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More => Old Versions => Media Center 12 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: Osho on March 19, 2007, 03:32:59 pm

Title: How do you back-up all your MC12 media data?
Post by: Osho on March 19, 2007, 03:32:59 pm

Hi Guys,

So, I am looking for a solution to back-up all my MC12 media data (audio files, images, video, library data etc. etc.) to protect against hard-drive failure. I am getting a 500GB external drive for this purpose. What solutions (with MC12 or without) do you use to back-up all these data? I will probably do back-up every once/twice a month or so?

What are your suggestions?

thanks,
Osho

Title: Re: How do you back-up all your MC12 media data?
Post by: StarBand Guy on March 19, 2007, 10:16:00 pm

I use PTReplicator (KarenWare). It's very simple to set up, does incremental backup, and is pretty fast.
Select the drives and directories you want to "synch" and forget it. Just check the logs every once in a while to make sure everything's kosher. Freeware.

If you'd rather do an image of everything, I like Acronis TrueImage, but it's pretty expensive. Also does incremental.

cheers.

Title: Re: How do you back-up all your MC12 media data?
Post by: ozmael on March 21, 2007, 04:27:53 am

Periodically I copy everything (about 140GB) to an external drive, but I also use Mozy (http://mozy.com), which is a continuous online data backup system. I like Mozy because it's cheap (US$4.95 per month for unlimited data storage) and you just set it and forget. It continuously backs up selected directories to Mozy's servers. It's better than my external drive because if the house gets broken into or burns down, the external drive is likely to go with it.

Ozmael

Title: Re: How do you back-up all your MC12 media data?
Post by: Magic_Randy on March 21, 2007, 10:00:31 am

I use Genni Backup software for my multi-media stuff.  It supports multiple backup types including Mirror, which is what I use for music and videos.  Mirror is like a net change but it keeps the backup totaly in sync with the source.  This includes any deletions or file movements.

I also use Acronis TrueImage for image backups.  I use image backups for the PC.  Note: I do not keep my multi-media files on my PC.  They are are an external drive.  I have a second external drive devoted to backups.

Title: Re: How do you back-up all your MC12 media data?
Post by: glynor on March 21, 2007, 10:18:19 am

I use an external hard drive (actually 4 500 GB internal SATA drives which I swap into my AMS Venus SATA-USB drive enclosure (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817145660)).  I use the absolutely wonderful SyncBack SE application (http://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/syncback-hub.html) to actually run the synchronizations.  One nice thing about this is that I use one of those 4 drives as a "portable" version of my RAID (culled to include all of my music and just some of the video off of my RAID).  I can actually work on the files and whatnot using my laptop and then easily re-sync the data back onto my RAID when I get home (SyncBack allows for very sophisticated rules-based syncing logic).  This also provides an easy way to carry around most of my data for DJing, having movie nights over at friend's houses, and whatnot.

The other 3 drives contain a full backup of my RAID (which is 4 500 GB drives in RAID5 so that works perfectly), and I keep them at work so that if my house burns down or floods or whatever I still have a backup.  Once a month or so (actually it's usually every three or so unless I know I've acquired a lot of new stuff) I lug them home and run the sync.