Back up two drives

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ejsim

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Mar 11, 2014
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I'm going to be building a PC shortlywhich will have a 120GB SSD and a 1TB HDD. I was also going to buy a 2TB HDD to back up both of the drives. Could I use a RAID 1 configuration with the two HDD's and then use the leftover 1TB to manually back up the SSD? Would the leftover 1TB be accessible? Would I need two separate RAID 1 setups? Is there a better way to do this?

Thanks.
 
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USAFRet
That won't work in the least.

RAID 1 (mirror) - 1TB + 2TB + RAID 1 = a 1TB RAID array.
The size of the smallest drive.

And RAID 1 is not a backup. Yes, it mirrors data across two drives. It also mirrors accidental file deletions, malware, corruptions. It just does it twice.

What you really need to do is, once you have stuff installed where it needs to be, create an image of that drive. Save it on the 2TB drive. Update once a month or so.

For changeable data (your personal stuff - docs/pictures/etc), there are several easy applications that will take a source and target folder, and on schedule, copy whatever is new or changed over to the target.
SyncBack Free does this easily.

This means that the data (the only really important...
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USAFRet

USAFRet

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Mar 16, 2013
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That won't work in the least.

RAID 1 (mirror) - 1TB + 2TB + RAID 1 = a 1TB RAID array.
The size of the smallest drive.

And RAID 1 is not a backup. Yes, it mirrors data across two drives. It also mirrors accidental file deletions, malware, corruptions. It just does it twice.

What you really need to do is, once you have stuff installed where it needs to be, create an image of that drive. Save it on the 2TB drive. Update once a month or so.

For changeable data (your personal stuff - docs/pictures/etc), there are several easy applications that will take a source and target folder, and on schedule, copy whatever is new or changed over to the target.
SyncBack Free does this easily.

This means that the data (the only really important part) exists in more than one place. OS and applications can be easily recreated. Your personal data cannot.

My current process is this:
Every 12 hours, my designated data folders are copied to another internal HDD
Every 24 hours, those same folders are copied to another PC (external drive on that)
All automated.

So I have 3 copies. The live one, the copy on another internal, and a daily copy on that other drive. My main PC could melt into a pile of goo, and pics of my grandson are still safe.
I don't care about the applications. I have all the serial numbers and install files and disks, etc, and they can always just be reinstalled.
 
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ejsim

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Mar 11, 2014
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So could I back up both the HDD and the SSD onto a 2TB internal drive, say every 24 hours using that automated program?
 
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USAFRet

USAFRet

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You don't really need to back up the entire drive(s). You just need to back up 'your stuff'.

For instance, on the SSD. You'll have the OS and applications. How often does that change? Not that often. Make an 'image' of that drive, and update once or twice a month.

DriveImageXML (which I use) allows you to backup a 'drive' (more accurately the data on a drive) to a folder on another drive or network location.
So I have an image of my boot SSD saved elsewhere. Actually, 2 elsewheres. But that is more for convenience sake if I ever need it.
My actual, personal data is what matters. I can reinstall Paintshop Pro or MS Office easily. I can't get back a pic of my grandson from 4 years ago, or a current resume.
 
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