Back up Options???

[Charlie Jefferson]

Currently I have all my digital music on a 500GB external HD and would like to back it up. Previously I reasoned that my 160GB iPod was sufficient back up but now the number of songs on the ext.HD easily exceed the storage capacity of the iPod.

I'm living in constant fear of total wipeout of my digital music. The vast majority of the 350GB's of music has been ripped from my own CDs, which is the bottom line of back up, but obviously I want a more instantly accessible form of back-up if ever it's required.

Apple's 1TB Time Capsule or cheaper external drives linked to my current set-up?? Any suggestions anyone?

 

[idc]

I have no experience of the following, but it seems to me that one of the many online storage companies who offer a secure, guaranteed means of storing and accessing your files may be the answer. They all appear to cost one way or another, I do not know how much.

 

[PJPro]

I have one of these. Nice and cheap but good quality.

Simply drag and drop. It comes with backup software....but I don't use it.

Once you've done your backup, take the drive to work, mum's, etc or keep it in the garage. Anywhere except in the house.

I also have a second hard drive in my PC. So, two backups. You can't have too many!

 

[PJPro]

idc:
I have no experience of the following, but it seems to me that one of the many online storage companies who offer a secure, guaranteed means of storing and accessing your files may be the answer. They all appear to cost one way or another, I do not know how much.

I've never used these online services either. But I'd expect the upload to take forever (it's a lot less than your download speed) and if the company lose their files (poor business continuity strategy) or go bust, you're left with nothing!

 

[Messiah]

I would just buy another external drive.

For further piece of mind though you could burn the data to some DVD's. This will take a lot of time and many DVD's but at least you will have a rather more reliable back up.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Thanks folks.

I'm probably going to go with a another external drive or two.

 

[up the music]

Or an internal drive for main store and use your current external as backup drive.

 

[chebby]

Another external drive. (Or two. They are so cheap nowadays.)

Two gives you the opportunity to keep a copy offsite. (At your workplace or a friend's/family member's house.)

I would recommend using "SuperDuper!" backup software. (I assume you have a Mac system from what you say about Time Capsule.)

"SuperDuper!" will let you take a complete 'clone' system backup that is bootable. I have tested this with our iMac and it boots up from the external backup HD with no problems at all.

It lets you do incremental backups after the first full backup, so typically only takes a few minutes to run.

So if you ever have a complete system HD failure, you can simply boot up from your backup external HD and copy everything across to the new/fixed HD very easily once your repairs/replacement is completed.

 

[Gerrardasnails]

up the music:Or an internal drive for main store and use your current external as backup drive.

I agree with this option - it's what I do. Internal drives are more reliable than external ones. I have a 1TB drive in my Dell which is just for music, films and pictures. I back up my music and pictures to an external drive.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

As far as I know, and being a computer luddite (oxymoron alert), I might be wrong I think my iMac could only be upgraded from it's current 320 to a 500Gb drive. Ultimately, I need at least two 1TB drives for current and future storage requirements.

Thanks Chebby, will check out the SuperDuper option. Looks promising.