Always back up

[The Vector Doctor]

Just a reminder. What would you do if you had to wipe clean your HD and start from scratch? How much time/money/aggravation would you lose?

Thankfully I have a good back up system in place. I spent 3 hours this AM restoring my main HD from a fresh backup

HD did not fail per se but there was a directory structure error which required a wipe and HD restore. I will look into it further though to see if the HD is actually failing somehow

I don't know what I would have done without my backup though. And offsite storage (online) would not have helped me in this case

 

[round man]

I keep all my files on a 5 usb external drives. I have one usb adapter that plugs into a sata/ide 40 pin and an 80 pin interface.For less than $20 it was a great deal as it works with laptop drives and or with an included power adapter on normal size drives. that way if one fails I have multiple copies just in case. It also serves as a great tool for recovering data off clients drives when their system drive needs to be restored to an out of the box state with a recovery disk and or it is screwed up by a virus and or malware and will not boot. I usually back up all my files on multiple drives once or more a week depending on the amount of work I have going at anyone time,...

 

[Mosh]

I kkep a copy of all Corel and Signlab files on an external hard-drive. I need to back it up more than I do...

 

[SignManiac]

I did a total backup last Friday. I'm getting in the habit of backing up every Saturday when I'm not using the computer and if my HD takes a dump, I'm only out a weeks work, which is still a lot in my case.

 

[mrfern]

Something to consider. FIRE.... I set up a nice NAS (Network Area Storage) 1 TB server for a company where all their files were back up to the main NAS backup hard drive 2 times a week. I told the owner to make sure he had a copy of what was on the NAS in a safe location.. off site. In the event of theft or fire. Two years later he called me and said THANK YOU THANK YOU... FIRE... building went all the way down to the ground. I had set up folderclone program to run as a service and back up to the NAS. Once the folderclose took the 400 meg of zipped data to the owners workstation then all he needed to do was burn it to a disk and move it to a safe location. I set up a outlook reminder to tell him to do it Monthly on a WED and he usually did. Most data he was out was 2 weeks worth. Lesson learned was a remote back up at least 2 times a year at an off site location. Oh and in case you wondered if the A rated fire safe worked... yes and no. The ammo in the safe got so hot that had it not burned which it did the exploded ammo would have killed the backup media.

2 TB harddrive is 80 bucks on Amazon
folderclone is 30 bucks
Backup of all your data offsite.. priceless

mrfern

 

[Finishline Signs]

I just purchased a Netgear TeraStation that is used as our main storage for all computers. It is set as Raid 1 so if one drive fails all I have to do is pop another one in. I am also fixing to buy another set of hard drives to use with a plug in drive holder to back up the TeraStation so I can have a weekly backup in a fire safe and another offsite.

 

[Border]

I'm home-based and have a a detached shop with a hard-wired network (as well as wireless) between the buildings. I do my backups via Ethernet to a hard drive in the other building in case of fire or theft, etc.

 

[Mosh]

I have a concrete poured building, even the roof!!! Not going to burn down! I know
the stuff inside can burn, but that is what insurance is for!

 

[njshorts]

Quick/Easy way is what we do... All files are replicated real-time to a server downtown with a brick level backup (clonezilla) that I update when major changes are made. Getting everything back to normal is a 15-20 minute deal.

If you'd like to go a bit further and contain your own data at home, use clonezilla/deltacopy (rsync if OSX/Linux) to create local backups to a linux box (cheap, 75-100$ plus drives), rsyncing to a similar system at your home or other location. All in all, this can be done with RAID for under 500$... Restores can be done quickly and easily.

 

[Sven]

I have two hard drives in my comp. The second is for backup. The first is split in two partitions. The first partition is for Operating System and programs. The second for files. The files are backed up to the second drive regularly--about once a week--using Syncback. It's an awesome free program I've been using for years. The operating system partition is backed up in a disk image I created with Acronis True Image, which is saved with my files, and also backed up on the second drive. If I ever have system problems, or a virus or something, I just use the Acronis boot disk to restore the partition. Takes about ten minutes. Files are left untouched. I have had to do it a few times and it works great. I also have an external drive I keep at home with all files, including OS image, backed up.

 

[phototec]

Just a reminder. What would you do if you had to wipe clean your HD and start from scratch? How much time/money/aggravation would you lose?

Great post!

I thick we should have someone post up a reminder about backing-up once a week at least.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, maybe even a TON in some cases!

 

[The Vector Doctor]

Everybody keeps mentioning that their total restore is 10-15 minutes? Really? It takes at least that long to install Adobe software to a HD

My hard drive wipe and reinstall of every bit of system software and user created files was about 3 hours automated.

I could probably restore my doc folder in 10-15 minutes but I have always found that the above process takes a long time. It was about 130gb

 

[Bigdawg]

We run two hour backups and on Fridays the boss brings in an external drive that I back up to and he takes back home for offsite storage - just in case of fire or catastrophe - or even theft.

That two hour back up has helped - nothing like being able to go back and retrieve a file you accidentally overwrote...

 

[petesign]

I just bought a 1TB external hard drive that plugs in via USB. It automatically saves every file on my drive, and automatically backs up every change. I think it was about 60 bucks. It's not a ghosted image though, so if my HD dies, I will have to reinstall everything.

 

[Pat Whatley]

How come nobody ever mentions online storage? I would think that would be a whole lot more secure than carrying around external drives.

 

[The Vector Doctor]

How come nobody ever mentions online storage? I would think that would be a whole lot more secure than carrying around external drives.

My concern is restoring. It is a great 2nd or 3rd option but should not be your only one. I have heard that some people say it can take several weeks to back up 100's of gigs when you first sign up for the service. That would never work for a quick restore either

 

[mrfern]

How come nobody ever mentions online storage? I would think that would be a whole lot more secure than carrying around external drives.

Storage is a reoccurring bill. Drives and remote storage are cheaper. CLOUD computing is good but there is a problem with off site data recovery.... It is very slow but does work.

my .02 cents
mrfern

 

[James Burke]

Don't forget to back up your FONTS! Seems everybody remembers their customer files and other pertinent data, but oftentimes fonts are forgotten.

You'll quickly remember when you load an archived file and it tells you that it can't find the fonts. Artwork that hasn't been converted to curves isn't worth a crap without them. Absolutely frustrating.

I recently re-loaded 500+ MB of fonts that were backed up in my Suitcase Fusion 3 font vault. It took just a few clicks of the mouse and everything was good to go. Absolutely priceless! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_GgHSP_Dfo


JB

 

[Sven]

Everybody keeps mentioning that their total restore is 10-15 minutes? Really? It takes at least that long to install Adobe software to a HD

My hard drive wipe and reinstall of every bit of system software and user created files was about 3 hours automated.

If you create a restorable image of your hard drive using a program like Acronis, after you've initially installed all the software you use and adjusted settings, restoring the *image* takes just a few minutes. No need to reinstall any software. Everything is just the way it was when you created the image--bit for bit.

For this to work, you have to keep your files on a separate drive or partition, otherwise they will be rewritten.

 

[njshorts]

Everybody keeps mentioning that their total restore is 10-15 minutes? Really? It takes at least that long to install Adobe software to a HD

My hard drive wipe and reinstall of every bit of system software and user created files was about 3 hours automated.

I could probably restore my doc folder in 10-15 minutes but I have always found that the above process takes a long time. It was about 130gb

www.clonezilla.org

I don't reinstall, I reimage based on my last good backup.

Did a restore for a client a few weeks ago with 160 GB in use, took 35 mins. My estimate is based on my HD usage, ymmv. To speed up your restores, use a multi-tiered approach to backup with a separate brick-level backup (like what I posted).