Backup Questions

[Bruce]

as a timing guide, when I take an image on my home or work PC, Macrium takes between 7 to 12 minutes.
the image on both systems ends up around the 45GB range.
the image gets created on to the 2nd internal drive.

and as to offsite backups, the file backup program I use, ViceVersa, backs up to a 2-bay NAS unit onsite.
it allows profiles to be used, so the daily profile goes to the NAS, and the weekly profile dumps to an external USB drive.
I have three of them which I rotate regularly.

and don’t forget - offsite doesn’t have to be a hassle to swap the drives, one of my offsites I keep at work and the other I keep in the car. so they are always dead easy to get to. but you could also use your neighbours house and any other location you frequently go to.

to some, all this may sound over the top, but trust me, you will live or die by your backups (or lack of).
they are literally your digital life insurance - you’ll go ages (years) of never needing one, wondering why you waste all that time and energy doing them, then one day - POW - house burns down, you escape with only the kids and the clothes on your back (and the god damn cat!) and think you have lost all those family albums, birth photos, wedding shots, tax records, video and music library, password list, documents etc only to remember that you did a backup last week and put the drive next door!

[Ima_Non-Techie]

as a timing guide, when I take an image on my home or work PC, Macrium takes between 7 to 12 minutes.
the image on both systems ends up around the 45GB range.
the image gets created on to the 2nd internal drive.

and as to offsite backups, the file backup program I use, ViceVersa, backs up to a 2-bay NAS unit onsite.
it allows profiles to be used, so the daily profile goes to the NAS, and the weekly profile dumps to an external USB drive.
I have three of them which I rotate regularly.

and don’t forget - offsite doesn’t have to be a hassle to swap the drives, one of my offsites I keep at work and the other I keep in the car. so they are always dead easy to get to. but you could also use your neighbours house and any other location you frequently go to.

to some, all this may sound over the top, but trust me, you will live or die by your backups (or lack of).
they are literally your digital life insurance - you’ll go ages (years) of never needing one, wondering why you waste all that time and energy doing them, then one day - POW - house burns down, you escape with only the kids and the clothes on your back (and the god **** cat!) and think you have lost all those family albums, birth photos, wedding shots, tax records, video and music library, password list, documents etc only to remember that you did a backup last week and put the drive next door!

Hi Bruce.

Yes, back-ups are very important. Even the minor things I have on my computer I wouldn’t want to lose. That’s why I’m looking into new options.

I could store an external drive in my vehicle, but that seems risky to me. What if my vehicle gets broken into? If I were going to store an external drive somewhere offsite, it would be in a safe deposit box. That would be safest I think.

I could also store them with relatives. But it would still be a hassle to go get the drives every time I need to do a backup.

[Bruce]

to me the security of the second location is not important, in fact any location doesn’t matter, even the primary one of the original data.

the important consideration is that both locations are not effected by the same disaster.
having the original location in the PC, and the second on an external drive kept next to the PC, and a third in the car downstairs in the garage and a fourth next door at the neighbours is useless if they all get taken out by the same disaster - flood, earthquake, bush fire!

obviously they are extreme scenarios and you should absolutely try to protect yourself against the most common circumstances in the order of the chances of them occurring.
so for me, hard drive failure, theft and loss of property (either house or car) should cover 99% of the reasons I would ever want to restore data from any one of my backup mediums.

whatever gives you that warm and fuzzy feeling and will actually be able to restore your data come D-day is what you are chasing - and that can be a very subjective goal.

[Ima_Non-Techie]

to me the security of the second location is not important, in fact any location doesn’t matter, even the primary one of the original data.

the important consideration is that both locations are not effected by the same disaster.
having the original location in the PC, and the second on an external drive kept next to the PC, and a third in the car downstairs in the garage and a fourth next door at the neighbours is useless if they all get taken out by the same disaster - flood, earthquake, bush fire!

obviously they are extreme scenarios and you should absolutely try to protect yourself against the most common circumstances in the order of the chances of them occurring.
so for me, hard drive failure, theft and loss of property (either house or car) should cover 99% of the reasons I would ever want to restore data from any one of my backup mediums.

whatever gives you that warm and fuzzy feeling and will actually be able to restore your data come D-day is what you are chasing - and that can be a very subjective goal.

Thank you, Bruce. You are absolutely right.

I’m just having such a difficult time finding the right software. I’ve given up on sending an image to the cloud at this point. As for creating an image on my external hard drive and sending files to the cloud, either the softwares seem too difficult, or they’re enterprise solutions, or they have horrible reviews due to no support and/or bad business policies.

I want an easy, no hassle, set it and forget it solution that will let me easily restore my data (if not my operating system and apps). Beyond that I’d like excellent support by phone, or chat, and it would be nice if the company had an easy way for me to cancel if I want to.

Acronis had all that. I found it easy to use, and it seemed it would be easy to restore with it too. Their support was very helpful, and when I requested a refund it showed up in my bank account as soon as I was off the phone. I was truly blown away by that. Unfortunately, I only had the software for about 24 hours because it just didn’t work on my computer. From reading reviews, it seems it hasn’t worked for a lot of people.

So I guess that’s my last criteria. The software has to to work! :ROFLMAO:

[Bastet]

When in the Macrium Recovery environment I don’t believe you can access the web so you wouldn’t be able to restore that way.

I have done a couple of ‘How to’ videos which are stored on my MediaFire account. Cleaning drives with diskpart & moving Start menu icons to the desktop.

[Ima_Non-Techie]

When in the Macrium Recovery environment I don’t believe you can access the web so you wouldn’t be able to restore that way.

I have done a couple of ‘How to’ videos which are stored on my MediaFire account. Cleaning drives with diskpart & moving Start menu icons to the desktop.

Hi Bastet.

After much researching I decided Macrium is a bit advanced for me. I need something simple. It’s not that I couldn’t learn how to use it, I’d just rather not have to take the time. I need something I can just run with - something created specifically for non-techies like me.

I’ve been searching for nearly 3 weeks now, and last night I finally found software I really like. It’s new - just came out two months ago. It’s Synology C2 Backup for individuals. The only thing it doesn’t have, from what I can tell, is 2FA. I can live with that. They’ll probably add it at some point as at least one of their other products has it.

But, other than that, it’s got it all. It will save everything on my PC to the cloud (it’s own internal cloud - 300GB or 2TB) - files and folders, apps, OS, everything. It’s got encryption on both the client and server side, and at rest. It’s got incremental back-ups. And it will even save everything from an external drive, though that won’t be necessary in my case as my external drive is currently empty.

Also, it’s easy to cancel the service if I ever want or need to. That’s another thing that’s important to me. In looking for a good cloud storage/backup solution I’ve found that with many of them, if you want to cancel you have to contact support. And often that’s sending an email and waiting for someone to get back to you. That doesn’t sit well with me. So I like that with this company, I can cancel the service from inside my account.

My only concern with C2 Backup is support. I see a knowledge base and a community forum, but no email, chat or phone support. However, from their main site I can find these things, just not for this particular product.

So, I emailed their sales department to ask if they provide this type of support. I have received a confirmation email that a ticket has been opened, which is a good sign. We’ll see how long it takes them to get back to me and what they say.

If I do like their answer, I’ll sign up for their free trial of the product. Amazingly, it’s a free 90 day trial! I’ve never seen such a long trial anywhere!

Also, I would have my choice of keeping my data in the US or in Frankfurt.

So, this would completely solve my cloud problem. Then, I would just need to get an image on my external drive, and all my files too. Then I’d be covered whether my PC boots or not, and it would just be a matter of keeping the external drive backed up regularly and storing it in a safe place.

I really hope this solution works. Synology looks like a solid company. They do business with some very large businesses I recognize. I actually came across them earlier in my search, but the individual solution wasn’t easy to find on their website and I missed it. So I dismissed them as more for enterprise companies.

Anyway, I’ll post here again as to what I learn from Synology. I really hope this is my answer!

[Bastet]

I hope it is perfect for your needs.
The website state 2FA can be active & is recommended although it doesn’t state how this is set up.
The 90 day free trial is available until the end of 2021.

[Ima_Non-Techie]

I hope it is perfect for your needs.
The website state 2FA can be active & is recommended although it doesn’t state how this is set up.
The 90 day free trial is available until the end of 2021.

Well, I’m going to do the 90 day free trial! I just got a reply back from support - about 10 minutes after I sent them my question! Here is their reply:

Support will be through Synology. As part of the process you’ll create a Synology Account, which from there you can reach out to our support team via ticket.

Technical support is handled through the USA Subsidiary during business hours.

Synology Technical Support is intended to assist you to diagnose your errors and is focused towards providing support for the Synology product. Synology Technical Support cannot be guaranteed to provide technical support for integrating with 3rd party technology such as network equipment or 3rd party software. Support is available through online chat or phone for simple troubleshooting and our ticket system is for in-depth assistance. Technical Support is available for the lifetime of the device free of charge.

[ol]
[li]

Telephone and Online chat support is available 24/7 including holidays. Telephone support is available at. Telephone and chat support is intended for resolving basic concerns with the Synology product only such as initial setup and anything more complex will be referred to an online ticketing system or existing knowledge-based documentation. Response times for tickets are within 24 hours during business days.[/li]

I don’t have a device, just my pc, so that doesn’t apply to me. I know they sell hardware, so I think that’s what this is referring to. But, it does clarify for me that they have support, and when I can expect a reply if I need to use it.

I’m going to work on getting this set up today, and then I’ll work on getting a solution for the external drive. But having the cloud backup will at least replace what I have on Carbonite right now, plus it will backup things Carbonite did not (like my videos). I’m only using about 100GB on my pc out of 1TB. Carbonite backed up only 24% of that. Synology will back up 100%. And it will only cost me another $10 per year for Synology over Carbonite.

Oh, and Synology’s phone support is in my time zone! Another plus!

So, That’s it I guess. Thank you for your time and knowledge! I’ve learned quite a lot! :giggle:

[/ol]

[Ima_Non-Techie]

For my external drive back-up, I’ve decided to give the new Ashampoo Pro 15 software a try. Even at full price it’s only about $50, so worst case scenario I’m out my money, and it’s not much money.

It doesn’t have the best user reviews on TrustPilot, but the people who do like it REALLY like it and the latest version has been upgraded for non-techies like me.

And, there are far more reviewers who will write a review to complain rather than to praise. So I’m willing to give it a try. It would take an image of my entire PC, and back up my files incrementally too.

Then, if everything works as I hope, I’ll have everything on my external, PLUS in the cloud - which was my goal.

This issue is now solved. If I run into a problem in the future, I’ll create a new post/thread.

Thank you to everyone for your help. I’ve learned a lot and I know this is just the start. I’m sure I’ll probably upgrade my backup plan in the future to something a little more sophisticated. But this is where I’m at and it does the job for now.

This problem is now solved. I don’t know how to mark it solved. Is that something I do, or is it done by an admin? I can’t find a way to do it.

Thanks and all the best!

[Bruce]

good luck moving forward.
and please keep us informed on how it all goes for you down the track.

it would be good to hear how your backup solution is working in a few months time.