Hi guys,
I'm trying to work out a strategy for backing up- and long-term storage/archiving of my data, and could do with some opinions/help.
I have 2 PCs - a Windows 8 one with ~1TB of mostly slow-changing uncompressible data (photos), and a Linux Mint one with <25GB of more changeable data. At the moment they're being backed up to removable drives by manually running a sync program. There are a few issues I can see with this:
I figure there's a few ways of addressing this:
So, any thoughts/advice..?
Thanks.
P.S. Keeping an external drive at work/relatives isn't an option.
I'm trying to work out a strategy for backing up- and long-term storage/archiving of my data, and could do with some opinions/help.
I have 2 PCs - a Windows 8 one with ~1TB of mostly slow-changing uncompressible data (photos), and a Linux Mint one with <25GB of more changeable data. At the moment they're being backed up to removable drives by manually running a sync program. There are a few issues I can see with this:
■ I don't have a backup that isn't at home
■ Linux Mint really encourages you to set up automated OS backups with Timeshift, which is a pre-requisite for automatic patching.
■ None of the external drives use a resilient filesystem, and are generally off when they're not in use, so don't get "read scrubbed" unless I remember (same for the PCs).
I figure there's a few ways of addressing this:
■ Use Amazon Glacier, which behaves like a cloudy version of an off-site tape backup. On the plus side, it's an enterprise-grade solution so it should be resilient, and maintenance is Someone Else's Problem. On the negative side, I'd be committing to an on-going monthly cost in a foreign currency, restores take a while to begin, at some point shell scripting will probably be necessary, and doesn't deal with the Timeshift issue (although I suppose I could use a Raspberry Pi or Intel NUC for that). Also, the initial upload will be painful (I'm on ADSL, so it'll take nearly 3 months at the 1Mb/s I get). Total cost is around $65 per year (including VAT) for 1TB.
■ Build a DIY NAS. Obviously, the obvious option is FreeNAS. Unfortunately I'm struggling with ZFS's relatively heavy hardware requirements (16GB of ECC DDR4 is £180) and finding suitable mini-ITX boards, which leaves using Ubuntu Server with BTRFS in RAID-1. This should give me an easy-to-use and relatively expandable and performant backup end-point, with support for snapshots and silent data corruption detection. However, it also means work to set it up and maintain, takes up space I don't really have, and doesn't solve the off-site backup problem. It also represents a not-insubstantial up-front cost of around £390 plus disks (2x 3TB WD Reds run to ~£200), plus power (~£20/year).
■ Get a consumer NAS such as a Synology DS218 or DS418. These are more compact than the DIY option, and trade flexibility/expandability and performance for ease of use. Cost is around £280 for a 2 bay unit, or £380 for a 4 bay unit, plus disks, plus power.
So, any thoughts/advice..?
Thanks.
P.S. Keeping an external drive at work/relatives isn't an option.
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