I'd like to get some ideas and opinions from people about online backups. I think the various CAT user communities are probably quite discerning when it comes to software (otherwise you wouldn't be here), so I'd be interested to hear your views and reasons on this subject.

I've been investigating various online backup methods but haven't come to a decision yet. At present I have a very small number of key data files (including my CATraxx database and templates) sync'd using the free storage on Windows Live. I'm now looking at backing up a very much larger amount of data (~220GB) somewhere online. This data is backed up nightly from my PC to a RAID network drive in my house, so I'm not completely exposed, but the accepted wisdom seems to be that 'true' backup needs to be under two different roofs.

So I started looking at and trialling the usual suspects - Mozy, Carbonite, S3, SpiderOak etc. I haven't yet found the perfect partner and I wondered what had made other people select the methods they use (assuming you do).

One issue that has discouraged me during some trials so far is the incredibly slow speed of the initial backup. With Mozy I found I was getting around 1GB/day transfer. At this rate it would take me over 6 months to make an initial backup, by which time my requirements will have increased by another few GB, thereby extending the backup period, by which time my requirements ... etc
I have found others with very much faster uploads speeds (best I've got yet is ~15GB/day) but there's usually some other fly in the ointment with them.

All opinions and reasons welcomed.

Thanks

Ken

Hi Ken,

First of all, the fact that you're doing a nightly backup puts you way ahead of most people. You're far more likely to suffer a failure of your primary storage than total loss of everything under one roof.

Now, as to a 2nd backup, I suggest a two-part approach. I suspect that the vast majority of your data is (almost) "static", i.e., it changes infrequently if at all. For this data, I suggest that you backup to an external drive that you normally keep "offsite", and bring home once in awhile to update. that should leave a far smaller amount of "dynamic" data that you backup to an online provider, including a now manageable initial backup. In fact, you may find that your existing Windows Live 25GB is big enough for the dynamic data.

This isn't elegant, but it works. Yes, the music and photos you add to the static data are exposed until you do the next big backup to the external drive, but IMO it's a small risk worth taking to avoid that nasty six-month initial transfer to Mozy.

HTH, and that I've been able to repay you in small part for the help you've given me in the past!

Cheers,
Uncle Boo

I use Cloudberry with S3.

Cloudberry has some nice advantages, for example block-level backup, so if you've got say 200gb of music files and then update the replaygain tags on the whole collection, you only have to upload the parts of the files that have changed, not the entire 200gb again. Options for versioning, compression, encryption, etc. Cloudberry costs $30.

Cloudberry works with S3, Azure, and a bunch more. I use S3 because it's dirt cheap (9.3 cents per gb per month for reduced redundancy storage) and you can use it with a front end for other online access of your storage if you want.

I can do between 15-20 gb per day to S3, but obviously speeds may vary depending on your connection.

I currently use Mozy. I am backing up 190GB of data. I like Mozy (dead simple). I signed up for two years with unlimited storage, however, the price will increase dramatically when my term is up. So I'm looking at alternatives.

My ISP (Charter) is offering unlimited storage for $5/month so I may take them up on that offer, however I'm looking at others.

Cloudberry/Amazon S3 (thanks felldownawell) is promising so I will be taking a closer look at that.

Thanks for all the responses so far - I appreciate that.

@Uncle Boo
I have seriously considered the idea of a periodic (rather than continuous) backup using transportable physical storage devices. It has a lot of merit: simplicity; not subject to the future fortunes of any backup company; relatively low capital expenditure (maybe a couple of drives); zero operational expenditure (no monthly fee to anyone); almost immediate recovery of data.
[In fact, the more I write this, the more attractive it becomes!]
I think the biggest hurdles would be the discipline of establishing a backup rotation regime for myself and sticking to it, and a long-term off-site storage location.

@Felldownawell
For some reason, I hadn't come across Cloudberry in my investigations. I'd seen other front-ends to S3 like JungleDisk, S3Browser, TyphoonDrive etc. Initially I loved the Amazon promise of 99.999999999% durability and 99.99% availability. Whatever that meant these numbers looked impressive! But the 14¢/GB/month with my 220GB meant around $370/year for storage alone without any service charge from Cloudberry or others. [For that I could buy loads of drives and use Boo's method.] I then considered how many nines I needed from Amazon, and the reduced redundancy option is, as you point out, much more attractive. But it would still be ~$250/year. This was still more than I expected. Am I really just being unrealistic about what storage should cost? (Or is it several hundred years of Scottish ancestry that have given me a 'careful' approach to spending money? OK. I'm mean.)

@Doug
Mozy seems to produce split opinions everywhere I look. Many people love it, but I've found just as many forums and reviews where it gets criticised for all manner of issues. My wife runs her own business and uses MozyPro for all her vital business data. She is very happy with it, but the volume of data is an order of magnitude less than I'm considering.

One system that seems encouraging at present (I'm still on my 15-day trial) is Backblaze. This is very cheap (unlimited storage - $5/month coming down to $3.96 if you buy 2 years in advance) and that appealed. I'm well aware of something looking too good to be true so I'm still slightly wary. Technically, Backblaze are very open indeed about how they build storage pods so cheaply (their blog even includes a parts list and layout diagrams should you choose to follow their design yourself). I was reasonably impressed that they own up to all the compromises they've made and which corners they've cut. They're not claiming to offer nine-nines like S3, but nor do they expect that everyone actually needs that. If you do, you're not their customer. So far the upload rate for this initial backup has been running about 14-15GB/day. I haven't yet attempted any restores but I'll report back.

Ah, the days of simply copying it all to a couple of floppy disks are long gone, I guess.

Thanks again

Ken

Update ...

So after about five-and-a-half days trial with Backblaze I've backed-up over 46,000 files / 78GB.
Transfer rates appear to be consistently high.
I've also done a restore of 2GB of data and that was really easy and quick - a few minutes

I'd say my biggest remaining concern is Backblaze itself. How stable an enterprise will it prove to be? It's been around for 2-3 years already so I'm hoping it's over the biggest start-up hurdles by now and has a reliable business model. If I were to rely on a single back-up I might be more concerned about the basket in which I'd be putting my eggs, but I'm intending to continue with my local back-ups anyway. The odds on the source data, local back-up and Backblaze all failing at the same time is the kind of probability I think I can sleep with.

Thanks again to all who contributed.

Ken

Final input ...

OK, so I took the plunge with Backblaze and signed up for 2-years storage for a total of $95 US. As anyone educated in arithmetic in the last century will work out (or anyone else with a spreadsheet, phone, camera, etc) this is $3.96 per month. It also happens to be the rate advertised on the home page by Backblaze - "... from as low as $3.96 per month ..."

However I then spotted some tiny text down at the bottom of the page: a link named "UK Storage". I live in the UK, so what was this? It jumped me to a new home page which offered backup " ... from as low as £4 per month ... "

Wow - so Backblaze's idea of an exchange rate is 3.96USD = 4GBP? Now I'm beginning to see the business model! These numbers suggest 1GBP is worth 0.99USD (99 cents). A quick check elsewhere shows the current 'real' exchange rate to be about 1GBP = 1.61USD. Hey, let's rip these Limeys off and use their money to subsidise Uncle Sam's users! They're not a storage company, they're a bank!

Ok, it wasn't quite that bad. When I followed the so-called UK pricing purchase link, it bounced me back to the same original USD-based order form. I could only have purchased in USD no matter where I started from. Strange.

No real point to this post - just finishing off the tale with an oddity.

Ken

Hi Ken,

Are you still happy with your choice of Backblaze? I'm thinking of signing up with them too.

I have a 2 terabyte portable hard drive that I plug in and just backup the entire folders of both program and data. Few minutes I have a complete backup and just have to load over my old stuff and bang ready to go with licenses, data, etc. Just plug into my usb port and no problem. Then take with me or store in safe. For the $100 is the cheapest alternative plus can put all my other computer stuff like picture backups, docs, program downloads, etc.

I have always used a portable hardrive and never have gone wrong. Every few years I just update with a new portable and copy everything to that one.

Hi Dave

No problems at all to report - I'm very happy with how it appears to operate. I think the analogy is that you can't give a full verdict on an insurance policy until you try to place a big claim. So far I've not had to do a complete recovery, but I've tested partial recoveries and they're quick, easy and effective.

At one point, having already backed up all my data (55K+ files, ~215GB) I issued a simple command in CATraxx to update all my mp3 tags after a prolonged period of editing. Up until then of course the only change had been in my CATraxx database i.e. one file. Then when I wrote all these changes I was updating every audio file I had. Catraxx did the changes in a matter of minutes of minutes but it took Backblaze a few days to catch up on that! But of course while it was doing that it already had safe copies of all the previous mp3 anyway.

One of the other services I trialled was Backify/LiveDrive. Backify were a reseller for the LiveDrive services and I'd created a trial account with Backify. In mid-November I received an e-mail from LiveDrive telling me that all Backify accounts would be closed, Backify were no longer to be a reseller, complaints had been received by Livedrive about Backify, that I should not provide Backify with credit card information, or if I already had, that I should advise my bank that my card may be used fraudulently! Strong stuff. I hadn't provided any financial data for my trial account, and I'd created a new Gmail account just for the purpose so I wasn't at all bothered.
Two days later I received an e-mail from Backify with their view, saying that the quality of service they had received from Livedrive was so poor as to be unusable, that the action taken in closing my account was wholly illegal given the nature of contract that existed between Livedrive and Backify, and that I should take legal advice on recovering my money and data from Livedrive etc etc. Equally strong stuff!
I assume Backify and Livedrive are now at each others throats in the courts and that the only real money will be the stuff piling up in the lawyers' accounts.

On that basis at least, Backblaze has proven to be a blue chip investment so far

@Gastorino
I've invested $95 in unlimited storage that is performed continuously (well, never more than an hour or so out of date), that is available to me everywhere without having to remember to do anything about it or carrying anything around with me. That suits my approach just fine. As I noted earlier in the reply to UncleBoo I considered doing all the back ups myself on portable drives, but recognised I was probably the weakest link in that scenario

Ken