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Terina Altmark
What I am trying to say is that many people use a RAID as their primary storage system, and have it configured either as a RAID 1 or 5, thinking that the redundancy of the RAID is a backup. THIS IS NOT A BACKUP SYSTEM. This was the point I was trying to make.
UPDATE: As for my current 2018 setup, I am running an iMAC with a Retina 5K Display and a 3.5GHz Processor with 1TB Storage. The daily work for the year is stored on an external 5TB drive. That drive is backed up daily using Time Machine. Every month or so (depending on workload) the backup is backed up to a WD My passport Drive and that copy is moved offsite to a safe deposit box.
A BACKUP needs to be a complete and recoverable copy of your data that resides on a separate hard drive possibly even a RAID. Just DO NOT USE SOFTWARE THAT MIRRORS THE PRIMARY DRIVE TO THE BACKUP or you will run into the same problems as above with at RAID 1. Proper backup software will perform a full backup and then hourly or daily backups of changed files.
Every year I rotate the oldest year off to a small portable drive. For these backups of the archives, I use Western Digital My Passport 2-terabyte drives. They are small and easily portable for off-site storage.
Would you be able to share what HD or SSD you chose for your work drive and daily backup drive? I think I would like the same setup because, you getting your livelihood from these files suggests to me your setup is good.
WHY? I use a RAID 5 10 TB with 2 hot spares on a NAS server. Not a bad setup with a GIGABIT LAN and GIGABIT to the Internet for Offsite backup. Use 25 year ago when I worked at John Space we used NAS server with RAID 5 for onsite backups then we would back up the NAS with a 10 tape DAT which would have tapes for the whole week used one tape a day. at the end of the week I would take the Sunday Tape home for offsite storage usually my safe that was suppose to with stand 1500 degrees fire. I would also so the the last day of the month tape in the same matter. Then after 6 months we had archival storage of the DAT tapes.
I think letting people understanding better to use more causal term, RAID is single version data forever all the time while backup is making versioning of data
For RAID 1,
it applies data changes to all copies on all disks at same time , which mean all copies are same version/identical.
1) Dual redundant power supplies, RAID controllers and IO interfaces (i.e. Thunderbolt BUSES, not just ports). Notice the mention of controller here explicitly implies against even considering a workstation-based software or motherboard-integrated RAID controller.
4) Configuring the RAID to use RAID cache, BUT NOT DISK CACHE. Per disk cache in a raid offers a near guarantee of either a drive failure or worse when your power goes out, your kid turns off the RAID while in use or your UPS goes out (oh yeah it happens). RAID cache is reliable enough to enjoy the performance benefits, presuming you have a redundant backup of the component in your RAID.
Using two separate RAID 1 arrays together act as RAID 10, simple solution, I have two different 20TB disk arrays, setting backup interval per minute mirroring, I also have disk fails on me average every two years for high usage as daily server storage, never had a single data loss at all.
So a few questions.. can I backup 3 external hard drives (each being 1-2TB) to a 5TB SATA drive (connected with a Plugable docking station) using Time Machine on an iMac? Would I always need all external drives connected for it to start backing up or can I have any combination of drives plugged in at any time? Or is it best to partition the 5TB SATA and have each external drive backup to its own partition of about 1TB?
thank you all for the ongoing learning(and sharing) discussion. storage, backups, archiving is so critical to our lives now, and new technology continues to try to adapt to offer usable options to address these growing complexities. remember when 1MB sounded like an enormously huge file?
So I would suggest using two Drobo 5D3s as your main work and backup units (connected via Thunderbolt3 daisychain), and then a Drobo 5N2 (or more) on your network as a tertiary backup. I would also have a 1TB USB 3.0 or TB drive attached to the Mac Pro as system drive backup (basically as backup against drive failure on the main Mac Pro drive). I would also employ the Superduper drive cloning app from Shirt-Pocket as well as Chronosync and iPhoto Manager from Fat Cat Software.
6) If adding a 4th copy of the data, I would likely either setup a VPN network both ends and have a 2nd Drobo 5N2 transfer the data by scheduled Chronosync directly from the office to the home OR have a 3rd Drobo 5D3 setup at home where data I have from work via the external drives is copied over to manually at the end of each working day. Being on the network you can also copy what is on the 1st 5N2, so you have a secondary copy of the TM backups.
Just a short question. I have a 12 TB Raid 0 on a Lacie 2Big. When I want to move on, could I just take out the 2 disks and store them as backup and use two new disks for new work? Would the 2 old disk work as backup meaning when I put them back into the LaCie, would they still work of will the Raid be lost or at least risky? I hope my question is clear .
Hopefully, someone may be able to help you better. My concern would be if the RAID is being administered by hardware in the unit or by software. If you pull the drives out and then replace them in the same enclosure and the RAID is being administered by hardware in the enclosure, all should be OK. Of course, if something ever goes wrong in the hardware, you probably will not be able to use those drives as a backup unless you find another Lacie 2Big.
I am assuming from what you are saying that you have 14TB of images on those two drives. My first question is do you need to have all 14TB of images online (I use the term online here as meaning connected to the computer and accessible instantly) at once. Sounds to me like much of that could be archived, i.e. placed on offline drives and stored (at least 2 copies in different locations). IF that is the case I would archive as much as possible and then use 1 8TB drive for storage and one for backup, moving older images to the archive as you need more space on the first drive.
I have received many emails saying that you can use a RAID configured drive as a backup drive. Which is true. My headline is not as clear as it should be. My point is that having a system where a Mirrored RAID (RAID 1) is the primary drive AND the mirror is the backup is a very bad idea. But you could use a RAID (4,5 or 6) as the backup drive if you really have to have both 8TB drives online and backed up. The problem, of course, is that eventually having all these images online at once will be unmanageable. And most likely there is no need for it.
Hey Pete,
I hope you can help me out.
I use Time Machine to backup up system and currently have a Lacie with 2 qty 3TB drives RAID 1. My drives are full and my data from 2012 is being overwritten, this is okay.
I would like to get two new drives at a higher capacity to replace these; how do I transfer this over and after reading these comments, is this the correct thing to do?
I have a new Mercury elite pro thunderbolt enclosure I was going to use and take the Lacie home. Do I use this as my second backup? What size HDD do you recommend, knowing I have 3TB (6TB RAID) and any brand that works best in your opinion?
How do I connect these and follow your rule based on two separate drives rather than one?
Seems reasonable to me. The weakest link for me also is the time span between the shoot and the movement of the new files to the desktop system. I try to be diligent about the transfer so that if the macbook crashes, I have a backup. I think I am going to get a wi-fi enabled WD My Passport to keep nearby to backup without me having to think about it.
The 3TB IS the backup. On it is the backup of the system from the tower, the work disk backup and the backup of the last two years disk. The last two years are also on separate drives that are stored in a safe deposit box.
The Raid 5 should be considered at one big drive as far a backup software in concerned. But this is where you have created an issue for yourself. Since you feel you need to have 32 TB of data readily accessible, you need a 32 TB drive to back it up. (or should have anyway)
I think the confusion comes with people using raid and thinking its as good as a backup. Its not. But if you want to make sure your backups are viable I would store them on a raid 1. Then it is less likely when you need to go to that backup that its bad.
I use ZFS with scrubs + ecc to ensure no bit rot creeps into my backups too.
I must say for a Non tech (I am assuming that) or in your case a photographer you are quite adept and your methods are solid. You can recover data from Raid drives but it will be expensive. Have had to do it several times in my career for clients that simply had no backups or never tested the backups. Never lost data in 25 years in IT doing storage and Server management. Not that I am sure it is possible data is irrecoverable but I have been lucky enough to always be able to recover though it has cost some big dollars a few times for the client that did not listen.
I have trained many Photographers and Photo Booth Operators and know that you are a very smart group in general. Rarely am I asked more questions after the first 6 months unless its things outside the scope of the shop they are running.
As to Raid I would highly suggest Synology devices for your backups. They are extremely well made, very versatile and I have heard so many positive experience reports and few bad ones. I do agree 100% in the policy of having 2 backups of your data. One is simply not enough. Plus an offsite cloud copy is a great idea as it is so inexpensive. BackBlaze is $50 per year unlimited for one machine. Other deals offer 1 TB at $50 a year unlimited machines and there are offers with Synology now for some cloud backup that is very reasonable such as $10 TB per month. Amazon has a new low cost offering as well. JungleDisk is another excellent choice. For Windows software SyncBackPro is excellent as its Touch add on software can backup even Android phones. Quite amazing,