A General Backup Plan
August 5th, 2006
We all have different computer usage patterns and therefore different backup demands. This post will explain the backup plan I have in place, I’m sure there’ll be people out there who will find this useful, and I’d appreciate any feedback that could improve the process.
A little bit of background. I am a heavy computer user, using at least two computers every day, often more. As a hobby I develop software and create and manage websites. My projects change on a daily basis (I actually do work on them!) and so does my personal documentation, such as finances, passwords, reference and todo notes, etc. Since I need access to these at all times, a USB drive is a crucial part of my setup and is where my working copies are located. My websites must be backed up on a nightly basis. This includes the static content, databases and Subversion repositories. I make enough photos to have to back them up once a week from my camera (not cutting edge backup, but good enough for me) and any new music should be backed up once a month, since I’d like a copy of it to survive all future disasters. All my email is stored on an IMAP server (Fastmail.FM), which is backed up locally with IMAPSize.
This is the diagram of my backup plan (click to enlarge):
The main idea with creating a backup plan is understanding how often the data changes and what data is “priceless”, meaning that once lost, the data would be extremely hard or impossible to regenerate. For me, my software, my websites, my personal documents, my email and my photos are the priceless electronic stuff. This data changes on a daily basis and for it I maintain both an automatic daily online backup and several copies of monthly offline snapshots.
Offline backups are performed on a monthly basis and include both a snapshot of my crucial data as well as less important data (can be found online) such as software, publicly available docs, etc.
These are the tools and services I use:
- SyncBackSE with powerful filtering options is used for moving everything to a centralized backup area on my main PC. I do this since my projects require some cleaning from unnecessary files (svn folders, build files, etc) before being backed up. This saves space and therefore backup times.
- Mozy is an excellent online backup service which I’ve been using for the past few months. The Mozy agent is transparent and does it’s job very well. Mozy provides a free account with a generous 2GB, but also provides paid accounts in case you need more space.
- Fastmail.FM is my email service provider. With a 2GB IMAP store my live email system is also my main email backup area (I’ve been with Fastmail for almost 5 years and they have earned my trust). However, I do backup up my email locally with a scheduled automatic backup every week with IMAPSize and monthly to a DVD. Fastmail also provides me with 1GB of flexible file storage which I use in case I need to share files online.
- For backing up my websites I use the widely available scripts for automatic backups. Even though I’m extremely satisfied with my main host A Small Orange and I do trust their backup strategy, I feel much better knowing that I have my own backups in case something goes terribly wrong. I keep two copies of my live websites at every time. One is the latest nightly backup and the other is the weekly backup, which is a Sunday’s copy of the daily backup. Due to space limitations I can’t afford to have more than two full backups, so this is a compromise I made. Ideally, at least a week of daily backups should be kept in case the latest backup is messed up for some reason.
In summary, all my important data is backed up automatically on a daily basis. An exception are photos and the address book in my phone, since these currently require my manual intervention. Once a month I perform the big offline backup to DVDs.
Tags: Backup, Online Backup, Mozy, SyncBack, IMAPSize, Fastmail, Email Backup
Wow.. great diagram! My backup process is very similar to yours. In fact, I also use SynbackSE, but instead of Mozy, I use Carbonite.
I used to do offline to DVDs monthly, but that got to be kind of a chore, so no I do it about every 2 months as I figure the external USB, monthly rotation to another external USB, and carbonite pretty much cover the bases.
In addition, I backup my photos daily, but if there are no changes, then no backup
Great post!
Comment by wujimon — August 8th, 2006 @ 2:13 am
Wow that’s an intricate plan.
Personally, I use Data Deposit Box for my Online Backup. I’ve tried a few other online backup tools but find this one a lot easier to use.
Comment by C Brown — August 9th, 2006 @ 3:25 pm
There are a number of online backup services out there including ours. Many use the delta bit technology which after the initial full backup does incremental backups but only the bits in the file that have changed.
We will never use this technology as it requires several files to restore the full file version and if one of those files is corrupted - no restore.
We have found most of our customers after the initial full backup, the regular nightly backup is usually between 7 and 10 minutes for each customer.
Be careful in choosing your online backup service. Many are offering tons of space at a low price, but, read the fine print as many are restricting the user on the restore process. For example Mozy – offering tons of space, BUT, its still in beta and can only be used with the Windows XP OS. Further, you are restricted on the number of restores with them per month. If I or one of my customers have suffered from a data loss, I want my data NOW and not have to worry about how many restores or whatever. A customer needs to get their computer and files back ASAP so they can do business again.
The most important thing to remember is to test to be sure you can recover your using the software BEFORE a computer or other type of data loss.
Mike
http://akronbackups.com
Comment by Mike K — September 24th, 2006 @ 11:06 pm
Hi, for a fast and secure backup of your precious data, you can try IBackup for Windows (www.ibackup.com/ibwin_new.htm).
You can perform interactive and scheduled backups of critical files to your online backup account with IBackup for Windows. With its Windows like user interface you can even drag and drop files to get them backed up or to restore them. You can also use the automatic selection, restore and scheduler wizards to do the desired operations.
IBackup for Windows transfers only modified portions of your files to ensure a quick backup with compression/ decompression on the fly. You can receive desktop or email notifications on your scheduled backups or restores. You can keep the ‘Mirror Path’ option (default) so that the entire source path can be duplicated for your backups and to avoid any overwriting.
Using IDrive (www.ibackup.com/IBDrive_new.htm) you can map your online IBackup account as a network drive on your computer. You can then drag and drop files to the IBackup account from the Windows explorer. It also allows you to open and save files stored in their IBackup online backup/ storage accounts directly from their associated applications like Microsoft Office.
`Privately Share’ data instantly with another IBackup user using the browser-based application called Web-Manager (www.ibackup.com/webmanager.htm). Using Web-Manager you can create new folders, upload files, move, rename, delete and search files in your online account. The private share feature can be disabled at anytime you wish. You can all these features and much more while using the free trial itself. So take a look at IBackup’s applications and have a really good time.
Comment by Steve — October 18th, 2006 @ 12:39 pm
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