external hard drive for backups

[Alex]

Hello Everyone,

I have a somewhat complicated situation and would greatly appreciate
advice.

I have two computers I need to back up. The first one is a laptop with
a 60 Gb hard drive, which is split evenly between Linux (RedHat 9.0)
and Win2000 (FAT32 file system). The second is a desktop with a 250 Gb
hard drive with Windows XP on it (I assume NTFS file system). I would
like to be able to back up both the desktop and the Windows partition
of the laptop onto an external hard drive with minimum hassle (e.g.
pressing a button). Of course, I wouldn't mind backing up the Linux
partition as well but I recognize that this is probably much more
technically challenging and am willing to settle for less right now.

I've seen a few external hard drives out there (mostly Maxtor and
Seagate) but wasn't clear on several issues:

1. Is it possible to connect the hard drive to two computers at once?
If yes, is it possible to do so only part of the time?

2. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the file
systems are different on the two Windows systems?

3. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the operating
systems are different (2000 vs. XP) on the two Windows systems?

4. Are there hard drives that are "Plug and Play" or does some
software generally need to be installed for the hard drive to be
recognized? One of the reasons I am asking is that I read a horror
story on Amazon about someone installing (whatever that involved) a
Maxtor external hard drive on their system and corrupting the primary
hard drive in the process. I would not be able to replace the data on
the hard drive and so even a 0.1% probability of this happening would
be unacceptable. I am particularly concerned about the laptop as it
has two partitions and hence screwy things are more likely to happen.

5. Would it be more advisable to just purchase two different external
hard drives for the two computers? Of course, the question # 4 would
still apply.

6. If only one hard drive is used for both computers, how does one set
up backups for each of them?

7. What backup software should I use? Amazon.com reviewers complained
about software that comes with both Maxtor and Seagate (more so
Seagate).

Any other tips would be tremendously appreciated.

Feel free to cc the reply to my email.

Thanks!

Alex

 

[Arno Wagner]

Hello Everyone,

I have a somewhat complicated situation and would greatly appreciate
advice.

I have two computers I need to back up. The first one is a laptop with
a 60 Gb hard drive, which is split evenly between Linux (RedHat 9.0)
and Win2000 (FAT32 file system). The second is a desktop with a 250 Gb
hard drive with Windows XP on it (I assume NTFS file system). I would
like to be able to back up both the desktop and the Windows partition
of the laptop onto an external hard drive with minimum hassle (e.g.
pressing a button). Of course, I wouldn't mind backing up the Linux
partition as well but I recognize that this is probably much more
technically challenging and am willing to settle for less right now.

You can do a Linux backup with "tar" while it is running.
Just do "tar cvjfl target_file.tbz2 /". You can back up the
FAT32 partition in the same way from Linux. Works well.

If you don't habve the time, use "z" instead of "j" to get
gzip compression.

I've seen a few external hard drives out there (mostly Maxtor and
Seagate) but wasn't clear on several issues:

1. Is it possible to connect the hard drive to two computers at once?
If yes, is it possible to do so only part of the time?

No. Only SCSI supports this from the hardware and the bus,
but most OS'ses don;t even support this there.

2. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the file
systems are different on the two Windows systems?

Yes. You cannot do NTFS backup reliably with Linux.

3. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the operating
systems are different (2000 vs. XP) on the two Windows systems?

See last item.

4. Are there hard drives that are "Plug and Play" or does some
software generally need to be installed for the hard drive to be
recognized? One of the reasons I am asking is that I read a horror
story on Amazon about someone installing (whatever that involved) a
Maxtor external hard drive on their system and corrupting the primary
hard drive in the process. I would not be able to replace the data on
the hard drive and so even a 0.1% probability of this happening would
be unacceptable. I am particularly concerned about the laptop as it
has two partitions and hence screwy things are more likely to happen.

Under Linux firewire and USB2 are pretty much "Plug and play"
(depending on Distro) and I have never heard of getting damage
on _anothe_ hdd from it. I think this kind of stupid behaviour
is MS only.

5. Would it be more advisable to just purchase two different external
hard drives for the two computers? Of course, the question # 4 would
still apply.

It is always advisable to have at least 3 independent backup media sets.

6. If only one hard drive is used for both computers, how does one set
up backups for each of them?

Huh? Put them into separate files?

7. What backup software should I use? Amazon.com reviewers complained
about software that comes with both Maxtor and Seagate (more so
Seagate).

For Linux and FAT32 use "tar". For NFTS you will have to use
some toy-quality-level app from the MS world.

Arno

 

[Al Dykes]

Hello Everyone,

I have a somewhat complicated situation and would greatly appreciate
advice.

I have two computers I need to back up. The first one is a laptop with
a 60 Gb hard drive, which is split evenly between Linux (RedHat 9.0)
and Win2000 (FAT32 file system). The second is a desktop with a 250 Gb
hard drive with Windows XP on it (I assume NTFS file system). I would
like to be able to back up both the desktop and the Windows partition
of the laptop onto an external hard drive with minimum hassle (e.g.
pressing a button). Of course, I wouldn't mind backing up the Linux
partition as well but I recognize that this is probably much more
technically challenging and am willing to settle for less right now.

I've seen a few external hard drives out there (mostly Maxtor and
Seagate) but wasn't clear on several issues:

1. Is it possible to connect the hard drive to two computers at once?
If yes, is it possible to do so only part of the time?

2. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the file
systems are different on the two Windows systems?

3. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the operating
systems are different (2000 vs. XP) on the two Windows systems?

4. Are there hard drives that are "Plug and Play" or does some
software generally need to be installed for the hard drive to be
recognized? One of the reasons I am asking is that I read a horror
story on Amazon about someone installing (whatever that involved) a
Maxtor external hard drive on their system and corrupting the primary
hard drive in the process. I would not be able to replace the data on
the hard drive and so even a 0.1% probability of this happening would
be unacceptable. I am particularly concerned about the laptop as it
has two partitions and hence screwy things are more likely to happen.

5. Would it be more advisable to just purchase two different external
hard drives for the two computers? Of course, the question # 4 would
still apply.

6. If only one hard drive is used for both computers, how does one set
up backups for each of them?

7. What backup software should I use? Amazon.com reviewers complained
about software that comes with both Maxtor and Seagate (more so
Seagate).

Any other tips would be tremendously appreciated.

Feel free to cc the reply to my email.

Thanks!

Alex

I use and like Acronis TrueImage (now v8) to backup what sounds like a
similar situation over a LAN. If the external USB disk is hooked up
to the desktop system it will be accessable to the laptop via
workgroup TCP. Backup at 100Mbps is fast enough for me.

TI8 can image a running w2k/XP system and the recovery is done from a
bootable CD, which I have done a couple of times.

On the desktop it's the same, except that it's disk-to-disk and even
faster. TI compression is good, and can keep a couple backup
generations of each system on one big disk. If your data is _really_
important consider buying a second big disk and flip-flop them for
backups. It's never a good idea to wqrite to just one backup media.

Always verify your images when you make them. The target disk has to
be formatted NTFS to get past the 2 (4?) GB limit in FAT32. External
devices are beginning to make me nervous. All it would take is
a power glitch during a backup to screw the whole disk and all your
backups. I'm have it powered by the UPS when I'm writing to the disk.

My big disk is internal to a desktop. I'm about to buy a second big
disk and put it in another machine on my network and flip-flop my
backups electronicaly.

 

[Al Dykes]

You can do a Linux backup with "tar" while it is running.
Just do "tar cvjfl target_file.tbz2 /". You can back up the
FAT32 partition in the same way from Linux. Works well.

If you don't habve the time, use "z" instead of "j" to get
gzip compression.



No. Only SCSI supports this from the hardware and the bus,
but most OS'ses don;t even support this there.


Yes. You cannot do NTFS backup reliably with Linux.


See last item.


Under Linux firewire and USB2 are pretty much "Plug and play"
(depending on Distro) and I have never heard of getting damage
on _anothe_ hdd from it. I think this kind of stupid behaviour
is MS only.


It is always advisable to have at least 3 independent backup media sets.


Huh? Put them into separate files?


For Linux and FAT32 use "tar". For NFTS you will have to use
some toy-quality-level app from the MS world.

Arno

I could have added that Acronis TI will backup and restore Linux
partitions and disks with a mix of WIndows and Linux partitions.
while running windows. Been there, done that.

You can back up a dual boot windows/linux system from Linux with dd,
but with my knowledge on linux it's a pain. I have not gotten past the
2GB file system limit (My problem, not Linux) and you need to script
the backup to compress the image.

 

[P.T. Breuer]

1. Is it possible to connect the hard drive to two computers at once?
No.

If yes, is it possible to do so only part of the time?
Yes.

2. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the file
systems are different on the two Windows systems?

Yes, though the statement as such is meaningless, since file systems do
not belong to operating systems, but to the drives they are on.

3. Will there be any problems arising from the fact that the operating
systems are different (2000 vs. XP) on the two Windows systems?

No. Operating systems are not connected with file systems. They simply
support them (or not!). You may find that one o/s alters the f/s so
that it is not supported by the other o/s, of course. That's up to you.

4. Are there hard drives that are "Plug and Play" or does some

All of them are. Or are you talking about something very special, like
a USB or firewire or PoE drive? Well, it will still be a generic usb storage
device, most likely.

software generally need to be installed for the hard drive to be
recognized?

No, nothing more than the normal basic drivers for the interface and/or
controller.

One of the reasons I am asking is that I read a horror
story on Amazon about someone installing (whatever that involved) a
Maxtor external hard drive on their system and corrupting the primary

Happy happy happy. They are free to do what they want.

hard drive in the process.

They didn't.

I would not be able to replace the data on
the hard drive

Then back it up and/or take it out.

and so even a 0.1% probability of this happening would
be unacceptable.

Then don't do it! The chances of messing up when any user does anything
are much higher than that!

I am particularly concerned about the laptop as it
has two partitions and hence screwy things are more likely to happen.

Why? The number of partitions does not bear on anything!

5. Would it be more advisable to just purchase two different external
hard drives for the two computers?

I wouldn't do it since it sounds like you just want a backup medium,
and it hasn't occurred to you that it can be anywhere in the universe,
and you can cppy stuff over to it over the net.

Of course, the question # 4 would
still apply.
Good!

6. If only one hard drive is used for both computers, how does one set
up backups for each of them?

You use the backup setup application in your do-backup application.
What's wrong with "tar"? Or "cp"?

7. What backup software should I use?

I would have thought rsync or tar or cpio myself. Why? DO you need
"software"?

Amazon.com reviewers complained
about software that comes with both Maxtor and Seagate (more so
Seagate).

I should hope so! The concept sounds vaguely ridiculous. I'd just e
rsyncing the disk every day. First set out your intended salvage
scenario and then set up a backup regime to support it! People have
been doing this for forty years, you know .. it's not rocket science.

Any other tips would be tremendously appreciated.

Read a howto.

Peter

 

[Arno Wagner]

In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.misc Alex <[email protected]> wrote:

[...]
I could have added that Acronis TI will backup and restore Linux
partitions and disks with a mix of WIndows and Linux partitions.
while running windows. Been there, done that.

You can back up a dual boot windows/linux system from Linux with dd,
but with my knowledge on linux it's a pain. I have not gotten past the
2GB file system limit (My problem, not Linux) and you need to script
the backup to compress the image.

No need to do that for the Linux part and for the Windows part
only if it is NTFS. Unless you want to backup the bootloader
as well. But for that it is better to be able to reinstall it.

Arno