Posted on 02/25/2010 7:40:34 PM PST by Constitutionalist Conservative
RAID1 is never to be considered a backup. Mirroring is instant - that means any corruption, damage or problem instantly also involves the mirror drive. RAID1 does not add data security - it adds uptime in the event of a drive failure (hopefully, if it works right)
The only thing that gives data security is a second discreet copy - a backup. That copy should be maintained by virtue of a backup utility. As such it is disconnected from the main data drive except when the backup utility is updating it. Should any catastrophic event occur your backup drive is hopefully not part of the problem.
A proper NAS is really a computer with shared storage. Most cheap NAS units today are a simple hard drive with a network bridge attached to it. They work ok except they do not have a way to manage the data nor run a good backup. Most of the cheapies also do not do the minimum required of a storage enclosure: maintain stable voltage and maintain stable drive temperature. Those little brick power supplies are insufficient to the task of a stable voltage output to the drive, and the lack of decent cooling is the other cause of higher drive and component failures. SIgnificantly higher failure rates. There is no substitute for a quality internal power supply and active cooling when it comes to drive longevity. All of which increases data security.
Quality NAS units, those costing upwards of a thousand dollars (without the drives!), have an onboard motherboard/dedicated processing unit to manage the storage, share it over the network, run backups and maintain the database free of corruption.
Do NOT buy Buffalo NAS 1TB products. It is a world of suck. I had a similar experience with the Buffalo 1TB USB/Ethernet NAS, tore it up and use the 1TB drive in the PC now.
There are a good number of smaller DIY home network manufacturers that could fill your needs.
CoolMax.
Thecus.
I half agree with you, in that a RAID1 doesn’t protect you from data infection or corruption.
What it protects you from is a hardware failure. The question is whether you think most of your data loss will be due to corruption, or hardware problems.
I had two LaCies with noisy mechanical problems; got one repaired before failure, the other ... don’t wanna think about what was on that one.
That's really what I'm aiming for. I like the idea of NAS because the alternative -- dedicated internal or external drive -- would require the PC it's attached to to be on when the other PCs are running their backups.
The more I think about it, the price differential between a traditional 1TB drive and a NAS 1TB drive is big enough that I'll probably just put up with the hassle of leaving the host PC switched on.
You can get a wireless data station for $99, and hook your USB disks into it. The terabyte network drive I got wasn’t much more than that, and it supports additional USB disks hanging off it — so did my 250gig network drive I already have, now that I think of it (it’s only 100mbits/sec ethernet).
I suggest using Cobian v9 for backups of user data (My Documents, etc.) and Macrium Reflect for doing whole drive/partition images. Bot use VSS (MS Volume Shadowcopy Service) and both are freeware. I've used both for some time and they have saved my bacon a couple of times.
Cobian can be set to run on a schedule. Just set it and forget it. Macrium is easy to use but is a bit more manually oriented.
User Data,...or complete Operating System plus Data...
With Multiple machines and if backup is your user Data,...then Network access across all machines is very nice...
My hopes have been revived by CharlesWayneCT's suggestion about a wireless data station (or network USB hub), which would allow me to buy a cheaper external USB hard drive, and connect it to the network through one of these devices.
I brought my 1-terabyte drive online Sunday, formatted as a raid-1 so it’s only 470 gig in the end.
I plan on hooking a couple of 500-gig USB drives to it tonight or tomorrow, so I’ll let you know if that works for me.
My 1tb drive apparently has internal backup capability, meaning I can schedule automated backup from the drive to a USB-connected drive, without a computer. That will give me automated backup of 500 gb of data, in addition to the increased real-time ability of the Raid-1 configuration.
I also took the opportunity to bring a new gigabit plus wireless-N router online, to augment my Verizon fios wireless router. This was to get my 2 gigabit ethernet network drives faster access to the main computer, and also I ran a gigabit ethernet line to my xbox-360, which I still don’t know if it’s gigabit or 100megabit.
It was auto-setup, which surprised me because I thought I’d have trouble with two wireless routers, but now I have two different wireless connections in my house, with two different networks, one supporting my wireless-N and the other for my older wireless-G stuff.
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