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Topic : "how do you backup your stuff?" |
Francis
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 Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 10:36 am |
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Just curious how people deal with backups of their art work and photos, mp3s, etc. I have a file server that's hooked into my router so all the machines on our home network can see it. It's also where I keep all my freelance working files so naturally I'm paranoid that one day it will blow up and I will be hosed.
So, I'm investigating some backup options and wanted to see what people here do about that.
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eyewoo
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 11:15 am |
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I use an old method. As I'm working on a picture, I save at various stages to incremented numbered versions on my hardrive. At day's end, I copy the day's work to DVDRW disks, overwriting old files from the day before if necessary. When I have 4 gig of new stuff or a project is over, I burn the files (generally development and finals) to permanent DVDs and reuse the DVDRWs. I do this pretty religiously.
I don't bother backing up programs or the OS... Since 1984, I've always moved to a new system before the old one dies of old age, so OS and programs have not been a backup problem as long as i have the install disks...
My backup system is tedious, but well indexed so i can find old stuff when I have to.
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Jimmyjimjim
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 11:33 am |
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I burn to DVD-R as I fill up 4.3 gigs worth of stuff (usually one or two jobs). About once a month I make master copies that are sorted and put them in my safe deposit box. That way I'm also protected against physical damage or theft as well.
I do this with pretty much any information based stuff that would be dificult to recover, also (personal docs, mp3 collection, etc.).
Of course, I haven't been doing much freelance since I started school, but I like to keep schoolwork safe, too. |
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Francis
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 12:03 pm |
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Wow you guys are too diligent!
But that's pretty failsafe isn't it?
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Francis Tsai
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balistic
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 12:11 pm |
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DVDs are way too much effort. I have two USB2.0 hard drives. One is a full-size drive that sits on top of my machine and receives a backup of all my work files about once a week. The other is a bus-powered laptop drive that I keep off-site, and every couple weeks I bring it home to do a backup.
It's critical that you have something off-site, in my opinion, in case fire or burglars snag your on-site copy.
With external hard drives being so cheap, they really strike me as a better option that optical media.
But then I'm lazy 
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Jimmyjimjim
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 12:56 pm |
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I'd agree with you about physical drives, but I've seen far too many of those get toasted.
Just this week a friend of mine had an unrecoverable error. He lost everything from the last 3 months. |
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eyewoo
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:12 pm |
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yea... I agree on the disadvantage of using harddrives for backup. I've been at this for quite a few years now, and still have stuff easily available to me that I did at the beginning of this crazy digital journey. I doubt that would be the case if I had backed up to a hard drive... Some of my CDROMs go back to the early 1990s... (way before DVDs)
For what I consider "important stuff" I also keep copies off site.
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jfrancis
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:21 pm |
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I have a Filemaker Pro database for real world stuff that I have in storage. I can tell you the id numbers of all the boxes my Christmas decorations are in, and I can tell you the contents of a particular box.
For data, on the other hand, I am extremely haphazard.  |
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balistic
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:53 pm |
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| Jimmyjimjim wrote: |
I'd agree with you about physical drives, but I've seen far too many of those get toasted.
Just this week a friend of mine had an unrecoverable error. He lost everything from the last 3 months. |
That doesn't say anything about the validity of hard drives as backups.
He obviously didn't even have a backup. My data is on THREE hard drives, one of which is in another location with 24 hour security. Safe deposit boxes at banks are great for this kind of thing.
I could lose two of them and all I'd have to do is buy another and mirror the backup again. You can buy two 100 GB external drives for less than $200.
DVDs do not last forever. They chemically degrade over time. With a hard drive, at least you know when it's failed (and in 15 years of using computers, I've never had one fail that wasn't due to user error). A lot of the CDs I burnt back in the late 90s are no longer readable, or are riddled with errors. Some optical media is stable for longer, some isn't. It's a crap shoot.
That's why I like hard drives. Optical backups can lull you into a false sense of security. You think you have a copy of something sitting in a cabinet somewhere but in reality it's degraded and won't be readable when you need to look at it again years later. With an HDD the files are constantly refreshed, and a simple scandisk will tell you if the media needs replacing. No surprises.
It's good to also keep things on optical media, but I consider that secondary to my HDD mirrors.
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goldenavatar0
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:30 pm |
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I don't have the financial resources or incentive to buy myself a DVD-RW system or some other more professional file back up system right now, even though my standing PC is a 3 year old 1.1ghz pc, but what I do to backup my files is pretty simple. Once a month I tend to burn the stuff I've completed for various projects to 700 meg CD-R discs, if needed. This consists mainly of classwork I want to save for later personal review.
Software/programs are totally different since they get updated at least once yearly to the newest version, the 29c spent on a disc would be wasted if I did that. If there's software I feel I need to keep at the ready, rather then burn it to disc, I'll keep it on my Dell DJ 20, and just access it as needed. I doubt it sounds very professional, but like I said, right now I don't have the incentive to invest resources into a more professional file backup system.
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B0b
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:32 pm |
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my stuff gets put on HDD each night
end of the job it gets burnt double on either DVD or CD depending on the size of the job, 1 then gets put with a final output of the finished job in the job docket - then goes into the filing cabinet, the 2nd then gets put in a work CD wallet that i have, and gets taken out of the office each night
like phil i don't save Apps as i have the originals that can then just be re-installed within 1/2 a day, i do have a Ghosted System Disk which i Ghosted when i had tweeked my system b4 installing the apps (means i have a full system up and running within 30 mins if my system should take a turn for the worst ) |
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Jimmyjimjim
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 10:54 am |
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| balistic wrote: |
That doesn't say anything about the validity of hard drives as backups.
He obviously didn't even have a backup. |
How does that not say anyhing about the validity of a HDD as backup? The drive (an external USB2.0) WAS his backup. If you have a triple redundancy system, maybe it's stable enough, but then you have to copy everything 3 times.
You're right, DVD's do degrade, but I still have CD-Rs from way back, like Eyewoo. Most of them are consolidated on DVD-R now. No problems yet. On the flipside, in that same timeperiod I've lost (I think) 3 hard drives. 1 could be reformatted, two were done.
Long before a CD-R or DVD-R degrades, it's most likely that all the data will be transferred to a new kind of high storage media anyway. It's likely in 3-5 years everything of mine will be on HD-DVD or Blueray DVD.
I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm tellng you what works best for me. |
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balistic
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 11:04 am |
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| Jimmyjimjim wrote: |
How does that not say anyhing about the validity of a HDD as backup? The drive (an external USB2.0) WAS his backup. If you have a triple redundancy system, maybe it's stable enough, but then you have to copy everything 3 times.
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That's the thing . . . it's not a real backup if you're only making one copy. It's safer than not making any copies, but the general rule of thumb I've heard from IT guys is that you want at least one local backup, and one off-site. That gives you pretty good protection if either your main drive or one of the copies should fail.
I didn't have the off-site drive for a long time, but then it occurred to me that if my apartment burned down while I was at work, or if my computer was stolen in a robbery, I'd be totally screwed.
Whatever media you use, keep a copy off-site.
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Misc
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 11:30 am |
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| What programs do you guys use to make automatic backups on another HDD? |
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eyewoo
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 11:33 am |
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IT guys probably have a different mindset about backups than an artist has. The IT guy wants stuff backed up for at least a "legal" amount of time, measured in a few years. An artist probably is thinking about longer term backups...
Just an interesting difference to note...
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Naeem
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 2:30 pm |
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| i used partition magic watever version is the newest, created a 'virtual' drive and stored all my artwork/important stuff there. now if my windows messes up, i can keep all the data and only format the drive that windows is installed on. however, if something drastic happens like my cpu fries up, im screwed. but this has proved efficient. |
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eyewoo
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 4:00 pm |
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annisahmad... hmmm... I think it should be pointed out that your system of backing up on the same hard drive that you are using is not really backing up. Simply creating another partion is not setting up a system of backing up. A hard drive will fail at some point, in which case all partitions are lost. It may take years, but it will fail. To backup your work or data, you really need to copy it to a different hard drive or storage media of some sort. Believe me when I tell you you are not backing up... 
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Jimmyjimjim
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 4:14 pm |
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| balistic wrote: |
| Whatever media you use, keep a copy off-site. |
If you re-read my first post, that's exactly what I proposed. |
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spooge demon
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 5:53 pm |
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I separate backups from archives. Daily BU of my whole work drive goes through retrospect to a large USB2 drive. This way I have incremental copies as well.
Once a set of data will more than likely no longer change, I burn it to three sets of DVDs. Two sets stay here, one set goes to my Dad out of state. His climate is also cooler and drier than it is here.
I am not too worried about the longevity of optical media, as I transfer all the data as things change. And as capacities increase, this becomes less of a chore.
I also have a complete copy of all the DVD archive set on my HD, as further BU and so I have access to old work easily. If that drive went down, no big deal. But also if my opticals all went south I have a totally different technology to help out.
Balistic, I have had many hard drives go belly up on me. What may I have done to cause this?
I worry a bit about retrospect and its proprietary file format for backups. I could see my work drive goes down and I go to restore and it says it cannot read that 100GB wad of a file. Sorry. I guess there are synch utilities that just deal with files, I might look into that.
Also might want to consider checksums before archive. Some stuff that I did before 95 has gone through many transfers and from mac to PC, etc. It is pretty difficult to open up every file and verify that all is OK. I use a little utility called QuickSFV that is excellent. The check file goes with the archive. |
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balistic
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 7:36 pm |
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| Misc wrote: |
| What programs do you guys use to make automatic backups on another HDD? |
I use this.
Free and simple.
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balistic
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 7:38 pm |
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| Jimmyjimjim wrote: |
| balistic wrote: |
| Whatever media you use, keep a copy off-site. |
If you re-read my first post, that's exactly what I proposed. |
Indeed you did, it just sounded like your friend had all his eggs in one basket.
Last edited by balistic on Sun Jun 26, 2005 7:59 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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balistic
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 7:50 pm |
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| spooge demon wrote: |
Balistic, I have had many hard drives go belly up on me. What may I have done to cause this?
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There have been a few bum models over the years with inherent defects . . . the IBM Deskstar series had an awful failure rate. Otherwise, things like overvoltage and sudden impacts can bone a drive. And then there are a tiny fraction that will just fail after X many years.
But with drives increasing in capacity so quickly, there's no reason to let things sit on an HDD for more than 3 years before you move it to a newer, faster, more reliable one (or rather, two or three).
| spooge demon wrote: |
I worry a bit about retrospect and its proprietary file format for backups. I could see my work drive goes down and I go to restore and it says it cannot read that 100GB wad of a file. Sorry. I guess there are synch utilities that just deal with files, I might look into that. |
Definitely opt for vanilla per-file backup. You take a hit in terms of disc space because the files won't be compressed, but you have the advantage of being able to quickly browse and retreive files without propietary software that may or may not be supported by any OS in 10 years.
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Jimmyjimjim
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 8:36 pm |
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| balistic wrote: |
| it just sounded like your friend had all his eggs in one basket. |
Indeed!
Stalemate! 
Wasn't the deskstar nicknamed the "deathstar" after it's nearly legendary failure rate?
Personally, I've had two Western Digitals and one Maxtor die. To be fair, the Maxtor died during a de-frag. Apparently a common occurence with any drive. |
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spooge demon
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 10:13 pm |
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I don't use retrospect for archiving at all. Just daily BU. But when I have had to rely on it, it has been OK. But still nervous.
So that leads to another question. Are there any good synchronization utilities that will simply synchronize folders in one direction on a schedule? Folder to folder, different drives? That is really all that is needed.
Two advantages of retrospect are that different versions are saved, and like you said, it is compressed. But reliability is more important than either of these things.
I really urge everyone to use the CRC utility that I mentioned. I have lost quite a few files to corruption that I didn't know had been corrupted. If I had known, I could have done something about it at the time. I am supposing that the corruption happened at file transfer, but even if it happened some other time, the sooner you know the better chance you have of correcting it. |
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Bg
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2005 11:15 pm |
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Some years ago I lost tons of stuff due to HD failure, since then I've made an effort to backup my files. I have two computers at home which have pretty much the same files each. Every once in a while I send all my project files and references over the internet to my brother for backup.
BTW. Just a couple of weeks ago I had two IBM deathstars fail on me, they were in Raid array.. it was one of those moments when you can really appreciate the fact that everything is backed up well.
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Pato
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| Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 4:40 am |
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I like XXCopy to sychronize two harddrives. In my case I use a raid 0 to my working files, and a single HDD to my "temporary" BU. Temporary because the "permanent" BU, or almost, in my case, is the DVD.
The XXCopy is pretty simple command line, but very powerful. I create a .bat file, and in the end of the day it synchronize everything.
Works for me...
www.xxcopy.com |
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balistic
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| Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 5:52 am |
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| spooge demon wrote: |
So that leads to another question. Are there any good synchronization utilities that will simply synchronize folders in one direction on a schedule? Folder to folder, different drives? That is really all that is needed.
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That's what this utility does. You just define what folder or files you want copied, where you want them, and how often. It will supposedly RAR them up into an archive for you if you tell it where your rar.dll is, which would be good for maintaining a checksummed file (I don't use this feature). It will also do incremental backups with datestamped directories.
I tried a bunch of freebie scheduled copy utilities and it was the only one that seemed to actually do what it was supposed to.
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B0b
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| Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 2:06 pm |
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| windows has its own syncronisation - using the briefcase, if you copy your briefcase to another HDD, and then when u copy again it only updates the files that have been changed since you last dragged the briefcase to the drive.. |
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Socar MYLES
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| Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 2:29 pm |
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I'm doing mostly traditional work these days. Some of it gets sold before I get the chance to scan it, but I try not to let that happen too much. That mostly happens with crappier pieces that I don't care about anyway.
My normal means of preserving the work for my records is to scan it as well as possible, put it on my hard drive, and hope I don't get a crash. Every once in a while, I back it up to CD. But my scanner is a real piece of garbage anyway, so the scans never look anywhere near as good as the real thing. (Anyone who bought a picture can attest to that!)
If I ever want to do a book of my work, it's going to be really hard. All I have is this pile of mediocre scans. The originals mostly belong to folks I don't know well enough to ask for a better scan. I don't know--can publishers fix that sort of thing? Is there some Photoshop trick I don't know, which would enable ME to fix it? Augh. What a pain.
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Chruser
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| Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2005 8:25 am |
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I upload my digital work to multiple servers on different continents. Failsafe for a small-scale nuclear war? As far as scanning your work goes, what kind of scanner do you guys use? I have a Canon LiDE scanner, which takes A4 (approximately 9"x12"), but I'm not comfortable with the quality. Light lines (e.g. pencil strokes) are sometimes ignored or badly distorted.
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