Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

We have three computers. I made a spreadsheet of what software is installed on what computer. It helps a lot in situations like this.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Amazon S3 cloud - by far the largest cloud provider (for a reason)

lorvey Loc: Lincoln, Nebraska

I use IDrive and SyncbacPro. IDrive for off-site backup and SyncbacPro for backing up to external drive. SyncbacPro can also be used to backup to OneDrive which is off-site with Microsoft. Pleased with both.

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

I am wondering what problem or problems you encountered with Backblaze, since I'm using them. The specific nature of the problem(s) might also help folks when they recommend another backup plan.

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

I use Carbonite. I found it does the job well, but you have to specifically have it include videos.

markngolf Loc: Bridgewater, NJ

I just purchased one more external drive. I'll back up all my internal drives to it and store in my bank safety deposit box. That will be my "off site" backup.
I suppose I'll now have to drive to my bank more than 3 times year.
Mark

JD750 Loc: SoCal

My suggestion: Buy two external HDs. Back up photo to both, and take one to work or to a friends house. Continue to back up on the other one. Swap them every week.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Not as good as a major cloud solution, but certainly better than no off-site DR (disaster recovery) copy. Why?

1) convenience. Will you REALLY do this every week for years?
2) you lose a week of work (max) in the event of a failure
3) a large majority of HD failures occur on start up after the drive is powered off for a period of time
4) in the event of a regional disaster such as a hurricane, your DR copy may not be available (which is awfully handy for dealing with insurance/business/important documents from a distant hotel or any location with an internet connection)
5) and most importantly, no comparison between a single HD (typically not enterprise class) and multiple copies of your data in different geographic regions in professionally managed, hardened data centers with redundant disk, servers, networking and power.

JD750 Loc: SoCal

The problem with the cloud is we have some sunny cloudless days. So even if you have "the cloud backup", you still need the physical backups.

Some counterpoint.
Re 1) That all depends on your commitment and amount of self discipline.
Re 2) You have to have 2 failures to lose a week. Your you main storage AND your backup drive.
Re 3) I don't get your point. If one fails you replace it.
Re 4) True, good idea to grab that HD if you packing to leave because of a hurricane.
Re 5) What could possibly go wrong? I repeat, even if you have "the cloud backup", you still need the physical backups.

frjeff Loc: Mid-Michigan

Have decided: two external HD (alternating) on-site, ….. and IDrive for the off-site cloud. First year only $7.95 for switching from another cloud site.

Thanks for all of the suggestions.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Regarding all the points, you need your DR copy when your primary (working copy) and your on-site backup fail. This can occur from fire, theft, power surges lightning strikes, floods and other natural disasters, but also virus, ransomware, malware or operator errors or accidental deletion where an issue is propagated from the primary storage to the backup. Happens all the time. Doubt that? Just read the forum - happens regularly.

As to number one, it all depends on how much time you’re willing to waste. You could ride a horse to the bank I suppose for a leisurely trip.

As to number 3, taking drives in and out of service (bringing down and restarting a spinning disk at a later time) is a classic failure mode. You may run a disk constantly for years, but bring it down and restart it at a later time, and it fails - a well known failure mode that professionals are aware of. At Y2K, the major storage companies instructed their clients NOT to bring down their storage for this exact reason - many disk failures occur on start up

As to number 4, in most of those failure scenarios, you don’t have the opportunity to grab the disk and run. In several recent forest fire and hurricane disasters, both the home and the banks and offices in the community were destroyed. Suppose, worst case, my house burns or is destroyed by a tornado or hurricane. All I need is a phone, tablet, laptop or the business center at a motel to get ALL my data, including insurance policies and images of everything in my home to file a claim. and of course, I have all the images that I spent thousands or tens of thousands in equipment and untold hours to creater. Of course, if I’m working, my company’s IT department has taken the steps I mentioned, so I can access it and continue working. Or if I’m self employed, I can continue working with ALL my data, wherever I am.

You absolutely DO need a local backup, but you also need a 3rd off-site DR copy, and the cloud is the most robust method to accomplish that. I’m just providing you the professional best practice procedure. Whether you decide to follow that standard is always up to you as is the value of your data.

JD750 Loc: SoCal

And this the of software errors would propagate to a cloud backup as well.



Practically, my buddies and I have been doing this collectively 40-50 years, a small sample but 0 failures on hard drives. So I would say statistically correct but practical applications is unlikely and if one fails you have the original and the other backup.


You mentioned hurricane, forrest fires, usually you know they are coming. They don't sneak up on you. If a tornado or fire hits your house unlikely they will hit the house where you store the backup.


Yep I agree.

And I see that OP has also done the smart thing, using both. ;)

Enjoyed the point counterpoint. Thanks.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Let’s just take your first comment. Do you have versioning implemented in your local storage so that if a file or folder (or the entire disk) is corrupted, infected, deleted or ransomware encrypted, you can go back in time to previous versions of the file/folder or disk before the issue occurred? Almost no one does, but all major cloud storage provides versioning or Snapshots. When I was at Network Appliance / NetApp, our NAS introduced the idea of snapshots to the enterprise NAS community. Our mantra was “snapshots are going to save your ass one day”, and it often did for our customers.

And I enjoyed the point - counterpoint as well, and glad the OP found a solution.

Cheers and best to you.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I just realized that in over 35 years of doing backups,
I've never had to "restore" any files.

But I won't say that........

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Ohhhh, you better be careful now, you know about Karma…