dec 4, 2008, 01:04 AM
 
I've been using both Time Machine and SuperDuper, each on a different external HD. My strategy was having different backup utilities. SuperDuper had failed when I incorrectly used it to back up. I've since learned how to use it and check that it is a good backup (Booting up via the external HD). Recently I purchased an iMac and am using only TIme Machine with one external HD. After reading in these entries I am thinking about using CCC with its incremental backup ability. I'll daisy-chain the HDs together. Any suggestions for a strategy regarding rotating a third HD for ultimate safety?
     
jimd144
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Dec 4, 2008, 09:00 PM
 
rdisk is free and already on the Mac. Most programs simply "package" rsync

type "man rsync" to lean the command from the terminal window.

rsync does it all
     
turtle777
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Dec 4, 2008, 11:13 PM
 
If you are not familiar with the terminal, rsync, scp etc... will be too high of a learning curve.

For simple incremental backups a la TimeMachine, use Methusalem, FTW.

-t
     
Hal Itosis
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Dec 5, 2008, 12:43 AM
 
I liked the look of Mathusalem, but -- after reading this -- it won't do for me:
Information about Mathusalem limitations ...two of which are:
:
• Mathusalem does not preserve owner and permissions on files or directories
• It does not preserve extended attributes on directories, but preserves them on files

re: preserves them on files
I wonder if "preserves" means they are copied the first time AND also tracked for changes.
...Or, that they are copied the first time, but NOT tracked for subsequent (xattr) changes.[?]
(i.e., would changing a file's metadata cause that same change to be "backed up"?)

Also see the questions/comments which follow on that page,
including this answer/info from one of the developers:
Mathusalem does not use rsync but a custom backup file engine.

Oh well, it is free after all. So . . .
-HI-
     
JBucanek
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Dec 5, 2008, 09:42 PM
 
For incremental backups, check out QRecall <http://www.qrecall.com/>. Handles extended attributes and even captures and restores hard links. Can also restore an entire system.
     
thechidz
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Dec 6, 2008, 01:52 AM
 
I vote carbon copy cloner
     
turtle777
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Dec 6, 2008, 02:21 AM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post
I liked the look of Mathusalem, but -- after reading this -- it won't do for me:
Information about Mathusalem limitations ...two of which are:
:
• Mathusalem does not preserve owner and permissions on files or directories
• It does not preserve extended attributes on directories, but preserves them on files


Oh well, it is free after all. So . . .
Well, isn't that sort of a given, if you'd back up to FTP / SFTP server ?

For local backups (to a HD), it's a different matter.

-t
     
turtle777
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Dec 6, 2008, 02:26 AM
 
Originally Posted by JBucanek View Post
For incremental backups, check out QRecall <http://www.qrecall.com/>. Handles extended attributes and even captures and restores hard links. Can also restore an entire system.
Looks interesting.

-t
     
thechidz
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Dec 6, 2008, 04:03 AM
 
I will look into this
     
   
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