Backups and Balls Ups - Dealing with Data Loss
A very recent paraphrased conversation:
Me: So when did you last do a back up
Them: When it stopped working
Me: When was that
Them: About a year ago
Me: WTF, why in the name of Christ did you not tell me before
Them: Don’t know.
Me: But the break in we just had last night where one of the main machines was stolen and all the data liberated so the machine can be sold for £100 down the boozer was the reason we had the backup in the first place. Now we don’t have a box or the freaking data etc etc etc
So based on the above what can I put in place to get it all automated. I need simple solutions that don’t require massive outlay. I am after recommendations please. :-). A 3 machine network.
Cheers
- Y! MyWeb
Windows or *nix?½
Well, what are they running?
Sorry to hear about that ukgimp, sure this is not a competitor? Better be changing all those passwords that may be stored on there aswell mate...
Small scale office environment
XP, you know the form Word, excel documents etc calendars.
Data?
Rough idea of data to be backed up? External USB hard-drives are your friend (re-writable DVD's are not). If lots of data then the Iomega Rev drive (35 Gig, bite-sized) keeps me happy - a daily rotation system seems to work.
If Windows then HandyBackup is simple and can do networks, so can GRBak. If you've got a Server then things start to get pricey - Dantz Retrospect is good albeit idiosyncratic (and not cheap).
And commiserations - give them a good kicking for me.
Online maybe?
Sounds like not a lot of data - as you're in the UK and good ADSL is probably cheaper than bad lager, might be worth looking at online storage/backup solutions - run it overnight and let someone else worry about flame-proof vaults and the like.
We back up all our important
We back up all our important stuff every night to a server at remote location. Takes about 1 hour over 2mb line.
It's basic, it's cheap, it's
It's basic, it's cheap, it's easy and it's bloody efficient.
I love it - ReoBack
The downside is that it is nix specific, which is fine for me but not neccesarily for you.
For Windows machines I save files to a nix machine that is set up with WebDav, access that as a standard Windows drive then remotely back that machine up using ReoBack.
connected.com
Over the years, we've tried every backup possible. All local backup methods suck. What if you have a fire, water damage, domino hardware melt-down (like power problems), theft, etc? Remote backup is the only pro way to go. We settled on connected.com (not an affiliate link and no relation to the company):
http://www.connected.com/solution/DataProtector.asp
Aloha,
Kirk out.
Combo perhaps
It seems a combo would work for you gimp. Something like handybackup (my fav) or similar to USB drive/s, run daily, and then burnt to DVD weekly to be stored offsite. Then you are a day behind locally, and only a week behind offsite should local be a total disaster. You could even rotate offsite locations to further lessen the risk of total data loss.
This would probably not be sufficient for a larger network though.