Scott Hanselman devises a Family Backup Strategy. Sadly, the inspiration is an unexpected data loss (all of his Dad’s e-mail from 2005 and 2006).
What’s your backup strategy? Do you have one?
What’s your backup strategy?
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12 thoughts on “What’s your backup strategy?”
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Ed Bott (@ wordpress.com) 
I let Vista do it automatically with an external hard drive. My backup needs are not elaborate.
It’s manifold:
1) Vista automatic backup of C: drive’s crucial files svery Sunday night.
2) Manual backup of D: drive’s work directory (i.e., stuff I work on for other people) to another hard drive once a night.
3) Copies of current work are echoed to my notebook and a removable USB drive whenever I’m working on something on the road or just like to take it with me to the coffee shop.
In short, there’s probably at least two copies of anything I need somewhere if my main system should catch fire.
Here is my backup strategy, and in the comments are the strategies of a number of TechBloggers. What I’d really like is a fully automated system, with OS and incidentals stored locally for failure recovery, and critical data backed up via network to an offsite location. Sadly, the latter half of that is now just a kind of sneakernet, but it works well enough to give me some peace of mind.
I really am so glad Vista now has Robobopy. Why Microsoft hid it from the “common man” for so long is beyond me, but it’s great to have it now.
I am using Windows Home Server Beta to backup my Media Center PC, my laptop and my new UMPC
It works great, and its easy to get at the data if you want to restore a file
I regularly backup my system drive of my PowerMac to a portable hard drive using rsync (incremental backups). There are actually two drives, one stored in a depot at my bank. From time to time, I switch drives to ensure having a backup in case my home burns down.
My Debian server is being backed up on CD-R using mkcdrec. The discs are stored at the bank as well.
I want to try out Windows Home Server.
Mine is primitive. I sync everything (my data) from the D drive to the C. Then I make an image of those files and burn the new ones to DVD, keeping a rolling backup. I make an image of the C drive and burn it to DVD once every 4-5 months.
Mouser at DonationCoder.com invokes the “Cry test”: If your system were to crash and burn right now, would you cry? If so, then back it up. Good advice.
The most important first part of my backup strategy is redundancy for the hard drive using RAID mirroring. Dell has a product option for many of its desktops called “DataSafe” that will add a second hard drive, configure mobo RAID and include a copy of Norton Ghost, to cover the deficits of XP System Restore.
DataSafe has already saved my system once. It’s crucial when your disk is 400+ GB and contains all your music from CDs, all your photos, and all the email you ever sent or received in your life (about the size of one TV show).
i use vista. if the system crashes due to boot up problems then i can access any file using the winRE ( repair mode) and copy it to a usb key!!
Mohammed, what would you do if the drive itself failed? Or if you deleted a bunch of files (as Scott did) and couldn’t recover them from the Recycle Bin or even using a raw disk editor?
We’re talking home backup here – but I have a desktop that functions as a server with a software RAID 1. I regularly backup the server’s data to an external hard drive. I’ve been dragging my feet on this, but I’m going to buy a second external drive and start storing rotating the two drives between home and my in-laws house 30 miles away. My main concern is my digital photos. I can rebuy CDs if I have to, but my photos are irreplaceable.
I briefly tried Mozy.com for online backup. It worked as advertised, but my upload speed (768 Kbps) was so slow that I wasn’t even close to backing up my 60-odd GB of data after days and days of 24/7 uploads.