Author Topic: Need an external hard drive  (Read 6483 times)

Offline falcybe

  • RootsChat Veteran
  • *****
  • Posts: 840
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #18 on: Friday 06 February 15 19:29 GMT (UK) »
Quote
At the risk of overselling, I think, except for the very, very casual user, the manual backup route is a dead end that will end in a mess.

Absolutely but I think that most RootsChatters with their tree on their computer and a dozen or thirty folders containing the underlying information, certificates, censii, photos etc, and with e-mail on google, gmail, yahoo, live, etc, are what is known as casual users so it would be best for them (us  :) ) to keep it simple.

When I copy files from one folder to another or even one disc to another and I have a file in the destination of the same name then my 'puter asks if I want to replace "older with newer"/"newer with older"/"bigger with smaller" or make a copy then I go with the flow and take the safest path. Afterwards I check the results to avoid having too many copies which are not needed.

cheers, falcybe
Hayden Cowan Weir Jowett Barclay Howard Gooch Joiner Rayner Ash Travers Coltman Samuel Falconer Lacey Croton Clarke Robinson Alden Burroughs
Ford Lusty Jones Wice Wise Scorey Rayner Harding Bacon Chambers and lots more
Click on the little house on the left to go to our site

Offline rosijayne

  • RootsChat Senior
  • ****
  • Posts: 290
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #19 on: Friday 06 February 15 19:54 GMT (UK) »
I agree with you Falcybe - I am not a huge computer user at all, and therefore wanted the most simple option to store my precious family tree information safely.  Now that I can see my named folders on my external drive, I feel much happier!  I also intend to use the very method that you suggest of replacing older with newer etc.

.

Gill

Fill/Field-Kent       
Hayward/wilts
Wood/Kent
Shoesmith/Kent
Andrews/Kent
Austin/Kent
Heritage/Kent
Lawrence/Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire
Beaumont/Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire
Reeves/Kent
Rooker/Birmingham

Offline downside

  • RootsChat Marquessate
  • *******
  • Posts: 4,208
  • Make my day
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #20 on: Friday 06 February 15 22:48 GMT (UK) »
Bear in mind that there are two types of data:

Personal
System

Microsoft's backup program backs up both types, incrementally (weekly) as well as a full backup (monthly).  How would you know which Windows system files to backup if you were doing it manually?  Manual backups very limited in scope and should only considered as extra copies of existing files - probably not something you will use for a full restore.  Backup/Restore software checks the age of a file before overwriting it - humans cannot be relied on to check hundreds of files before restoring them.

The other thing I would say is that I will never use a USB backup device again as they are prone to failure - I use an ethernet backup drive or NAS drive (Network Attached Storage) and I have never had a failure with that.

500GB is too small these days - you need a terabyte at least.  I had a 500GB drive and had to upgrade it after a year as I ran into capacity problems.  I now have a 2 TB drive which I hope will last for a couple of years or so.
Sussex: Floate, West
Kent: Tuffee
Cheshire: Gradwell
Lancashire: Gradwell

UK Census information is Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Offline falcybe

  • RootsChat Veteran
  • *****
  • Posts: 840
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #21 on: Monday 09 February 15 22:10 GMT (UK) »
Hello rosiejayne,

If you are the slightest worried then you could keep a copy of an older version the time you make one back-up and then delete it the second time you make a back-up of the same information. That way you always keep two levels of security.

Downside, I don't understand why we would want to keep back-ups of Windows system files, surely Windows does that anyway? Yes, I keep my Windows programme files, or with my latest computer, the general back-up should I wish to restore but I don't keep backing up on a daily or weekly basis

cheers, falcybe
Hayden Cowan Weir Jowett Barclay Howard Gooch Joiner Rayner Ash Travers Coltman Samuel Falconer Lacey Croton Clarke Robinson Alden Burroughs
Ford Lusty Jones Wice Wise Scorey Rayner Harding Bacon Chambers and lots more
Click on the little house on the left to go to our site


Offline downside

  • RootsChat Marquessate
  • *******
  • Posts: 4,208
  • Make my day
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #22 on: Monday 09 February 15 22:31 GMT (UK) »
Quote
I don't understand why we would want to keep back-ups of Windows system files

If you did have a hard disk failure, I guess it would be the quickest method to get your computer up and running is if you had a fully up-to-date system backup.  I don't think I mentioned daily backups only weekly/monthly backups which should be enough.  Additionally, it can be helpful if you get a bad virus and need to get the Windows operating system back to prior being infected.

It is always useful to have a backup of the things people don't always think about, like drivers and the operating system as well as personal data.
Sussex: Floate, West
Kent: Tuffee
Cheshire: Gradwell
Lancashire: Gradwell

UK Census information is Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Offline falcybe

  • RootsChat Veteran
  • *****
  • Posts: 840
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #23 on: Monday 09 February 15 22:43 GMT (UK) »
Thanks for your reply, Downside, I shall have a think about it.
Hayden Cowan Weir Jowett Barclay Howard Gooch Joiner Rayner Ash Travers Coltman Samuel Falconer Lacey Croton Clarke Robinson Alden Burroughs
Ford Lusty Jones Wice Wise Scorey Rayner Harding Bacon Chambers and lots more
Click on the little house on the left to go to our site

Offline rosijayne

  • RootsChat Senior
  • ****
  • Posts: 290
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #24 on: Tuesday 10 February 15 13:04 GMT (UK) »
Thanks falcybe, that sounds a good system and one which I could get my head round easily.

Gill.,
Fill/Field-Kent       
Hayward/wilts
Wood/Kent
Shoesmith/Kent
Andrews/Kent
Austin/Kent
Heritage/Kent
Lawrence/Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire
Beaumont/Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire
Reeves/Kent
Rooker/Birmingham

Offline km1971

  • RootsChat Marquessate
  • *******
  • Posts: 9,343
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard Nas solutions are fine to
« Reply #25 on: Wednesday 11 February 15 16:31 GMT (UK) »
NAS solutions are fine for recovering from hardware failure. But to recover from fire or theft you need a copy offsite; be it in the cloud or a copy in your car, or at your sisters. Or both.

Ken

Offline trystan

  • Administrator
  • RootsChat Marquessate
  • ********
  • Posts: 14,148
  • RootsChat Co-founder
    • View Profile
Re: Need an external hard drive
« Reply #26 on: Wednesday 11 February 15 17:14 GMT (UK) »
Yes, a NAS (Network Attached Storage) is a great solution.

With desktops and laptops we've had good experiences with www.synology.com but there are other ones that are just as good I'm sure.

The synology ones allow you to also backup the NAS itself to the cloud (to different cloud providers).

So you could have your computer in one room, the NAS box hidden somewhere, the two them connected to your router (either by wire or wireless), then the NAS also backing up to the cloud.

It's a great solution, but for many it's probably a bit too complicated, and the cost of keeping the backups in the cloud soon start adding up. The Amazon Glacier is very cost effective if you don't mind waiting to get your backups back after a disaster - if you had a 1Tb (1000 Gb) then this works out at about £7  per month.



For most people, just backing up your computer onto an USB External Drive and putting it somewhere safe (preferably somewhere away from home) is cheap and simple. You just have to accept that when you do need it, then there's a good chance you won't have backup up for a while so you'll just lost that bit of data.

If you don't have much data, you don't need a big external hard drive. Nowadays it's more future proof to not buy one much bigger than you need, because the costs of storage keep tumbling and the technology keeps moving on.

It's just what works for you, really.

Trystan
Send RootsChat a postcard:
RootsChat.com, Europa House, Barcroft Street, Bury, Lancashire, BL9 5BT
Admin Tip: Forgotten your Username or Password and would like to reply to one of these messages?  CLICK HERE to get a reminder.
AOL Users: You may need to 'cut and paste' any links you get in emails for them to work.