Western Digital "MyBook" as RAID?

Software RAID like you're talking about just duplicates files so if one gets corrupt you have the other to recover from. Like synching files in two locations but without the benefit of the two locations.

From what I hear from friends working in the IT World "Software RAID" should be avoided if possible from the many problems it seems to have.

If you just like the idea of duplicate files why not get two Network attached HD and schedule a script (or tools that provide scheduled services) to copy files from the "working" drive to the backup drive on a nightly/weekly basis?

Robert

Yeah, and I've been through a few HDs that literally came to a grinding halt. One really screeched. All backed up so nothing was lost, but one still learns from that.

That's what I will probably do if I can't get a HW RAID going between its internal HD and a USB disk. It would have been nice to have RAID though because there are days here in the consulting office where a layout is done and tons of intermediates are created. Those need to be backed up at least hourly.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

No reason you can't have the tools do an hourly backup. The network background traffic wouldn't seem to be a problem for you. And it shouldn't be hard to set up a one-time task in most of the tools I've seen which would fire off a "backup now". You could have an icon set to that on your desktop but you would have to remember to hit that while working in-between your hourly backups.

Robert

bullshit.

Have you ever used a raid system in your life?

If you get a corrupted file, software (and hardware raid) will pass the corruption to all drives in a mirrored array.

The purpose of raid is to provide enough redundancy to recover from drive failures. If a drive in a mirrored volume fails, the other(s) can provide the data.

No problem, although I am not quite the expert to set this stuff up. However, it would have to run in the background like RAID. I could imagine a backup to freeze on me when a file that is just being backed up is accessed. For example a huge CAD file. That would happen all the time here in the office, all day long. In fact, that is just the problem. Right now I back up during lunch and after hours. Kind of a pain because I have to come back and turn the machines off.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

I guess Robert meant corruption because of defects or failures in the platter itself. But yeah, if a corrupt file is written onto disk A and then mirrored it will of course be corrupt on disk B. However, that should (theoretically) not happen if the file hasn't been touched after corruption.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

If either drive in a mirrored system get such soft errors, the file will be trashed. RAID isn't a backup mechanism. It is a mechanism for continueing after complete drive failures and to gain extra performance by using multiple drives.

I've tried some backup techniques.. For awhile I was uploading backups to my ISPs FTP server...Encrypted of course. Nice if computers get stolen or there's a fire. I've tried rewriting a CDRW hourly. I've tried burning multisession CD's until it's full.. I've tried backup software with an external USB drive and internal drive. I think I tried

• other similar software such as.. Webdrive Handy Backup

D from BC

I haven't really followed this thread, but the thing that's called "software RAID" does what you need, on physically different disks (at least in the Linux world).

AFAIK "hardware RAID" doesn't just refer to physically separate disks but to an array that appears to the outside, by virtue of a special hardware controller, as a single disk. The advantage of HW RAID is that it takes the load of controlling the disks off the main processor, or it can cleverly interleave the files on the separate disks so that streaming access is much faster (useful in video editing applications).

But if all you need is silent, transparent mirroring of files on two disks, SW RAID is for you. If one disk fails, the other one takes over and gets mirrored back as soon as you get a new disk.

In Linux, all this is built into the standard kernel so you won't notice RAID at work except for a minor performance hit. I'm sure something similar exists for Windows as an add-on but I don't know shit about Windows.

robert

Gets old with most DSL deals where upload is only 128k or so.

BTDT. Gets old as well. Plus I am concerned about the amount of non-degradeable material the CD snippets will some day cause in a landfill.

That's what I am thinking about. Should be ok as long as the USB drive gets taken out after leaving the office. The nice thing about this WD LAN drive is that it allows a connection of one (or possibly more than one) USB drives.

Have to check all that out. So far I backed up manually. Copy the whole chebang from A to B. Works.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

Yes, it looks like RAID may not be the answer here if it can't discern enough in terms of corruption. Maybe I just use the LAN drive and connect a USB drive to that for regular backups by hand or automatically.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

AFAIU, according to AZ Nomad RAID could override a good file with a corrupt one, essentially trashing both. But then again, so would a backup routine except there you'd still have the previous backup.

This WD LAN drive essentially behaves like a small Linux PC on the LAN as far as I understand.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

Do backups on any data you're not prepared to lose forever. And do regular backups to be taken off site! Unless, of course, you're willing to chance losing it forever.

Why? I've been using the Promise RAID cards in several machines for several years. Never had trouble with the cards.

That's also a good option. Windows comes with its own backup software. It ain't exactly user friendly, but it does what it is supposed to do in the end. I use both RAID and backups.

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Reply to nico@nctdevpuntnl (punt=.)
Bedrijven en winkels vindt U op www.adresboekje.nl

Yep, that's the purpose of this whole exercise, to make that off-site backup easier. I was hoping that if this Western Digital could do RAID with a USB drive that is connected to its USB port I could just swap that in the evening, and it'll rebuild the one I plug back in. But I guess it won't be that easy. So it'll be the usual wait for the backup again :-(

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

I was hoping to cut the backup wait at the end of the day. Ok, my office is right here where we live but I usually have to start backup in the evening, then come back after dinner to take it away and shut everything down. Not a good thing when we go out for dinner. However, theft or vandalism is not too likely since intruders would have to conquer some barriers. Such as a Shepherd and a Rottweiler barreling down the hallway.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

Have you seen a $30 tool called "Second Copy"?

From Site:

Second Copy(r) is the perfect backup product designed for Windows

9x/Me/NT4/2000/XP/2003 you have been looking for. It makes a backup of your data files to another directory, disk or computer across the network. It then monitors the source files and keeps the backup updated with new or changed files. It runs in the background with no user interaction. So, once it is set up you always have a backup of your data somewhere else.

Robert

[snip]

Wouldn't that be an example of "Hardware RAID" not "Software RAID"?

Robert

Can't you have the computer auto shut down after backup? That's how I do it in my office. But how much data do you have, anyway? Whenever I do a full backup it runs to about 3 GB and takes 20 minutes, but the incrementals typically are just a few hundred MB done in under 5 minutes.

robert