Data Backup: Online, Offline & DiamonDiscs
A plethora of storage options, from online cloud storage to offline 1,000-year DVDs & external USB hard drives ensure your data is safe no matter what.
Backing up your photos, emails, documents and computer in general is usually something that’s neglected – until something goes wrong and you hit yourself on the head for not taking the 10 minutes to burn a DVD or email the file to yourself.
As someone that’s gone through a hard drive crash (and in the middle of a school term), I learnt my lesson the hard (and expensive) way. Pricing for data recovery services vary and it cost me about $500 (plus a new hard drive) to get it all back.
Considering the ever-decreasing cost of external hard drives today (around $100 for a 1TB drive), there really is no excuse to have your data backed up or multiple copies in different places. I have a 32GB USB key for multimedia & “lose-able” stuff and a 2GB encrypted USB key for documents & other important files.
There are various external devices that will automatically backup your files, usually without user intervention.
Western Digital’s “My Passport”
Seagate’s “Replica”
ClickFree
Apple’s Time Capsule
Windows Home Server
Cranberry’s DiamonDisc system has also recently dropped in price. Their discs do not use a dye like conventional DVDs (the purple colour that’s visible) and claim to be unaffected by temperature or humidity. The data is “etched” into discs that are made of synthetic stone, akin to chiselling stone tablets. The discs are readable in regular DVD drives. The $1,499 USD price for the writer is still out of reach for mainstream consumers but hopefully will drop in the future.
Cranberry cites a US National Archives resource about the durability of regular CD/DVDs which states that most only last two to five years (even gold “archival” DVDs).
The other method of data backup that is becoming popular is online or “cloud” storage/backup. Google’s online storage price was recently slashed and now provides packages from 20GB/$5 USD/year all the way up to 16TB/$4,096 USD/year. Google currently only allows storage of emails & photos but with Google announcing their Chrome Operating System sometime this week, the mythical “GDrive” might finally be announced.
The advantage of online services is 24/7 access to your data, wherever you can access the Internet. Pricing varies but a free service to try is MSN’s SkyDrive, which provides 25GB free.
When shopping around for an online storage provider, check out the features they offer such as:
- encryption (you don’t want others accessing your files)
- compatibility (Windows, Mac, Linux)
- recovery services (some will mail you your data on DVDs)
- accessibility (FTP, integrated into Windows Explorer, mobile/smartphone access, etc.)
- file size limits (a 50MB/file limit means you won’t be able to upload home movies for example)
- price (per GB, traffic back & forth [uploading & download], monthly fees, etc.).
Wikipedia has a decent comparison of various file hosting services & online backup services.
An online service that is conspicuously missing is BackBlaze, a service I’ve settled on after doing my research. They offer unlimited backup for $50 USD/year.
I also recently built a file server using a product called unRAID, which I’ll write about soon.
Whatever method you choose to backup your data, the important thing is that you have a backup somewhere, preferably off-site or at the very least, somewhere safe (like a portable fireproof safe).
Filed Under: Cloud Computing > Computers & Software > How-To > Productivity Tools > Utilities
Tags: backup, CDs, Cloud Computing, cloud storage, data backup, DVDs, file sharing, memory stick, online storage, Storage, thumb drive, USB key
Backing up data is truly a challenge. I find the best way to back up is using one of the online backup services.
There are many such service providers out there. The best way to pick an online backup company is by Googling “Online Backup Review”.
There are good review sites and read their rankings, ratings, features and so on, and then decide which one to pick.
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With online backups it has never been easier to backup your data. There is a new CloudBerry Online Backup powered by Amazon S3 reliable and cost efficient storage. You can download it at http://cloudberrydrive.com
Nadya,
CloudBerry Lab team
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I followed friends’ advice and bought a portable hard disk drive this last summer. After a summer with family and friends I decided to start sharing my photos and videos (as well as saving them to DVDs) but to my surprise, the HDD was inoperable! Yes, I contacted the manufacturer and they would replace it but not my memories… and if I decide to send it to a data recovery place, the warranty will be void and on top of paying the data recovery fee (which by the way, is not guaranteed), I will have to pay for a new portable drive. I guess I will give it a try to online backup systems.
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Hard drive crashes suck but I’ve never heard of a data recovery place charging for a failed recovery. It’s usually “no data, no charge”.
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I have a back up regimen, which suits me just fine, however with the price of backup software and one package not doing, as I want it to. Has led me to believe that buying a rather inexpensive internal HDD in the 1 to 1.5 TB range. At present, the prices are relatively cheap in comparison and the ROI is very short.
The current store price (on-line) the store price might be lower once in the door is:
SATA2 1.0TB SEAGATE 7200.12 32M ST31000528AS $99.00 CAD
SATA2 1.5TB SEAGATE 7200.11 32M ST31500341AS $139.00 CAD = 500 GB for $40. Extra CAD
The current system has 1.4 TB of which only a fraction is being used doubling plus a bit ensures years of stable encrypted in-house backups.
I do not trust any off site Internet backup scheme one does not know who is behind the scenes and if they have access to the files.
Also there is running a system in full RAID mode where C: is mirrored onto D: … makes life easy for sure.
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Have a look at http://www.perfectbackup.co.uk it will backup your data offsite and also run a local backup to a NAS or USB drive at the same time. That way you have an onsite and offsite backup.
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[...] those that prefer physical media (though DVDs have been known to degrade over time), a six-disc set is also available for $59.95 USD + $20.95 USD [...]
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