Backup solution: Sean, I think you're too quick to dismiss Zeuspaul's suggestion here. It all depends on what you want to do with your backup solution.
Your objections:
1. Cost per meg. That depends. With good, fast, >10 gig IDE drives hitting $300, and no need to buy a tape or cartridge reader, it may not be more expensive.
4 Gig Travan Tape - $30
4 Gig Drive - $200
no comparison here....
2. Multiple revisions. On the contrary, using Drive Image (not Disk Image), one can save many revisions of a partition to one's backup (and primary) hard drives. And it's so much faster and easier than tape or other media that incremental backups become less necessary (but still possible--just back up directories selectively.)
Still no comparison here. Lets assume 8 Gig Drive, 4 Gig TR4 Backup.
I can Fit one compressed Drive Image on a TR4. With an 8 GIG disk you can get a max 2 images at a time. I have no less than 8 Weeks of disk images available on tape at any point in time. 2 is no where near enough. Often times the damage may have occurred greater than 3-4 backups ago which leaves a mirrored drive user screwed. Again not an adequate solution....
3. Removability. No, not with removable drive trays and adequate cooling (essential). This has worked fine for me and others
yes you can do this but again cost is an issue. Also hard drives are still fairly fragile, continous removal and insertion from your PC can't be good for the life of the drive. Drop on it on the floor once and kiss your data goodbyte. Much less of issue with media that's DESIGNED to be removed.
4. Disaster recovery. Actually, Here is one among several areas where spare drives excell. If a disaster wipes out your main drive, just replace with a backup and you're all set.
Yes, assuming you do #3 correctly and store it a firesafe so thats is protected from lightning and fire. Original poster never recommended this and I have only ever seen the government do this successfully. Most of the time people leave them in the machines overnight which opens huge vulnerabilities...
There are also many advantages of using this system that other methods lack. Its convenience and speed simply can't be beat.
Speed maybe, I don't see the convience at all.
And in my experience, cheaper cartridge or tape solutions are less reliable than good modern IDE drives. (If you can afford DAT or another mid-high end solution, that's a bit different, of course.)
I disagree. You have to know how/when to clean tape drives and replace old tapes to reduce susceptability to failures. Other removable carttridge drives are highly reliable and much more robust from an abuse standpoint than internal HD.
Finally, a big extra hard drive can do double or triple duty. In addition to backing up your data, it can make tweaking, experimenting, etc. virtually risk-free. (See earlier posts the auxiliary on using HDDs with promise controllers, modern bios settings, and the like.)
How you can do these things it is full of data??? If you remove your data to play around your vulnerable. Removable disks such as Jaz and Syquest or perfect for this as well are certainly bootable....
You certainly raise valid criteria for a backup solution--I just think you're too quick to dismiss hard drives, _properly implemented_, as a workable response.
I don't think so. Maybe harsh, but I want to get the point across. I have never seen this implimented successfully. Its very high risk and high cost for what you get. Can it be made workable??? Yes Optimal, IMO no. The advantages of others over this type of system are large. I don't take chances with my data.
Sean
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