Backing-Up strategies

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Pham

Questions:

If we decide to run redundant storage Onboard as data Back-up
(accepting drawbacks in reliability compared to Remote BU),
how should one decide which config (the various choices of SATA vs USB2
etc) is best for his box?

What is the best way -from the Performance priority- to connect storage
and optical devices on our channels: IDE, SATA, USB2, Firewire ?

Background:

I have a Abit IS7 box (i865PE). My BU strategy is a pathetic haphazard
scheme: I run a dedicated old GA-8ihxp box (i850 with P4-2GHz & RDRAM)
which is LAN'd by cat5 cable (both run WinXP-P). I copy stuff to the
BU box when I remember. It's lame, but I am repentant and I've started
thinking seriously abt running a second HDD (inside or outside the IS7)
exclusively as BU. I know a remote would be safer - please keep reading.

Firstly, however, I thought to BU to my DVD burner. Then changed my mind
to a new internal SATA drive (IS7 specs say it'd support 3 SATA drives
on top of the 2 IDE channels- I've never heard it done!). Then I looked
at Maxtor's elegant External One-Button BU drives (USB2, and/or Firewire
-but not SATA).

Now I'm stuck indecision. As if the cost and different performances of
the various solutions were not confusing enough, I now wonder just how
my IS7 box would feel about supporting the various configs I'm
considering! My P4C-2.6 (at 3 GHz) is watercooled, but my MCH isn't!
ThermalTake's 500w PSU can TCB, but electricity is not the only "resource".

Thanks for reading it!
Any advice or page-slaps gratefully accepted,

Pham
 
Questions:

If we decide to run redundant storage Onboard as data Back-up
(accepting drawbacks in reliability compared to Remote BU),
how should one decide which config (the various choices of SATA vs USB2
etc) is best for his box?

What is the best way -from the Performance priority- to connect storage
and optical devices on our channels: IDE, SATA, USB2, Firewire ?
Click to expand...

Any backup is better than no backup. I suspect any of these options will be
fast enough to get the backup done in a reasonable amount of time. So I
would pick whatever is easiest for you and start backing up.

If you really must have the fastest possible backup, either IDE or SATA
drives will be fine. Given the same vendor's drive in IDE or SATA versions,
they will perform basically the same, so IDE vs SATA doesn't really matter.
Just get which ever is cheapest or easiest to find and start backing up.

Both options will be faster than USB2 and Firewire. Firewire has better
sustained transfer rates than USB2, and uses less CPU than USB2, so USB2
would be at the bottom of my list. But like I said, even USB2 will be fast
enough for most backup needs. You can get USB 2 transfer rates from the
vendor of the drive or USB drive chassis.

What you want to know is the "sustained" transfer rate. This is what to use
to calculate your total time for your backup. Time to back up = size of data
to backup (MB) divided by transfer rate (MB/S). You end up with the time in
seconds.

The "peak" transfer rates for all of these interfaces means _nothing_ and
will not help you calculate your time to do a backup. Drives do NOT operate
at the "peak"transfer rates for any significant length.

My advice: get a drive as soon as possible and start doing the backups.
Don't worry about the performance so much. Worry more about getting the
backups done and making sure they are safe. If you have only a limited time
window in which to get the backups done, find out how long that window is
(how many hours) and how much data you need to back up.

To calculate your required transfer rate

data size (MB) divided by backup window(seconds) = transfer rate (MB/sec).
 
Any backup is better than no backup.
Click to expand...

Amen.

As I mentioned in another thread, I use Drive Image Pro to make a
carbon copy of my main disk onto two targets: one is a removable hard
disk and the other is the second half partition on the main drive.

When I upgrade hard disks I do it by a factor of 2 in capacity. I use
the old drive for the removable target and split the new drive into 2
equal partitions. That way the main partition is the same size as the
old disk and I have a second partition on which to make a copy in case
I want to make a quick repair or grab some older data without having
to install the removable disk. The removable disk sits on a shelf and
acts as the disaster recovery disk.

It takes about 1 hour per 10 GB to do the carbon copy with verify on.

FWIW,


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"You can all go to hell, and I will go to Texas."
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