Here is a place to tell us how you back up your hard drive(s), and of
course to learn how others do it.

61 responses total.

Ever since getting a PowerBook and accumulating 60+ MB of "stuff", I
have been agonizing over backing up the HD. The last I checked with
the backup utility, it would take 43 HD diskettes and 192 minutes (if
I paid attention). It would take me hours - *days* - to recreate my
desktop. In addition I have an olde SE with 38+ MB on its HD, which I
had never backed up. What to do?

I have gotten a 170 MB external SCSI HD (LeCie), and simply dragged and
dropped the PowerBook HD (icon) onto it: in 18 minutes a backup was
created without shuffling diskettes. One can even open that "HD" from
the LeCie and runs its applications. Incremental backups are now trivial.
Next, I'll do the same for the SE's HD. 

This is a somewhat expensive option, but so would be backing up on 
floppies: without compression, one would be talking $70 or more in
floppies - and think of the *time*. In addition, I have th option of
installing systems (both 6.0.8 and 7.1) on the external so that it
is a boot drive. I also still have some 70 MB of free space after
backing up two hard drives. Think of all the goodies and records I
could store on those 70 MB? Of course, I'd want to back that up too....

I think the concept of backing up a hard drive on another one is
excellent if you can afford the hardware, but there are three
variants of your approach and they each have different merits.

(1) Tape. The advantage is that you can handle Gigabytes of data.
This is great if you have file servers to back up, but makes little
sense for the average computer owner, as you lose the benefit of
just dragging the files. They run via special software, and
are not randomly accessible.

(2) Removable disks. I favor this approach. In fact, I use this approach!
I have a 44MB Syquest drive (They can be bought new for $240 from
MacWarehouse). The drive is thus as cheap as the cheapest hard drive
(except for the steal rcurl got on his) and has some significant 
advantages. It is the nature of disk space to increase. Unlike a
fixed disk, removables can contain unlimited storage. I started with
just a few cartridges but now I have a dozen. You can maintain more
than 1 generation of backup. I highly recommend this. What happens
if some critical file on your disk gets hosed and you don't notice
until you run the backup??? You're screwed. With two generations,
you're still OK.

(3) Use MO instead of SQ in #2. MO (Magneto-optical) is a much more
stable medium than Syquests. Syquests are still hard disks. You can
take an MO disk and Magnet it to the refrigerator and it will not
lose a bit. Don't let a magnet get too close to a disk, though.
The media is cheaper, which makes MO a reasonable choice in between
SQ and Tape. the drives are a lot more expensive than SW though.

I prefer SQ 'cause you can get started with it for under $300.
I am queasy about having only one generation of backup, rcurl.

I do as Rane did.  I have an old External HD and back important
data on to that.  I also back all "document" on to floppies.
I already have all applications on floppies so no need to back
those up a second (or third) time.  Backing up only the docs. and
maybe some system stuff (AUTOEXEC.BAT, CONFIG.SYS, etc. for PC
users.) takes a minimal amnt of time.

I found that I've been elaborating my desktop with files that I am
downloading from archives, and therefore not keeping floppy copies.
I could make a list, of course, but the thought of downloading all that
stuff *again* is what drove me to this expediency. Now, I have some
questions about what I have done:

Since I just dragged and dropped my PB HD volume onto the LaCie volume,
I have everything there, including the System. Is that volume, then
a bootable volume? I didn't run an Installer to put a System on the
LaCie separately. 

Then, it gets more complicated, because I am going to do the same with
an SE's HD volume, so I will have *two* HD volumes (with Sys's 7.1 and
6.0.8) on the LaCie volume. First, is the Sys 6.0.8 volume also 
bootable, and second, *what happens if my internal HD drives and I
start up with the LaCie volume on the SCSI chain*?? How do I choose
which System boots (if either will, etc). I know I don't understand a
lot about this at the moment, so would appreciate clarifications.

I'm not sure but there is one way of finding out...  I know there
is a utility out there called system switcher.  It allowed you to
have both sysyem 6 and 7 on the same HD and switch between them.
Hence, I suspect having both on the same drive should not be much
of a problem.
 
I also suspect for either systems to work properly, they need to be
installed.  I know you could simply drag and drop early system versions
and have them work, but more recent versions would boot but not run
properly.  I don't know about sys. 7.  I just started using that myself.

Then I would appreciate information from someone experienced in this
a recommendation for the steps to take to ensure I am backing-up my
two computer HDs by this procedure, and what other steps I should take
to ensure recoverability. Do I really ever need to boot from the backup
drive? (i.e. - HELP! straighten me out!)

I believe that if you make a disk copy of a working system onto another disk,
that it will boot OK. The installer is necessary to ensure that things
get copied that you can't do with drag-and-drop, like individual resources
in a file, so you need to install from a floppy to your HD whenever you
get new software. Your whole disk copy is another matter. It should boot.

It used to be that it was taboo to have two system folders on the same HD.
I think that's an old taboo. You can tell which one will boot by looking at the
icon. Only one of the system folders should have s system folder Icon.
that one is "blessed" and will be the one that boots. The other one should
have an ordinary folder icon.

If you want to change the blessing under sys 7 you can do as follows.
Remove the finder from the blessed folder. This unblesses it.
Now go to the folder you want to bless. Take the finder out and then put
it back in. You may have to open and close in between to get the
finder's attention. It will become blessed and you will see the
system folder icon for it. I am not sure this process works under
system 6.

Rather than take my word for it, you should try rebooting from your
LacCie to double check. Use the "Startup Disk" Control panel to
select the LaCie, then reboot. If it fails to boot, power down
(disconnect if necessary) the La Cie. In the absence of the desired
disk, the system will revert to booting from your internal HD.

Unless you have the Desktop Manager installed in your 6.0.8 SYstem,
I would steer clear of trying to reboot that system. Otherwise you
will have to rebuild all your desktop files each time you switch
between sys 6 and sys 7.

You can have two System folders on the same mac drive if you use
someting called Ssytem Switcher 1.1 (that was the last version
I saw). run SysSwch and select which system will function NEXT time
you restart/boot the machine. 
  
Tastes great, less filling.
  

Thank you all! I have copied both my SE and PB HDs to the LaCie
external. I went through everything looking at blessedness, and noticed
that the System Folder I copied over arrived unblessed, apparently
because there was already a blessed one in the volume. (The LaCie came
with both systems 7.0.1 and 6.0.8 installed, but only the former
blessed.)

When I copied over the SE (Cobra45e) HD, it said there were some
hidden files it couldn't copy over, and asked politely if it would be
OK to just copy the "visible" files? What was all that about? Are there
hidden files associated with the formatting of the Cobra45e, which
had not been done with the SilverLining software used for the LaCie?

System Picker 1.0 came with the LaCie drive. With it, I could choose
among all the various system folders on both the resident and external
HD from which to boot. I tried booting from the LaCie, using either
the System 7.0.1 that came with it, or the 7.1 I had copied over
from the Powerbook. Both worked fine. 

System Picker determines which *drive* boots, regardless of SCSI
order. Before using System Picker, the PB/LaCie combo booted from
the PB HD. I could use System Picker to make it boot from the LaCie.
If I removed the LaCie, I presume the PB would boot from its HD.
Then, if I replaced the LaCie, would it remember I had earlier chosen
it to boot first? 

I did start to reboot the SE from the LaCie and its resident Sys 7.0.1,
and it started to rebuild the desktop (which I stopped). I do have
Desktop Manager installed: what did you mean, Steve, by "Unless" I
have DM installed?

The hidden files might have been any of anumber of things.  There
can be a hidden file named "icon\r" if you have a customized icon
for a disk or folder. The desktop files "Desktop DB" and "Desktop
DF" are also hidden, but most copying programs don't trip over them.
Were you using the finder to copy? if so neither of these two would
have caused a problem. Basically I don't know. You can see hidden
files with ResEdits's Get File/Folder info filepicker dialog. You
may have to hunt about some.

I'm not too familiar with System Picker, but if it's selecting which
drive boots, it must be putting that info in the PRam, just like
Apple's "Startup Disk" control panel. If the selected disk is
absent, the code in ROM that handles boot disk selection will go
through a standard search pattern looking for a bootable disk.

Concerning rebuilding the desktop. Before sys 7 came out, the Desktop
Manager was invented to handle desktops on File Servers. It replaced
the old Desktop file with 2 files, "Desktop DB" and "Desktop DF".
Many people found the improved performance a real plus and started
using Desktop manager on their non-fileserver macs.

When sys 7 came out, Desktop Manager was built into it. This means
that if the system had been running sys 6 without DM, sys 7 will
have to rebuild the desktop while booting. You said you have the DM
installed. I was certainly given to understand that if the sys 6 you
are running has DM installed, then sys 7 will not need to rebuild.
I have not done this myself though. I just stay on sys 7.
Are you *sure* the DM was installed on the sys 6 you booted?

Absolutely. I had to install DM because it is required for the use of
an INIT called CommentKeeper with Sys 6.x 

I have no explanation.

Sys Picker should choose which SYSTEM to boot under, not which DISK
to boot under.  go to the control panel adn modify the Startup Disk
setting to chanzge which DISK  to boot from

Sys Picker offers you the choice of both Volume (disk) and System,
from which you will boot. It looks everywhere for any systems.

Before long I will want to again back up my HD's on the PB and SE to
the LaCie external. The first time I just dragged and dropped the
HD icons, and therefore made copies of the volumes on the LaCie. 
What's the best thing to do the *second* time? Drag and drop the HD
icon on top of the one already there, and let them fight it out, or
trash the previous backups, and then drag and drop again to copy them
afresh?

It hardly matters, as in either case it will result in the old backups
being deleted nd new ones written where they were. If you trash them
first you will be prompterd to empty the trash to free up sufficient space,
but if you don't you will be asked if you wanted the existing folder
to be replaced by the copy. The effect is the same.

Is the former any faster because a lot of the folders haven't changed?

No. The Finder does not compare and check to see if anything doesn't need
copying. It just deletes everything and copies it all over again. You can
get that kind of functionality with a backup or file synchronizing
program, though. Then it can be much faster. I do my backups with a file
sync program that I wrote myself. I wanted to sell it as shareware, but it
has some limitations. I never spent the time to eliminate those, and so I
never released it to the public. Now there are a zillion synchronizing
programs, so I think I'll spend my time on other things.

I backup while I'm reading or making tea, anyway. I'll stay
unsynchronized.

Actually, what will be the *fastest* would be to drag everything to the
trash and *then* copy over.  However, this would only be faster if you had
the extra disk space to do this.  In doing this, you skip the time needed
to delete the "old" copies of everything.  You can then "empty trash" at
a later time.

Would the timeds it takes to delete the "old" copies, when I just drag
and drop, be essentially the same as that needed to "empty trash"? 
I would have the extra space for the SE HD copy, but not for the PB.

Yes, Rane. The function performed during emptying of the trash is
the same as the function performed when you copy a new item into a 
folder with the same name as an old one, and say OK to the 
"replace" dialog. They take the same amount of time.

You would save time by avoiding this "file deletion" phase, but only
until you had filled up the disk, and then you could no longer benefit.
If you had the disk space, you could rename the backup to be
OLD Backup and then drag and drop, keeping two generations.
I have espoused the benefits of this in the past,  but to be gain
any safety the two generations should really be on different disks.

Re #2 -- $240 for a 44 MB drive??
Am I missing somthing?  I don't care if it is removable, in the 
PC world we pay under $1/Mb.  Same with tape drives.

You should care if it's removable. If you count all my cartridges,
I have over 500MB accessible. And I can add more whenever I want.
I use it mostly for backup and I can have multiple generations cheaply,
and keep them off site, and access them directly when I need to.

You can't do that with a fixed disk.

I also carry the cartidges between home and work in my briefcase,
they're very light.

$200 is about as cheap as new drives get in any world - regardless of MB..

In the Mac world, we pay $299 for a 340MB fixed drive.
(That price is right out of a ClubMac ad - Quantum 11ms 3.5" low profile)
1.8GB is around $1050 for a 3.5" half-height.
I think this is the same world as the PC world.

Jumping 10+ years....(see #24). I have just ordered an 80GB external
portable HD for $120. That is a drop from $879 to $1.50 per gigabyte, over
that period.

But what I want to ask concerns backing up to this drive from a Mac G4 in
OSX.  What's the best way? Just drag-and-drop the volume icon, or use the
Disk Utility to create an image of just data? I don't need to backup all
the System (OSX and OS9.2.2) stuff as I'd have to reinstall all of that
anyway if I had an internal HD crash. 

I did try to create a disk image of the HD on the computer, but it didn't
work as the HD was in use: does that mean I have to reboot from a system
disk, to do this? Software does come with the new ext HD, but I don't know
until I get it if it contains backup software. My version of Retrospect
Express doesn't work under OSX and I don't want to upgrade if there are
simpler ways. I do need new OSX software for my CD burner, and the OSX
version of Toast does have some backup functions.

Decisions, decisions, decisions...suggestions, anyone? 

While we're on the subject, if anyone has a good solution for spreading
a Linux backup across more than one DVD+RW disc, I'd like to hear it. 
I've been just backing up my home directory to DVD+RW directly, but now
it's gotten too large.

Backup software (well, at least Retrospect) would do that. Otherwise, I  don't
know.

Retrospect doesn't seem to have a Linux version.

Further to #25: the 80 GB HD has arrived - and has no associated software.
So my original question returns: how best to backup to it? Let me
repose the question as:

1. Should I create a disk image of my computer HD and just copy it to the
external HD? If so, do I have to reboot from my system disk and do it from
its Disk Utility? Free.

2. There is a backup utility for OSX called Backup Simplicity, which will
perform automatic daily backups, and offers a little flexibility in saving
some older backups (from particular folder on the computer). I could
partition the ext HD and save alternately to each to retain some older
backups (or once a week on one, and daily on the other - but I think it is
slow because the whole HD is re-backed-up each time). $49.95

3. Then there is Retrospect Express, which has the advantage of being able
to retrieve single files, and only resave files to a backup if they have
changed, which is much faster. $ 59.95

4. Any other options I should consider?

In the absence of other options, I'd spend the extra 10 dollars and go for
that Retrospect Express.

A question (or two) about running external HDs:

The (skimpy) user's manual for my new EDGE DiskGo portable 80 GB HD says
that I must unmount/eject the drive (by dragging its icon to the Trash)
before disconnecting it or switching off the power.

1. What might happen if I fail to do this?

2.  Also, can this be automated in OSX - just in case I forget? 

3. Found that I could turn on the drive (by its switch) after
   the computer is operating (and then drive appears on the desktop).
   Manual did not mention this. What other startup options are OK, e.g.

   a. Starting drive with switch before starting computer?

   b. Leave drive switch on, starting drive by power-on to the
      power adapter?

They drive source does not have online support, but does give a
tech-support phone number. I think I'll try here before hanging out on the
telephone..... 

I HOPE Apple's hw and peripherals are more robust than this, but with
Commodores, switching stuff off in the wrong order could screw either the
peripheral, the connector, the port, or the computer. argh.

My guess is the worst that could happen with the portable HD is that if you
switch it off after the Mac, the disk won't be unmounted (marked 'not used')
properly, but I wouldn't want to be too cavalier finding out. Unmounting a
disk properly ensures that all the data that has been "saved" to the disk IS
actually saved on the disk and not still stuck in a memory buffer. The fact
that DOS and Windows are cavalier about this with floppy disks suggests that
they do not do disk-buffering for them, but Windows NT/2K/XP, at least, and
UNIX (which is what OSX is underneath), AmigaOS, just-about-every-OS-I-ever-
heard-of, DO do it for hard disks, UNIX does it for floppies, and I suspect
Macs do it for floppies too, given the software-eject mechanisms.

Twenex is right -- the problem is that, to speed up disk access, the 
operating system keeps data in memory and doesn't immediately write it 
to the disk.  This is called "caching".  (The reason is that making one 
big write is faster than making a lot of small ones.)  If you switch off 
the drive without unmounting it first, that data can be lost.

Shutting down the computer ought to have the same effect; it's only if 
you're removing the drive but leaving the computer on that you need to 
be careful to unmount it.  It's not a process that can really be 
automated because the computer has no way of knowing you're about to 
yank out the plug. ;)

I tried starting up the strip power with the extHD switch "on" and then
booting the computer. The drive did not come up on the desktop. It comes
up OK if I turn strip power on with the extHD switch off, and then turn on
the extHD before booting the computer. So, there is a difference between
the use of the power switch on the extHD vs using the power switch on the
power strip. This is something the user's manual does not note. (I don't
have any data on the HD yet so I was only a little concerned that I might
damage the drive by doing this - seems OK though.) 

OK, that's weird.

I'm wondering if some parts of the extHD circuitry are always "on" as long
as power is provided, and its power switch only actuates the drive motor
and some other parts of the circuitry. Then it might not be ready to function
properly if power is started only from the strip.

I bought Retrospect Desktop 6.0 for the Mac (although I was mistaken on
the price above - think $40 *more* - my earlier version was not eligible
for an upgrade). It comes with a 258 page *printed* manual! The
instructions are about as thick as the book, too. But, after a lots of
false starts and steps back, I got it to backup the G4 to the extHD on the
G4, as well as install a client on my networked iMac and backup that too
to the ext HD. 

Dantz is pretty closed-fisted with their software. The Retrospect package
comes with only two (2) allowable clients for other computers on a
network. You have to buy additional clients for more. 

One seemingly trivial problem was finding out how to partition and mount
the extHD volume: a search of Mac Help found nothing on mounting a volume,
but it was finally found by looking for how to *unmount* a volume.
Sigh....

Heh.  If you think Dantz is bad...I've been pricing out Windows Server
2003, at work.  Not only do they hit you up for the server software, you
need to buy a seperate Client Access License for each computer that will
be *using* the server.

There is .Mac Backup, but you need a .Mac account.  I'm planning on testing
it with the free trial offer.

StuffIt 9.0 claims to have backup support, but it saves files that have
changed in the last X hours, not since the last backup, and not files with
the modified bit set.  For heaven's sake, even eairly versions of DOS could
do that.  Not only that it saves lots and lots of empty folders.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss