[ltp] Backup Solutions?

[linux-thinkpad@www.bm-soft.com]

We are experimenting here at work with using some external USB (2.0)  
drives for backing up.  I've got two 120GB drives (I think they were
$170 each) which are raid-1'ed together here on my desk.  I had a heck
of a time trying to get USB 2.0 to work for me.  I would get a hard
freeze when I did under 2.4.19 (or 2.4.20-pre4).  I'm going to try the
latest 2.5.x to see if it is any better.  But, for back-ups, USB 1.1
speeds are probably fine (it just takes a long time).

In any event, we were looking at tape systems (which we currently use)  
which cost about $1,000 (with tapes) to get something decent.  With
USB drives, it gets much cheaper (not to mention larger capacities and
potentially faster speeds).  The drawbacks are that it is more
difficult to take backups off-site, stability/reliability isn't proven
(in my mind), and it takes up more space (particularly when compared
to an internal tape).

For a laptop, I could see using an external USB drive for backing up.  
When they get the kinks worked out of the USB 2.0 drivers you could 
seemlessly switch to using that for faster speeds.  You'll probably 
still need a power source, though, since most firewire and USB 
enclosures aren't bus powered.


Phil


On Thu, Aug 29, 2002 at 12:13:45AM -0400, D. Sen wrote:
> I am looking for suggestions for backing up my hard drive.
> 
> With hard-drives sizes greater than 30 Gigs, copying filesystems to
> CDROM is no longer an option.....Are people using USB(2.0?)/Firewire
> drives? Do they work reliably on linux?
> 
> I guess my priorities for backing up the laptop are:
> 
>      1) Reliability
>      2) Speed
>      3) Mobility (so I can back up while I am travelling)
> 
> DS
> 
> 
> -- 
> D. Sen, PhD
> http://www.auditorymodels.org/~dsen
> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Philip Edelbrock -- IS Manager -- Edge Design, Corvallis, OR
   phil@netroedge.com -- http://www.netroedge.com/~phil
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