External Usb Hd Which One?

[Guest]

still it is slow (considering Thailands internet) and if it is only 25 GB, you might be better off buying 3 pcs 32 gb USB sticks (in case one burns with your office, one is faulty you still have the third)

I think the speed is not so much an issue really. Initial syncing to the cloud will naturally take an good while, but after that only the changed and new files will be synced. If one creates or changes files for 100MB per week, then that's the amount which is required to put up.

Then again, the files need to be downloaded to another computer which is using an same dropbox account. Dropbox can copy the files between computers which are on the same LAN. This will speed up the copy process quite a bit.

The benefit of this is naturally that one can use two or more computers to access the same data. One could be stationary at home or office and another on the go. If Home / office burns and the Dropbox servers die, one have still the files on the laptop which was not at the office during that time. I would say it's pretty safe.

On top of this I use own LAN NAS server, where my laptop is backed up every few hours when I'm connected to my home office LAN. This is to make recovery easy if I accidentally remove my whole dopbox directory.

Data security is also an concern when using cloud NAS. I'm using encryption with EncFS for the directories which have more classified data. There is even an Android client which connects to the Dropbox account and can display the encrypted files and directories.

[h90]

All these stories of regular failures are not encouraging for a "backup" disk solution.

It is all very well to say the disk can be swapped, but what about all the data that is lost??

Cloud solutions are all very well, if you have fast and infinite bandwidth,

and even clouds can blow away.

I now use 2 USB HDD which I use alternative. So if one computer dies and at the same time the USB HD is not readable anymore, I just loose 1 more week of data (I think I'll now backup every Saturday).

I made a full backup of every computer last week. Boot with Acronis from an USB stick, start a complete HD backup over the network to my computer, is just 8 min. Move the user data from the server needs a bit more time.

Than copy everything to the USB HDD. Every week use the other USB HDD.

Can make it a bit more automatic, but it is good to see the staffs tables and computers as well. That a fan is about to die and getting noisy or that the computer is complete dirty doesn't disturb anyone here I think.

[h90]

still it is slow (considering Thailands internet) and if it is only 25 GB, you might be better off buying 3 pcs 32 gb USB sticks (in case one burns with your office, one is faulty you still have the third)

I think the speed is not so much an issue really. Initial syncing to the cloud will naturally take an good while, but after that only the changed and new files will be synced. If one creates or changes files for 100MB per week, then that's the amount which is required to put up.

Then again, the files need to be downloaded to another computer which is using an same dropbox account. Dropbox can copy the files between computers which are on the same LAN. This will speed up the copy process quite a bit.

The benefit of this is naturally that one can use two or more computers to access the same data. One could be stationary at home or office and another on the go. If Home / office burns and the Dropbox servers die, one have still the files on the laptop which was not at the office during that time. I would say it's pretty safe.

On top of this I use own LAN NAS server, where my laptop is backed up every few hours when I'm connected to my home office LAN. This is to make recovery easy if I accidentally remove my whole dopbox directory.

Data security is also an concern when using cloud NAS. I'm using encryption with EncFS for the directories which have more classified data. There is even an Android client which connects to the Dropbox account and can display the encrypted files and directories.

yes that is right, but I had at least 10 HD failing in say the last 2 years (rough estimate maybe just 1 year). That would be somewhat 50 GB on the company server and 100 GB on my computer.

That 100 GB must be downloaded before I can start to restore the HD/System.

With a local solution I plug in the USB3 HDD (or over the 1000Mbit Network), boot from CD or USB Stick and restore in minutes.

I had times when True internet had problems every 30 minutes. If that happens at the same time. With the nervous staff asking me every 5 min if they can print an invoice I would jump out of the window.

[Guest]

yes that is right, but I had at least 10 HD failing in say the last 2 years (rough estimate maybe just 1 year). That would be somewhat 50 GB on the company server and 100 GB on my computer.

That 100 GB must be downloaded before I can start to restore the HD/System.

With a local solution I plug in the USB3 HDD (or over the 1000Mbit Network), boot from CD or USB Stick and restore in minutes.

I had times when True internet had problems every 30 minutes. If that happens at the same time. With the nervous staff asking me every 5 min if they can print an invoice I would jump out of the window.

We are obviously talking of quite different cases here

Mine was small company / personal usage and yours about an company which probably have it's own IT-department and real IT infrastructure.

For larger companies I would go with NetApp or similar filers. Great snapshot system (or at least it was) for cases when an user said "I did nothing, the file/directory just disappeared.. could you restore it".

For small companies and personal usage Dropbox with and local backup is quite good. Specially as it allows shared directories to be synced between people.

[Dork]

It is all very well to say the disk can be swapped, but what about all the data that is lost??

In the case of a RAID5 (or other hybrid RAIDs) as long as only one disk per array dies at a time there is no data loss.

However as a stand alone unit, I agree - it's risky to rely on a single disk for critical data.

Cloud solutions are all very well, if you have fast and infinite bandwidth, and even clouds can blow away.

Some of the high speed internet packages we're starting to see in Thailand now make cloud (or other off site) back ups viable. With an upstream data rate of 10Mb/s it should be possible to back up say 50GB overnight.

[h90]

yes that is right, but I had at least 10 HD failing in say the last 2 years (rough estimate maybe just 1 year). That would be somewhat 50 GB on the company server and 100 GB on my computer.

That 100 GB must be downloaded before I can start to restore the HD/System.

With a local solution I plug in the USB3 HDD (or over the 1000Mbit Network), boot from CD or USB Stick and restore in minutes.

I had times when True internet had problems every 30 minutes. If that happens at the same time. With the nervous staff asking me every 5 min if they can print an invoice I would jump out of the window.

We are obviously talking of quite different cases here

Mine was small company / personal usage and yours about an company which probably have it's own IT-department and real IT infrastructure.

For larger companies I would go with NetApp or similar filers. Great snapshot system (or at least it was) for cases when an user said "I did nothing, the file/directory just disappeared.. could you restore it".

For small companies and personal usage Dropbox with and local backup is quite good. Specially as it allows shared directories to be synced between people.

Well, rofl, I am the IT Department, but I am also 10 other departments, rolf, as the cleaning woman resigned I am now also the house cleaning department, rofl.

The infrastructure is I don't know 10-15 PCs. One solid one is called "server" as it sounds better than "my wifes PC shares all the company files and accounting".

I see the critical data less of a problem, than the many HD failure (My guess: poor quality of WD, together with long hours of use per day and heat+moisture) and installing the OS and software again. Finding all the driver again.

No PC has a CD drive.

I always neglected that problems, ending with spending hours of reinstalling everything.

[Guest]

Well, rofl, I am the IT Department, but I am also 10 other departments, rolf, as the cleaning woman resigned I am now also the house cleaning department, rofl.

The infrastructure is I don't know 10-15 PCs. One solid one is called "server" as it sounds better than "my wifes PC shares all the company files and accounting".

I see the critical data less of a problem, than the many HD failure (My guess: poor quality of WD, together with long hours of use per day and heat+moisture) and installing the OS and software again. Finding all the driver again.

No PC has a CD drive.

I always neglected that problems, ending with spending hours of reinstalling everything.

Nowdays we need to be multitalented!

In your case get an simple RAID 1 NAS and store the files there? I have Linksys DNS-320 which is not great, but good enough. The box has gigabit ethernet and 2 disk bays. Cost is somewhere under 4000B

On the box 2 * 1GB or 2GB disks with Raid 1 configuration. Everything is mirrored to both disks.

In case of errors on disks, the filer can send reports by email. So when the filer reports that one disk is filing, you can send it for replacement. If you wish, you can have an spare disk which you push in to the NAS so that the raid will be rebuild automatically.

If the PCs are static on the office, just share the directories with Samba, NFS or which ever you prefer. There is no reason to keep any company data on the PCs.

Syncronise the data from the NAS once a week to an external disks, which you keep in other location in case of fire or thievery. This should give good enough data protection.

If you don't really need any Windows specific programs, you can try to use Linux. I just installed a new Kubuntu to my 5 year old laptop with shiny new SSD disk from a USB disk. It took something like 2-3 minutes from the start up and running system. I was amazed of the speed! Well. ok I had to install libreoffice etc later on, but the basic installation was fast.

[h90]

Well, rofl, I am the IT Department, but I am also 10 other departments, rolf, as the cleaning woman resigned I am now also the house cleaning department, rofl.

The infrastructure is I don't know 10-15 PCs. One solid one is called "server" as it sounds better than "my wifes PC shares all the company files and accounting".

I see the critical data less of a problem, than the many HD failure (My guess: poor quality of WD, together with long hours of use per day and heat+moisture) and installing the OS and software again. Finding all the driver again.

No PC has a CD drive.

I always neglected that problems, ending with spending hours of reinstalling everything.

Nowdays we need to be multitalented!

In your case get an simple RAID 1 NAS and store the files there? I have Linksys DNS-320 which is not great, but good enough. The box has gigabit ethernet and 2 disk bays. Cost is somewhere under 4000B

On the box 2 * 1GB or 2GB disks with Raid 1 configuration. Everything is mirrored to both disks.

In case of errors on disks, the filer can send reports by email. So when the filer reports that one disk is filing, you can send it for replacement. If you wish, you can have an spare disk which you push in to the NAS so that the raid will be rebuild automatically.

If the PCs are static on the office, just share the directories with Samba, NFS or which ever you prefer. There is no reason to keep any company data on the PCs.

Syncronise the data from the NAS once a week to an external disks, which you keep in other location in case of fire or thievery. This should give good enough data protection.

If you don't really need any Windows specific programs, you can try to use Linux. I just installed a new Kubuntu to my 5 year old laptop with shiny new SSD disk from a USB disk. It took something like 2-3 minutes from the start up and running system. I was amazed of the speed! Well. ok I had to install libreoffice etc later on, but the basic installation was fast.

Yes that is almost what I do.

The normal Office computer have no data on it, every staff has his shared folder on the "server" and only he (and I) can read/write it.

So I need only a system backup from these computers (exception when the staff does not follow the rules and save in "my documents". Only changes are new user or new passwords and the email folder (which I could also move to the server, never thought of this).

The production machine computers contain some data which need backups. Which could be moved to the server but I always kept it separate.

Unfortunately the silly accounting software needs some database things run on the "server" to function, so it need to be a PC. And there need to be a PC anyway.

What I don't like on the NAS is, that we have several problems with the electric, specially when there are thunderstorms. So I prefer to have the backup physically disconnected when the next time the lightning hits the electric.

On this computer I tried a Agility 3 SSD and it did not work stable. I use the same now on my desktop with Win7 and it is just unbelievable fast.....SSD is for sure the future.

[Guest]

I must say I was impressed with the speed of OCZ Vertex 4 SSD. 4450B/128GB.

On the lighter side. Tesco Lotus is now selling 2*16GB Flash drives for 500B. I was tempted to buy 2 sets (4*16GB) for 1000B. Then create an RAID 5 or RAID 0+1 configuration on an USB hub.

Read / Write speeds are not there.. but it could be fun project to do

http://bigbruin.com/reviews05/thumbraid_1

http://analogbit.com/node/4

[Dork]

I must say I was impressed with the speed of OCZ Vertex 4 SSD. 4450B/128GB.

On the lighter side. Tesco Lotus is now selling 2*16GB Flash drives for 500B. I was tempted to buy 2 sets (4*16GB) for 1000B. Then create an RAID 5 or RAID 0+1 configuration on an USB hub.

Read / Write speeds are not there.. but it could be fun project to do

http://bigbruin.com/...s05/thumbraid_1

http://analogbit.com/node/4

I've read of people doing that before. You can't do a software RAID with Windows though because it doesn't support USB.

Apparently the new "Storage Spaces" feature in Windows 8 does support USB. I have no experience with that but might be an idea....

[Gregory Morozov]

All of the drives will fail, sooner or later.

RAID is not a backup solution. It's a high availability solution.

Triple backups of critical and expensive data, one of them outside of the facility at all times. Online or rotate external HDDs and bring them to another location.

I saw it quite a few times when the data and all backups were gone in one go because of fire, lightning, or flood.

The moment you connect your backup drive to your PC, both of them are vulnerable.