Backing up via NAS - is this possible?

[Steve French]

Folks - After searching existing threads, i can't find an answer so am positing here.  My set up is B2 is connected to home stereo system via optical cable and on home Wifi system.  Complete Back Up via Export to USB C  function was done and back up device is a Seagate passport USB HDD.  All good so far.  B2 is enabled as NAS device in Windows 11, I can see it in File Explorer and yesterday copied 9 albums with 155 tracks to the B2 successfully via drag and drop in Explorer.  The questions I have are:

1) Is there a way to back up my updated music library by running the Export to USB C function but having the USB HDD connected physically to my PC and not to the B2?

2) I can copy the Music library from the B2 to the USB HDD in File Explorer as an alternative, but I don't see where to get he playlist file data and I don't know if a straight file copy of the B2 music library would be able to be restored via the Import From USB C function.

I realize the logical action is to physically access the B2, connect the USB HDD directly and do the back up, but I was hoping I could do the Export backup over Wifi.  Any thoughts are much appreciated.

Thanks,

Steve French

[Peter Lowham]

Hi Steve,

The quick answer to your query is that you can back up your B2 via NAS, but you don't use the 'Export' function.  'Export' can only see a USB device that is directly connected to the B2.

I use NAS to back up my B2, using a Windows feature called 'robocopy'.  This feature has been provided in Microsoft Windows since Win XP; I am using Windows 10 and it is supported on that release, so hopefully it is still supported on Windows 11.

However there is one important issue to discuss which is the use of Wifi for doing backups.

1.  Wifi is fairly slow and unreliable, and the backup would be very dependant on a very good signal strength, which is often not the case.

2.  The Wifi connection will run at something like 4GB/hour with a good Wifi signal..  A wired Cat5 cable connection will run at about 15GB/hour.  A direct USB connected device will run at about 28GB/hour.  My average sized collection of 1500 albums backs up to a USB device in about 8.5 hours.  That would equate to about 56 hours over Wifi.  

My command line is as follows.  Note that it runs from my Backup Server so that I can run it automatically from a Windows Batch script at a set time.

robocopy \\BrennanB2-1\Music D:\Public\Backups\BrennanB2-1\Music\ /MIR /R:2 /W:5 /log:D:\Public\Backup_Reports\BrennanB2-1\Music.txt /tee /NP

Parsing this command line is as follows:

robocopy    -- the backup command

\\BrennanB2-1   -- the name of my B2 in Windows Network; this is the 'Source' folder (usually this is just ''\\BrennanB2' but I have multiple B2s so I have renamed them).

\music    -- the 'music' folder in the source B2

D:    -- the target backup drive on my server.

\Public\Backups\BrennanB2-1\Music\    -- this is the 'Target' path and folder that the robocopy uses to do the backup into.

/MIR   --  use 'mirror image' mode so that the backup is an EXACT copy of the B2 'music' folder.  Note that this will delete files in the target if they have been deleted in the source.

R:2 /W:5   -- retries and wait times if a disk error occurs, here 2 retries with a wait time of 5 seconds between retries.

/log:D:\Public\Backup_Reports\BrennanB2-1\Music.txt    -- create a backup log file called 'Music.txt (very useful for problem resolution).

/tee   -- send log output to the console screen as well as to the 'Music.txt' log file

/NP   --  don't output the 'Percentage complete' number (this would mess up the 'Music.txt' log file.

Regards,

Peter.

[Chris Jones]

I user a app called "freefilesync" its easy to use, the only thing you will need to do is to map a drive to the B2 and to the share on the NAS i.e. B:\"Brennan" N:\"NAS Drive"  then you can use Freefilesync to mirror the B2 and then once done change the settings so when you run the app again it only copies over changes.

You can also use it to copy over to external USB drives. 

Cheers

Chris

[Gingerp30]

I have filesync...(donation edition) - I understand what you are saying theoretically but how to do that on the filesync.

My brennan backup is not viewable on the desktop

the nas on the network.

i want to backup nas to brennan.

is that sync?  

[john.h...@gmail.com]

I use the filesync all the time

full backup to nas 

the  any changes added to nas and 2 way sync back to the brennan

john

please post at the new forum

www.thebrennanforum.com

[fred.w....@gmail.com]

This forum has been archived. Please re-post the question to the newer Brennan forum at

thebrennanforum.com

If the MP3s that you are exporting are so-called "mirror" files made by the B2 from FLAC files, I've noticed that they don't seem to be properly tagged even though the FLAC files were. But mp3tag can tag them using the foldernames that they should be carrying along with them when exported.