How are you backing up / Imaging your system???

[Muzik4Life]

Folks, which backup solutions are you using to image your system drive and backup your projects???

Currently i'm using Bvckup2 to backup projects uncompressed/raw to two external drives. One task set to auto whilst the other task is run manually when i please.

I am also using Macrium Reflect V8 to image my system drive which is 764GB. Now here is my problem, Macrium has recently switched Reflect X to SaaS and a very expensive service too.
So before i commit to being (shafted) robed i thought i'd look about for an alternative solution.

So what you folks using??

[Jac459]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

[Muzik4Life]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

You have spoken the hard and cold reality.... Still a hard pill to swallow when going from a perpetual License to SaaS. But yeah, you're right, you cannot put a price on protecting your work.
But this is where Macrium has got us by the balls, it starting to feel like ransomware rather than a backup protection solution. Thankfully not as expensive!

I have multi options of backup because i have learnt the hard way from DLT tape drives braking to backup drives failing, this is why i have multiple options now. I also have my custom presets and projects stored in the same location to help steam line the backup process.

[Jac459]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

You have spoken the hard and cold reality.... Still a hard pill to swallow when going from a perpetual License to SaaS. But yeah, you're right, you cannot put a price on protecting your work.
But this is where Macrium has got us by the balls, it starting to feel like ransomware rather than a backup protection solution. Thankfully not as expensive!

I have multi options of backup because i have learnt the hard way from DLT tape drives braking to backup drives failing, this is why i have multiple options now. I also have my custom presets and projects stored in the same location to help steam line the backup process.

Well, as an IT professional I can only applaud your consciousness sir.
Have you thought about using a RAID system accessible in your network and you directly access the resources from your network ?

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up.

[BobDog]

The way I look at it is there is important stuff and non important stuff.

Anything that cannot be easily reinstalled is important, anything you can reinstall is not really important.

So my important stuff gets backed up onsite and offsite every couple of days, backups only deleted after about a year. I also keep another computer in step with this data, so I have a an extra live system, a local backup and a remote backup.

I keep a bootable image of my system disk (3 rotating backups) done every week, I'm on a Mac so I use SuperDuper for this.

As Jac459 says unless you are testing these backups there are no backups. So for my important stuff I have a system where the backups are not restored but are compared to the existing data after the backup is done. For the images, after I have made the image I make sure I can boot from that image.

I would never trust something like Macrium myself!

[Muzik4Life]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

You have spoken the hard and cold reality.... Still a hard pill to swallow when going from a perpetual License to SaaS. But yeah, you're right, you cannot put a price on protecting your work.
But this is where Macrium has got us by the balls, it starting to feel like ransomware rather than a backup protection solution. Thankfully not as expensive!

I have multi options of backup because i have learnt the hard way from DLT tape drives braking to backup drives failing, this is why i have multiple options now. I also have my custom presets and projects stored in the same location to help steam line the backup process.

Well, as an IT professional I can only applaud your consciousness sir.
Have you thought about using a RAID system accessible in your network and you directly access the resources from your network ?

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up.

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up. <-------- Only a techy has a vision like so.

The Macrium Image goes down to a Synology Drive over the network. I take a full image every month with daily increments. I keep the previous 2 months on backup "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean the toaster isn't plotting against you"

[anoise]

Important stuff: manual backup with Bvckup2 to external HDD.
System drive: Rescuezilla to external HDD.

[Jac459]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

You have spoken the hard and cold reality.... Still a hard pill to swallow when going from a perpetual License to SaaS. But yeah, you're right, you cannot put a price on protecting your work.
But this is where Macrium has got us by the balls, it starting to feel like ransomware rather than a backup protection solution. Thankfully not as expensive!

I have multi options of backup because i have learnt the hard way from DLT tape drives braking to backup drives failing, this is why i have multiple options now. I also have my custom presets and projects stored in the same location to help steam line the backup process.

Well, as an IT professional I can only applaud your consciousness sir.
Have you thought about using a RAID system accessible in your network and you directly access the resources from your network ?

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up.

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up. <-------- Only a techy has a vision like so.

The Macrium Image goes down to a Synology Drive over the network. I take a full image every month with daily increments. I keep the previous 2 months on backup "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean the toaster isn't plotting against you"

Have you tried to create a direct link to your Synology for your projects and sounds? No need to have a local copy maybe.

[Jac459]

Important stuff: manual backup with Bvckup2 to external HDD.
System drive: Rescuezilla to external HDD.

And then trash macrium.

[Muzik4Life]

Whaou, that's a very very advanced setup you have here...

What is the risk you are trying to manage with Macrium?
If your system is corrupted, I think it would be a day of work to rebuild it. So the cost of your backup system should be commensurate to the risk you have to lose one day of work.
You need also to take into account the fact that if your system is corrupted because of malware you must have a certain history.
I guess you also have presets/samples to backup but I would think that you use bvckup2 for that one.

You have spoken the hard and cold reality.... Still a hard pill to swallow when going from a perpetual License to SaaS. But yeah, you're right, you cannot put a price on protecting your work.
But this is where Macrium has got us by the balls, it starting to feel like ransomware rather than a backup protection solution. Thankfully not as expensive!

I have multi options of backup because i have learnt the hard way from DLT tape drives braking to backup drives failing, this is why i have multiple options now. I also have my custom presets and projects stored in the same location to help steam line the backup process.

Well, as an IT professional I can only applaud your consciousness sir.
Have you thought about using a RAID system accessible in your network and you directly access the resources from your network ?

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up.

Just one word of wisdom: Consider any backed-up system you are not trying to restore regularly as ... not backed-up. <-------- Only a techy has a vision like so.

The Macrium Image goes down to a Synology Drive over the network. I take a full image every month with daily increments. I keep the previous 2 months on backup "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean the toaster isn't plotting against you"

Have you tried to create a direct link to your Synology for your projects and sounds? No need to have a local copy maybe.

My sound library is stored differently to my os images and projects. I have an offline backup for which i only backup uncompressed if i add anything significant to it.

Screenshot 2024-11-19 165807.jpg

This is one of my sample drives. Stuff i have collected over the past 30yrs.

[Muzik4Life]

Important stuff: manual backup with Bvckup2 to external HDD.
System drive: Rescuezilla to external HDD.

Just looking at rescuezilla. may well give this a spin.

[BobDog]

It's also worth noting any external drive for backups that is attached to your machine is unsafe. If you manage to get an evil piece of software that is going to encrypt your data and then ransom you, any data on a drive attached to your machine or network accessible from your machine is toast.

Only non executable and non corrupted data that you have backed up and is not connected is safe. Any image or backup with executable code you may have backed up recently is not safe as the evil piece of software could have been hanging around for a while before wreaking havoc and that software may well have effected any executable you have backed up. Restore that backup and then you are still in trouble.

[Milkman]

I have 2 18TB JBODs with Macrium 8, just updated to X today actually. I run twice a month jobs that began with one manual primary full system backup and then incremental backups scheduled 2x/mo after that. This captures everything including library content. Ive got a little less than 3TB to work with and the last full backup took 4 hours. (USB 3)

[_leras]

Just to add a word of warning I've had several external drives just completely stop working over the years.

I was lucky in that I've had online copies of things and been able to find them but recently I wanted some old projects that were on an extremely drive and it was only by luck that I found copies online in a OneDrive account.

I currently have OneDrive and Dropbox, I try to copy my working project file regularly to a seperate drive, and slightly less regularly will copy to external backup.

This thread is makinge nervous and I'll probably review my backups in the very near future.

On my system I have three drives:
Win OS and apps installed
Drive for working projects, plus my bespoke samples and presets
Drive for larger sample library installs (which I have successfully moved across computers before just by copying)

The biggest pita when trying to move a computer is when plug in makers kinda force a location for presets or samples. Samples I think companies underestimated the need for a different location better.

The perfect preset location for me would be:
1) in a preset folder that I can put on a separate drive
2) also automatically stored in a subfolder, under my project folder in my DAW so it's forever saved with my project.

DAWs are getting better at storing state of a plug in,
but,
You never know when the DAW may change that format and it's no longer possible.
Two, you can't rely on it. e.g. expansion Strobe 2 just doesn't remember which preset you had loaded when using multiple instances, total pita. Thank god Bitwig has soany places you can add notes

(Oddly I'm also good at saving synth presets in a project when I'm set in a sound, I'll also save multiple variations.

However, thinking about it now, I'm terrible at doing this for my FX settings... Ooops).

[Milkman]

Just to add a word of warning I've had several external drives just completely stop working over the years.

I was lucky in that I've had online copies of things and been able to find them but recently I wanted some old projects that were on an extremely drive and it was only by luck that I found copies online in a OneDrive account.

I currently have OneDrive and Dropbox, I try to copy my working project file regularly to a seperate drive, and slightly less regularly will copy to external backup.

This thread is makinge nervous and I'll probably review my backups in the very near future.

On my system I have three drives:
Win OS and apps installed
Drive for working projects, plus my bespoke samples and presets
Drive for larger sample library installs (which I have successfully moved across computers before just by copying)

The biggest pita when trying to move a computer is when plug in makers kinda force a location for presets or samples. Samples I think companies underestimated the need for a different location better.

The perfect preset location for me would be:
1) in a preset folder that I can put on a separate drive
2) also automatically stored in a subfolder, under my project folder in my DAW so it's forever saved with my project.

DAWs are getting better at storing state of a plug in,
but,
You never know when the DAW may change that format and it's no longer possible.
Two, you can't rely on it. e.g. expansion Strobe 2 just doesn't remember which preset you had loaded when using multiple instances, total pita. Thank god Bitwig has soany places you can add notes

(Oddly I'm also good at saving synth presets in a project when I'm set in a sound, I'll also save multiple variations.

However, thinking about it now, I'm terrible at doing this for my FX settings... Ooops).

You couldnt pay me money to use online cloud storage lmao. Ive fallen back to managing all my local data, and I plan to build an email server at some point in the near future. I'll probably build a Mastodon server also. My multiple redundant JBODs are fine, my critical files(family stuff) are backed up in 5 local places, and my music and other data are backed up twice, or 3x for the running system and its redundant drives.

I have an archive of old plugins and drivers that would blow your mind. Firmwares, etc. Nobody is going to make me use the modern surveillance capitalist nonsense to store my files hahah helllll no. Got rid of my smartphones, etc. Not going out like that.