Data Backup Alternatives

  • Thread starter Thread starter nick
  • Start date Start date
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nick

Currently looking at alternatives for backing up data.
I can see flash drives, external USB hard drives, and
DVD-RWs as possibilities. I am not looking to make
data portable, just to back it up periodically for
safety. Don't expect much more than 2-3Gb regularly
(as long as I first save all my old Pix and Tunes
on a DVD once and for all).

So what are the tradeoffs?? The DVD-RW option is
certainly the cheapest and probably the slowest.
But is it reliable? Will the old data be overwritten
by the new data each time??

The flash drives look interesting, priced in the
middle, but you are constrained by whatever size
you buy. The 4Gb drives start to get pricey.

The external hard drives offer the greatest
capacity at the highest price. Not sure I need that,
but maybe the security is worth it??

helppp!

nick
 
RW disks are not a good choice for any type of permanent backup.
The simple fact they can be erased makes them a poor choice. Best
and easiest solution is a dedicated drive or partition to hold images &
then burn those to DVD-R disks. Use the small profile DVD-R disks
to be able to store them in a bank lockbox. Best to use an imaging
program like Acronis True Image and ALWAYS select the option
to verify the image.

Flash drives are actually less favorable to me after a recent run of a
few I own just "Going Bad". Usually, the Flash (Thumb) drives stop
working without any kind of erratic behavior to tip you off they are
becoming unusable.

You can never have too many backups. When you make a newer
version of a backup K E E P the older/previous ones. Use a blank
CD/DVD disk spindle to save them in. Just the other day I had to
find a program version from about a year ago. That stack of "Old"
images came in handy.
 
R. McCarty said:
RW disks are not a good choice for any type of permanent backup.
The simple fact they can be erased makes them a poor choice. Best
and easiest solution is a dedicated drive or partition to hold images &
then burn those to DVD-R disks. Use the small profile DVD-R disks
to be able to store them in a bank lockbox. Best to use an imaging
program like Acronis True Image and ALWAYS select the option
to verify the image.

Flash drives are actually less favorable to me after a recent run of a
few I own just "Going Bad". Usually, the Flash (Thumb) drives stop
working without any kind of erratic behavior to tip you off they are
becoming unusable.

You can never have too many backups. When you make a newer
version of a backup K E E P the older/previous ones. Use a blank
CD/DVD disk spindle to save them in. Just the other day I had to
find a program version from about a year ago. That stack of "Old"
images came in handy.
Click to expand...

Thanks Mega for all the info. I have in fact been looking at some
sort of portable external hard drives, given their capacity and
security. In the olden days we had hot-swappable IDE hard drives
(we called them disk -- as compared to diskettes) and you could
unplug and replug out the back of the PC.

I can find USB2 external hard drive, but they cost a bundle. Is there
a way to turn one of my extra IDE drives into a portable external
drive??

nick
 
nick said:
Thanks Mega for all the info. I have in fact been looking at some
sort of portable external hard drives, given their capacity and
security. In the olden days we had hot-swappable IDE hard drives
(we called them disk -- as compared to diskettes) and you could
unplug and replug out the back of the PC.

I can find USB2 external hard drive, but they cost a bundle. Is there
a way to turn one of my extra IDE drives into a portable external
drive??
Click to expand...

I don't think that external hard drives (Maxtor OneTouch, Western
Digital MyBook) cost a bundle, but they definitely cost more than an
external hard drive enclosure. Just buy yourself a good drive enclosure
and put your extra IDE drive into it. I have three Thermaltakes which I
like because they 1) are aluminum; 2) have an On/Off switch; 3) have a
fan. I like to buy the 5.25" size for hard drives because I want the
extra airflow. My Thermaltakes came with drive rails to safely mount the
3.5" drives. This is probably me just being overly careful. ;-)

I also have a couple of cheaper drive enclosures and they are a pain to
get the drive into and you can see they don't have good quality
construction. I was Googling around for a source of the Thermaltake for
you and happened upon this rather good discussion on one of the Cnet forums:

http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7588_102-0.html?forumID=70&threadID=97410&messageID=1109709

Here's a link to NewEgg's page on external enclosures so you can get an
idea of price. As I said (and which is also borne out by the Cnet
participants), don't buy the cheapest case - spend a few more dollars
for quality.

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=92&name=External-Enclosures

I'm not pushing Thermaltake (I don't work for them!) but here is the
enclosure that I have:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817145011

I back up to an external hard drive once a week and I also burn a DVD-R
once a month.


Malke
 
Malke said:
I don't think that external hard drives (Maxtor OneTouch, Western
Digital MyBook) cost a bundle, but they definitely cost more than an
external hard drive enclosure. Just buy yourself a good drive enclosure
and put your extra IDE drive into it.
Click to expand...

Can you tell me anything about an IDE to USB cable?? I have several
old 20-40Gb IDE hard drives lying about. Is there a way to simply
cable one to a USB port?? Where does the power come from???
 
chuck said:
Can you tell me anything about an IDE to USB cable?? I have several
old 20-40Gb IDE hard drives lying about. Is there a way to simply
cable one to a USB port?? Where does the power come from???
Click to expand...

I don't know anything about an IDE to USB cable. With extra hard drives,
I'd either mount one or two inside a desktop and/or put them in external
enclosures.


Malke
 
Malke said:
I don't know anything about an IDE to USB cable. With extra hard drives,
I'd either mount one or two inside a desktop and/or put them in external
enclosures.
Click to expand...

That's what I want to do, put 'em in an external enclosure -- but then
how do I attach both the signal and the power to the IDE controller
on the mother board?? An external IDE socket?? A USB to IDE converter?
Hang an IDE cable out from the box (Yrrcchhh!!)?
 
chuck said:
That's what I want to do, put 'em in an external enclosure -- but then
how do I attach both the signal and the power to the IDE controller
on the mother board?? An external IDE socket?? A USB to IDE converter?
Hang an IDE cable out from the box (Yrrcchhh!!)?
Click to expand...

???? I think you don't understand what an external enclosure does. Go to
the NewEgg link I gave the OP and look at some of the external
enclosures. You open up the external enclosure and inside is an IDE
connector and a power connector for the hard drive. You set your hard
drive to Master, connect it to the two items, close up the enclosure.
Attach the enclosure to your desktop computer with either USB or
firewire. Enclosures with firewire interfaces are more expensive than
the ones with just USB and are normally desirable when used with Macs,
not PCs.


Malke
 
Great Advice!! Thanks so much. Just bought a neat NexStar
external hard drive enclosure, popped in an old IDE drive,
connected it to the USB 2 port, and backed up my data files.
All in less that ten minutes. Great!
Many thanks Malke

chuck
 
chuck said:
Great Advice!! Thanks so much. Just bought a neat NexStar
external hard drive enclosure, popped in an old IDE drive,
connected it to the USB 2 port, and backed up my data files.
All in less that ten minutes. Great!
Many thanks Malke

chuck
Click to expand...

Glad that sorted it for you. Thanks for taking the time to post back.


Malke
 
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