What do you do at home to protect your data? (In comments: Any specific companies or services you recommend?)
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RAID (Score:5, Insightful)
Is not a backup!
Re: (Score:2)
you're just annoyed that the choice wasn't "cr0n backs up my data".
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Raid 0+1 is my savior. All bytes will return to the source...all data may be lost.
Re:RAID (Score:5, Funny)
I use a RAID array to store my backups, you insensitive clod.
Re:RAID (Score:5, Informative)
RAID is indeed NOT a backup... But that was NOT the question. The question was about protecting data. RAID Does protect data.
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But RAID 1-6 all have fault tolerance for drive failures, and that number of drives depends on the RAID type. That said, I had a RAID 5 array where the power supply failed and actually set two drives on fire. Fortunately I was there at the time and unplugged the machine, but two of the three RAID drives and the motherboard were toast and the data on them lost because I lost more than one RAID drive (the other 3 non-RAID disks all survived, probably because they weren't in use). The case was lost as well, ha
Re: RAID (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Certain RAID types can protect data specifically against data loss caused by the hardware failure of a limited number of active disks...but I think the RAID option was there to see how many Slashdotters are idiots on the topic of making backups. Right now it looks like almost 1/8th of us are.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Given that the question was "what do you do to protect your data at home", not "what do you use for backups", with the option of one choice, I am not sure that using RAID to protect data is in the idiot territory. I use RAID, snapshots & a local backup. I chose RAID in the poll.
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+1
"At home", I use RAID 1 to make sure my systems don't die of one disk kicks the bucket.
For backup, I use a cron script that mirrors important files to Mega
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...I also use several of the listed options, but if I had to name one that best protected my data, outside of military defense, it would be local backup.
OK, the military option was a lame joke.
Re:RAID (Score:5, Insightful)
I've worked with IT people who refused to back up development servers because they were on a RAID array. Then one day, the RAID controller crashed, permanently destroying all of the data on the entire array, taking 14 VMs with it.
You are correct, if you have only RAID as your "backup," you are screwed.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm surprised. That was either quite a remarkable failure or your IT guys were frauds.
Loosing a raid controller is usually not so bad. I've had raid controllers crash before and never have they destroyed everything. Replaced the Raid controller with an identical model, adopted the discovered raid sets, compare data to backups to find corruption, and that was about it. It's relatively little drama compared to some failures.
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Yeah, we were all surprised.
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Then one day, the RAID controller crashed, permanently destroying all of the data on the entire array, taking 14 VMs with it.
Holy moly! And I thought I got carried away with my home network!
You DO remember we're talking about protecting data on a home network, right?
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I was, and if you ever heard someone talking about "backups" back then, they were probably just joking around. Even if they were actually doing backups they were doing a pretty shallow job.
Re: (Score:2)
So was I, as of the mid 90s (the earliest I can claim to recall with any confidence) tape backups of all critical data were stored on-site in a fireproof safe, with an additional off-site copy.
I'm sure there were plenty of piss poor IT departments around, but I can vouch for the fact that they weren't _all_ equally inept.
Re: (Score:2)
Competent IT and companies had (and still have) tape backups of data to the local tape robot and to offsite in a tape exchange of a weekly full backup. incrementals done during the week.
Anything else is 100% incompetent IT department and 100% incompetent CTO/CIO.
Any company can afford a proper backup strategy, the ones that don't are simply incompetent boobs.
Re:RAID (Score:4, Interesting)
Read the Poll Question (Score:2)
The poll doesn't ask how you back-up your data, it asks how you protect your data. You are completely correct that RAID is not back-up but thhe use of any RAID type except RAID 0 will protect your data from a failed disk and the question was how do you protect your data.
Re: (Score:2)
But it is something you can do to help protect your data, provided you regularly check the health of the array and swap out dead disks as soon as you find them. It only protects against hardware failure, not software or environmental dangers, but it can help.
Re: RAID (Score:2)
Is "I leave my data scattered around on the random hard drives I leave scattered around my house"?
Re:RAID (Score:5, Informative)
You realize that if you're using RAID5 for a volume larger than about 12TB, you're going to run in to the mathematical certainty that you'll have a read error during data a rebuild operation, right? It's not a huge deal if you're under that threshold, but I've found 20TB+ RAID5s in production systems a few times and I think it's something a lot of folks don't know about.
The issue has to do with the rated hard error rate for mechanical drives, making an uncorrectable read error a statistical certainty at around 12TB for RAID5 and 30somethingTB for RAID6.
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"Rated" and "actual" are not necessarily closely related, even though it seems they should be.
I have only anecdotal evidence from having rebuilt multiple 12+ TB RAID5s at home and work to go on, but my impression is that the 10^14 figure I see quoted seems a tad pessimistic.
Having said that, backup is mandatory regardless of chosen RAID level.
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I'm unconvinced by this argument. 10TB hard drives have been available for a while, and 12TB is likely to appear this year or early next. If the error rate is really 1 in 10^14 as the original post over at HN claims, then they would be shipping broken drives. I always do a full write/read test on new drives when I get them, so I'd get stuck in an endless RMA loop until I opted for a refund.
The mistake appears to be in reading the datasheet. For example, take this one [wdc.com] from Western Digital. They list the unre
Re: (Score:2)
A decade ago a guy from SGI did a talk to the local Linux user group about their storage systems and where the technology was headed. The major problem they had was the bit error rate combined with the MTBF meant that something was always broken on the system.
Another issue is that the bit error rate carries based on the data that is being stored. Random works best but some patterns are much worse.
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Enterprise hard disks meant to be used in SANs have significantly better rating than that.
The Toshiba's used in my SAN are rated 10^17. When you plug that figure in the formula, there is 0 chance of a rebuild failing due to URE.
You can also use RAID6 (2 hard disks can fail) with disks that have lower URE raitings to protect yourself
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My employer uses a vast amount of storage [definitely lots
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1. Even if it happens, at most I'll lose one file on ZFS (and ZFS will tell me which one was corrupted), it's less fun if this happens on NTFS MFT area, but still, it's just one bad block, not a total loss of the array.
2. I doubt about the 30TB number for RAID6 (assuming 12TB is correct for RAID5) - to break RAID6 on a rebuild, a read error has to occur on at least two drives at for the same sector (otherwise it will be recovered), not just two read errors total.
Re: RAID (Score:4, Informative)
It's not really a backup where you could restore any file no matter how long ago it was deleted. Or recover a non-corrupted copy from, no matter how long ago the data was corrupted.
Name a backup system where this is possible.
Classic backup systems create a backup periodically (once a day, once a week, maybe even hourly), and then rotate the backup sets to keep X of each age group, like keep 7 dailies, 5 weeklies, 24 monthlies, and then yearly after that. So, if you go back far enough, all files that were both created and removed within a year are simply gone. It's an educated gamble that you won't need those.
Systems like Apple's Time Machine capture much more fine grained per-file changes. However, AFAICT, it still introduced a delay after modification before making the backup. Make a change; make another change soon after; backup only catches second changeset. At some point, it too will need to purge old data or run out of space.
RAID on its own is not a backup, but this monster of local RAID + snapshots + a remote mirror of that may constitute a fair reinterpretation of backups.
Re: (Score:2)
What if the power supply releases its magic smoke and takes most of the hardware it powered with it? What if your wife accidentally deletes your family photos directory? Kid spills water inside the cabinet? FSM smites you with a noodly appendage?
While your data is very redundantly stored with raid 10, you'd be much better off buying a monst
A combination of the above (Score:3)
My files are stored on a Buffalo LinkStation NAS box in RAID-5 mode at my house. My super-important archived files are backed up onto a removable hard drive which I keep at my office, disconnected. My super-important daily-use files are on a flash drive in my pocket, which I back up to the Buffalo box nightly.
Re: (Score:2)
I too use many of the options, so I had to pick Cowboy Neal. Dropbox for important small files or things I use regularly, local backup HDD that snapshots hourly for bulk files, and offsite backups whenever I remember to lug a HDD back and forth from work. (Of course I have two backup HDDs at work so I still have a backup in case my house burns down while I have one of the HDDs at home for backup.) The only things I really care about are in the cloud, offsite, and on a local backup, but that's a very small a
Re: (Score:2)
--If you're still using RAID5 with >500GB disks, you should read this article - and look into RAID6, or even better ZFS with RAIDZ2:
http://www.zdnet.com/article/w... [zdnet.com]
https://blogs.oracle.com/partn... [oracle.com]
https://pthree.org/2012/12/05/... [pthree.org]
http://bernaerts.dyndns.org/li... [dyndns.org]
--Be aware however, you can't really dynamically expand a RAIDZ pool without doubling the number of devices in the pool (if you want your I/O to stay sane) AND with a RAIDZ, you are limited by the spindle speed of the SLOWEST drive in the pool:
h [jrs-s.net]
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting reading. Thanks. So far, I have been lucky. I did have one drive fail last year, and the system rebuilt just fine when I plugged in the new drive. It took over 18 hours, but it worked. BTW, my system is a smaller one, using 4x 1TB drives.
I'll keep plugging along, and keep my off-site backup drive fresh.
Jman.
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I use a full server PC (low power Xeon running on an Intel board) as a NAS. This has the advantage of being able to provide other services like NTP and Bittorrent for my network, and off-site backup. My connection only provides about 10Mb upload bandwidth, but over time it's infinite and I currently have around 4TB encrypted and stored remotely.
I use Spideroak for the off-site backup. They were doing an offer around the new year where you got unlimited storage for about £100/year. I'll only take
Need checkboxes, not radio buttons (Score:2, Insightful)
A proper data protection solution needs redundant backup, which likely includes several of the poll options.
Think RAID is enough? How many simultaneous drive failures can it tolerate and can you recover from a controller going bad?
Think local backup is enough? Can your local backup survive a fire or flood?
Think cloud backup is enough? What if the company you chose goes under or decides to hold your data hostage?
Think about what happens if one or more systems fail. And when they do, how comfortable are y
Need checkboxes, because I use all of them (Score:2)
RAID / Local / Off-site (Score:3)
1) RAID-5 on home server
2) Weekly rsync to removable hard drive
3) Periodically swap removable drive with one off-site.
Re: (Score:2)
I have RAID 1 and 10 at both home and in the office. Since having fibre installed in both locations I now backup over the internet (using rsync over ssh). Home backs up to work and work backs up to home. Both then get backed up to an external drive.
backups (Score:2)
always a challenge.
1) local backup to disks with "retrospect" (which is old now but still works the best out of any product i have tried).
2) "free file sync", weekly manual backup of important files to a removable hard drive that I can grab if there is a fire or other emergency that I am home for. Hard drive is powered off when not doing backups (prevents against ransomware). Easy to pick up and run with.
3) "Crashplan" for online backups DR. I picked crashplan because its (theoretically) super secure, multi
Crashplan (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Carbonite (Score:2)
Yeah, the heavily advertised "commercial" one, but it seems to "just work" without any intervention once set up. When I had a disk crash a while back, the restore worked.
But... It took a very long time. (500GB-ish of data.) I'd recommend manually restoring the stuff you might need this week first, then starting the global restore.
Some cloud backup services have an option to mail you a hard drive. I'm not sure if Carbonite is one of them; I don't have any huge files that I have to get back that quickly,
Re: (Score:2)
RSync (Score:2)
I use SyncBackFree running as a scheduled task on Windows 10. My file server has 2 Windows 10 Storage "Spaces" consisting of 4x 4TB WD Red drives each. One set is the Master and the second set is the Archive. I work off the Master and let SyncBackFree deal with mirroring that data to the Archive. I thought 16TB would be enough but even after compressing some movies I still need to add at least 4TB to each "space". Need to start buying 5TB drives or higher. I'm waiting for prices to go down though. I don't w
All of the above (Score:2)
Perhaps it's overkill, but I've lost data too any times.
Combination (Score:2)
I've got a combination set up.
Acronis True Image backs up my OS disk daily to my NAS.. It does a full image every 14 days, then incremental inbetween, and keeping about two months worth. The NAS is configured with RAID-Z2 (4+2).
In addition I have my documents, pictures, source code and similar important stuff backed up using Crashplan, with an internal disk, an external disk and the cloud as destinations.
I'm about to get a few Seagate 8 TB Archive disks to take a backup of the NAS, in which case I might rec
emule (Score:5, Funny)
RAID+removable harddrive stored in the basement (Score:2)
Lackadaisical backup (Score:2)
Multiple Choice? (Score:2)
So, I use a separate local machine holding snapshotted backups on a RAID array, plus occasional backups to an offsite hard drive. What exactly do I pick here?
RAID everywhere (Score:2)
Primary storage: RAID-6 w/ SSD Caching
Local Backup Storage: RAID-5, with versioning
Off-site Backup Storage: RAID-5, with versioning
Combination (Score:2)
I use a combination of RAID, local backups, and (for critical files) offsite optical storage.
Protecting Against Loss: Local (Score:2)
To protect against loss, I use Acronis True Image to backup locally.
I have two physical hard drives. One drive is an SSD partitioned into my C-drive and B-drive; both of these are for software. I have Windows on the C-drive and try to install all non-Windows software on the B-drive. However, some applications insist they must be on a C-drive. The other drive is a spinner partitioned into my E-drive and F-drive. The E-drive is for data. The F-drive is a "recovery drive", which I hope I never have to us
Disk is cheap enough to RAID and backup (Score:2)
My only trouble is that my drives are getting old now, and I tend to leave t
Re: (Score:2)
--Drives are cheap these days; you can get 1TB WD Black on Amazon for less than $80, why not buy new drives now and replace it before it fails -- save yourself the trouble ;-)
RAID is not backup, this is true, but... (Score:2)
...a backup kept ON a RAID is a backup more likely to be usable when the time comes.
I back up onto both a local RAID-5 and to cloud storage (I use Backblaze) and though I have had several primary drive crashes in the last few years, the backups saved the day.
Ransomware (Score:2)
If your idea of local backup means network attached storage, I've heard multiple stories of ransomware getting on the system and taking out both the main disks and the NAS.
Make sure you always have some form of offline storage, whether it be a local disk or a cloud storage solution.
Combination (Score:2)
RAID to protect against local storage failure (not a backup per se), ongoing CrashPlan backup for the desktops, AWS EBS Snapshots for the AWS volumes, and AWS Glacier copies of the really irreplaceable stuff (in addition to the prior). The Glacier components are gpg'd and .par2'd just in case there is some sort of bitrot in whatever storage mechanism they use.
A combination (Score:2)
raidz2 + zrep (Score:2)
Windows machines back themselves up to samba shares in a raidz2 filesystem in the primary server. Primary server replicates to the secondary server every 5 minutes. servers are at opposite ends of the house (basement / 2nd floor office).
regular scrubs & smart long tests & automatic weekly emails, too.
any data you have only 1 copy of is data you don't care about.
Re: (Score:2)
You still need to send the data offsite in case your house gets broken into & cleared out while you're off on vacation.
local rsync (internal and external) and webserver (Score:2)
I do a nightly rsync of my home directory to another drive on my computer.
I do a periodic rsync with an external drive.
Family pictures also get synced to my external hosted account.
Spanned Zip Archive (Score:2)
no backup because I keep no data on the computer (Score:2)
At the bank (Score:2)
A small safe deposit box is only $25/year and the odds that the bank will burn in the same fire my house does are pretty low. So I swap out various media whenever I'm there (2.5" USB drive with everything, and flash / Fuji DynaMO disks with the most important source code). And also copy to separate HDDs at home pretty often, and to a backup partition on my main machine all the time (that's the least safe but it's still way better than nothing, and has saved me from my own stupidity many times). I don't t
This one needs to be multiple choice! (Score:2)
I use local backup plus CrashPlan. More than one backup type is common in the nerd world.
Duplicity to 'the cloud' (Score:2)
Got a local free storage provider with 2 TB free space available via webdav. Even though I've known them for >15 years still make sure my stuff is encrypted locally using duplicity ( http://duplicity.nongnu.org/ [nongnu.org] ) They just see a bunch of .gpg files.
More than one (Score:2)
Sandbags (Score:2)
... and an AR-15. Around my basement server.
Cloud and local backups (Score:2)
I chose cloud backup for the poll but my primary backup is a pair of external hard drives. I'm currently backing those up to Backblaze's cloud servers but it's slow going. 880GB to backup and a 1Mbps upload pipe. I've been backing up nearly constantly since March. It should be done with the initial backup in July.
My backup solution (Score:2)
Veeam backs up all my Windows machines to my ZFS NAS. Then, a cron task uploads the daily snapshot to Dropbox.
All of the above and more (Score:2)
Here's how it goes:
Mostly automated.
Cloud and local (Score:2)
I do local backups to a NAS, and sync everything to Google Drive as well, since I got 1TB free for 3 years when I bought a Chromebook. In the future, I'll be moving to btrfs for local data integrity.
Google Apps for Education (Score:2)
How about all of the above? (Score:2)
Business docs use cloud apps, which keeps the data from residing locally.
Needs a checkbox, not a radio button (Score:2)
Cloud (on my own rented server), RAID and multiple local disk backups. The disk has btrfs on it so it is snapshotted, as is the cloud backup.
Disks are encrypted with a key partially stored on a small Bluetooth device in the next room, so it HAS to be in the room to work. Take the disk away and you won't see the data, password or not.
NSA (Score:2)
I don't backup anything. If it gets lost I will ask the NSA for a copy
My family’s data protection plan (Score:2)
Read the question! (Score:2)
Multi-level Protection (Score:2)
I periodically backup to my RAID-5 QNAP NAS.
I periodically backup select data from the NAS to 2 external drives that are only connected to do the backup. Both drives are exactly the same.
Cloud Backup Host (Score:2)
RAID + external backup + secure upload (Score:2)
RAID 1 or 10 (5 or 6 are worthless) to avoir the early trouble
Backup because RAID is only a bandaid.
Secure upload to a server far away from the machines for the most sensitive information. (About 500Km in my case)
And of course keep safe copies of the keys/credentials.
ZFS RAID, external disks and tape (Score:2)
The main data pool is a 2-disk RAID mirror using ZFS-on-Linux. The system uses ECC memory and ZFS is self-checksumming. The data is backed up mid-month into an external USB disk. I have two, one at work, one and home and I alternate these. WIP files for my webcomic and music are usually kept on Dropbox so those are synced to the cloud and also various other machines under my control.
Recently I've considered the possibility of a cryptovirus getting into the system and chewing up the backups, which they
Local back-ups (Score:2, Interesting)
Work stations have internal drives on a key switch. Off 99% of the time except when enabled for back-ups.
Safe from crypto lockers, accidental deletion, power surges...
RAWPOD ( =Redundant array of Powered off Disks).
Synched C: --> E: and sda1 ->sdb1 once a week-month or when significant content is added. For windows I used Synchback free, works great.On Linux I used LuckyBackup.
Then to take care of the fire, theft, tornado risk... a back-up drive sits in a safety deposit box. Probably refreshed too
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I back up data to Amazon Glacier, after it's been AES encrypted with a random string of characters. It's strictly a secondary backup medium, but it's more trouble for Amazon to break the encryption than it is worth.
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Unless you rent a physical server where you have root access. In Germany, at least, this is not too expensive.
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Local backup (with per user snapshots) to a dedicated backup server, which has RAID, and snapshots the backups (the backup server has ZFS).
The backup server is itself backed up to the cloud.
Local mail gets its own server and an extra layer of backup.
Yes, I am paranoid. I only worry that I'm not paranoid enough.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, exactly. What kind of self-respecting sysadmin relies on only a single method to protect their data? This should have been "check all that apply".
Local snapshots & RAID, backed up regularly to storage device with RAID. Docs which may be useful non-local are also backed up to cloud storage. Everything backed up by different software to a USB drive, 'cause hey, it's sitting there already.... Everything backed up across the country to yet another device with RAID.... and I still feel like I'm living
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. The only reason I'm not still making nightly backups via Tarsnap is that I'm completely broke, and can't afford it. Otherwise I'd have all of the above. (And I'm nervous that I don't have off-site - I just can't afford the cost at the moment, so redundant on-site will have to do for now.)
Re: (Score:2)
What does that have to do with disaster recovery/backup?
Re: (Score:2)
Yep, you heard right, Time Machine. Has worked like a champ the last 7 years I have been using it. Apple network at home with Windows VMs. I also backup the VM snapshots to TimeMachine as well. Easy peasy and works.
Time Machine? Had two corrupted back-ups so far (had to reformat the drive), and had one incident where Time Machine didn't want to restore files in folders that had changed case (iTunes library of around 80GB). Crashplan saved me that time.
Re: backups for the super-paranoid (Score:2)
I spent a few years in the rotating rust (disc drive) business. Some of my friends are former StorageTec (bought by Sun then Oracle) engineers. The running joke with them is that tape is a write-only medium.
That being said, the IT dept at the company I was at did file restores from tape on several occasions. Maybe they were using IBM drives
Re: Copy stored on secondary location (friends/fa (Score:2)