How do you do NAS backups?

[cyberjock]

I will warn you that copies=2 doesn't work quite like you'd hope. If the file system gets corrupted you can kiss all of the data goodbye. ;)

 

[bestboy]

I'm currently about to switch my backup scheme.

Until now I used rsync to backup files to my old Buffalo Terastation NAS. While rsync is great for file transfers, it really sucked big time due to the abysmal performance of the Terastation. It could not handle the SSH connection and RSH is not an option with FreeNAS.

So for my new backup plan I'm switching to a ZFS replication. I got an external drive enclosure connected via eSATA that provides a backup pool. It's basically similar to this suggestion but without the evil port multipliers.

 

[Gareth Hill]

I use two different ways to backup.

Firstly I have two N54L Microservers, one is FreeNAS and the other acts as my HTPC, they have the same drives so I use Rsync to duplicate everything between them. Costs me two drives each time I need to upgrade but it saved me just recently when the RAID5 I was using died.

Secondly I use an online backup -Just switched to Crashplan on the FreeNAS - which I back up my "important" files to the web, all my family photos are too important to me to rely on even two copies of them, just in case they are both stolen, house burns down, etc etc. I include the documents and company accounts into that, and also Rsync the client machines to the FreeNAS and back those up too. Keeps everything that's irreplaceable backed up online while my Music/Movies are all re-purchasable I can not get back the pictures of the kids!

 

[Nick Howard]

I've settled on using a program called 'Syncbackfree' on my windows 7 machine. It's free and is a much better program than I was expecting to be honest. I've got a 4 disk raid 5 array in the PC and have 5 profiles setup in Syncbackfree, (movies,tvshows,music,photos,work) each profile is using ftp to connect to the corresponding dataset and they just mirror them adding any new files or removing old ones that have changed on the nas. This runs daily at 8pm and the good thing is even if I'm away and the PC is off it will automatically know to start up the very next time the PC is switched on. I've also got a couple of external drives that I'll back up to on a monthly basis and keep at my folks house.

 

[HawkieNorway]

I personally have a 2 way backup going.
1. I rsync over internet to a friend with a similar setup of mine, so we mirror eachothers data
2. I have a DROBO that mirrors my most valuable personal data

The problem with backup of data is the amount of storage, and most people have to prioritize, and I generally recommend you to make a simple listing of datatype, size and how easy you can replace them. Then from that list you prioritize and select backup solution. For the non-essential data I also mirror parts of it to Dropbox, Onedrive, Box and so on, so I have online backups as well. Using multiple accounts on those services, you can have a significant amount of data backed up into the cloud.

 

[thewiep]

I will warn you that copies=2 doesn't work quite like you'd hope. If the file system gets corrupted you can kiss all of the data goodbye. ;)

thanks a lot for the warning!
I guess it's time for me to read up on this :)