How good are ext. HD's?

  • Thread starter Thread starter John Wilson
  • Start date Start date
J

John Wilson

Hi all,

I am looking for a relatively inexpensive backup solution for, at least
as of right now, about 8 gigs of data. I've been doing the CD-R deal
for the better part of three years, but as the amount of data that
needs to be backed up is always increasing, I'm looking for cost effective
alternates to CD-R's.

Right now, I'm sort of leaning in the direction of an external hard drive
of some sort. The two major offerings, in regard to interface, seem to
be either USB 2.0 or Firewire. My understanding is that Firewire is much
less of a processor burdon as opposed to USB, but is this really a
consideration to take into account? What about speeds?

My mainboard has USB 2.0 ports built into the board itself, however, the
only fireware interface that I have is hanging off of a SB Audigy "Gamer"
card. Is this interface any different than the dedicated firewire cards
that can be purchased separately?

I've also considered the possibility of DVD-R's, but one of the aspects
that sort of frightens me is "putting too much on one single media". This
is sort of where splitting up the data across multiple volumes seems
nice - if one fails, you don't lose the entire set. I s'pose this could
also be argued -against- using an external HD, but for whatever reason,
I have a little more faith in HD's as opposed to DVD-R's.

What do you folks use in regard to backing up 8+ gigs on a bi-monthly basis?

Thank you for your time,
John W.
 
Great idea.

WD also provides a utility on their web site to clone a drive to their disk
drives.

Maxtor's utility:
http://www.maxtor.com/en/support/downloads/maxblast3win.htm
a.. "The copy feature lets you make an exact duplicate of your existing hard
drive."

b. etc.

Western Digital
http://support.wdc.com/dlg/facts.asp
Data Lifeguard Tools Software Utilities
a.. Easily partitions and formats the new hard drive.
b.. Overcomes operating system and BIOS limitations.
c.. Quickly and safely copies the contents of the existing hard drive onto
the new hard drive.
 
I've also considered the possibility of DVD-R's, but one of the aspects
that sort of frightens me is "putting too much on one single media". This
is sort of where splitting up the data across multiple volumes seems
nice - if one fails, you don't lose the entire set. I s'pose this could
also be argued -against- using an external HD, but for whatever reason,
I have a little more faith in HD's as opposed to DVD-R's.

What do you folks use in regard to backing up 8+ gigs on a bi-monthly basis?
Click to expand...

I use a hard drive in a removable tray. It will cost about $ 50 to 60 for a
drive and another $ 15 for the tray. The drive I have is a duplicate of the
one in the computer. Set it up as a slave and I can just turn off the
computer, slide in the back up , boot off a floppy from Maxtor (the maker of
the drives) that will allow an exect duplicate of the drive. In a couple of
hours, maybe less the data is backed up while I am doing other things. Then
turn off the computer and take it out. That way if the hard drive crashes I
can be back up and running in about 2 hours or less if I get another drive
and copy the data to a new drive. If I really need to , I could use the
backup drive and take a chance on that one not crashing on me tuil I can get
a new drive.

For Other data that does not change I do use a cd-r when I think I have
enough new data that I don' t want to loose. Either way is inexpensive
compaired to the time it takes to reload a computer or recreate the data.
 
FWIW, John, I've connected a 120GB Maxtor in an ADS Dual Link
enclosure to my system via the FireWire port in my Audigy 2 card.
Works just fine. No reason to buy a separate FireWire card.
 
John said:
Hi all,

I am looking for a relatively inexpensive backup solution for, at least
as of right now, about 8 gigs of data. I've been doing the CD-R deal
for the better part of three years, but as the amount of data that
needs to be backed up is always increasing, I'm looking for cost effective
alternates to CD-R's.
Click to expand...
(snip)

I bought a WD 80gB USB2 external drive about 4 months ago. I use Acronis
TrueImage to copy a compressed image of my entire drive once a week. I
name each new backup according to the date created (i.e, BU031205.TIB) and
keep all of them on my external drive. When it gets full, I'll start
deleting the oldest backups to make room for more.

My computer is set up to boot any of MS-DOS 6.22, Win98, Win2k or Linux. On
a couple of occasions, having an older backup has saved my tail.

Each full-disk backup takes about 15 minutes. Quick, easy, great insurance.

I store the external drive in a room far away from the computer for safety.
I really oughta make a CD-ROM copy of the really critical stuff every month
or two and store it off-site for disaster recovery.

Roby
 
John said:
Hi all,

I am looking for a relatively inexpensive backup solution for, at least
as of right now, about 8 gigs of data. I've been doing the CD-R deal
for the better part of three years, but as the amount of data that
needs to be backed up is always increasing, I'm looking for cost effective
alternates to CD-R's.

Right now, I'm sort of leaning in the direction of an external hard drive
of some sort. The two major offerings, in regard to interface, seem to
be either USB 2.0 or Firewire. My understanding is that Firewire is much
less of a processor burdon as opposed to USB, but is this really a
consideration to take into account? What about speeds?

My mainboard has USB 2.0 ports built into the board itself, however, the
only fireware interface that I have is hanging off of a SB Audigy "Gamer"
card. Is this interface any different than the dedicated firewire cards
that can be purchased separately?

I've also considered the possibility of DVD-R's, but one of the aspects
that sort of frightens me is "putting too much on one single media". This
is sort of where splitting up the data across multiple volumes seems
nice - if one fails, you don't lose the entire set. I s'pose this could
also be argued -against- using an external HD, but for whatever reason,
I have a little more faith in HD's as opposed to DVD-R's.

What do you folks use in regard to backing up 8+ gigs on a bi-monthly basis?

Thank you for your time,
John W.
Click to expand...



I've been using a Maxtor 40GB USB 2.0 external drive for about 2 years.
It's mostly permanenty attached, so I use it for some routine storage
tasks (mostly MP3's and video files; the machine it's hooked to also
serves as a low-rent music server). It's also my primary backup device
for my most important data files: my rationale is what are the odds of
both the internal HD *and* the external HD failing at the same time?

It's powered up all the time (even when the PC isn't), and has run
trouble free. The only reason I'm considering an upgrade is that they
have become so much cheaper: I can get double the capacity for less than
half the price I paid for orginally.

Since I don't do raid or removable internal drives, external HD seems
like the ideal choice for what I use it for...
 
I've been using a Maxtor 40GB USB 2.0 external drive for about 2 years.
It's mostly permanenty attached, so I use it for some routine storage
tasks (mostly MP3's and video files; the machine it's hooked to also
serves as a low-rent music server). It's also my primary backup device
for my most important data files: my rationale is what are the odds of
both the internal HD *and* the external HD failing at the same time?

It's powered up all the time (even when the PC isn't), and has run
trouble free. The only reason I'm considering an upgrade is that they
have become so much cheaper: I can get double the capacity for less than
half the price I paid for orginally.

Since I don't do raid or removable internal drives, external HD seems
like the ideal choice for what I use it for...
Click to expand...

--And because I'm cautious and paranoid about data preservation, I also
back up to DVD's: at 4.7 GB per, they hold all of my (non music/non
video) backup data easily. Of course, now I need to get everything out
of one room:-)
 
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