Date: Mon, 11 Oct 1999 09:56:33 -0500 (CDT) From: mhughes@logroad.bridge.com (Michael Hughes) To: darrylo@sr.hp.com Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Why use tape for backups? (was: backup method reccommendation?) Message-ID: <199910111456.JAA08459@logroad.bridge.com> In-Reply-To: <199910111449.HAA09498@mina.sr.hp.com> from "Darryl Okahata" at Oct 11, 1999 07:49:00 AM
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I use tape backup at home. I found a Exabyte tape drive for $15 and tape for jsut the asking. I have about 25 tapes that I cycle thru. I use a script that I wrote that keeps track of the tapes and it tells me the right tape to use for the backup. I just can see spending the money for a drive to backup me data. Plus like you said, off site backups are a little hard when using a hard drive. To each his own. Darryl Okahata said in email to me: > > Brooks Davis <brooks@one-eyed-alien.net> wrote: > > > On 10 Oct 1999, Arcady Genkin wrote: > >n > > > Is there any reasons tapes are a better choice? > > > > In summary, if you really care about your data, hard drives are likely a > > more expensive option. Anyway, who wants to end up with only one machine > > anyway. ;-) > > Everything you've said is very true for a commercial enviroment, > but there's much to said for using a drive as an home backup device. > > I'm using an IDE drive on a *separate* system as a backup device. > I just use "dump ... | gzip -9 | rsh ..." to do backups. Advantages: > > * It's cheaper than a *good*, high-capacity tape drive. US$230 for a > 5400 RPM 27GB IDE drive is a very good price point. > > [ 5400RPM is good, because (1) you don't need the speed of a 7200RPM > drive for backups, and (2) 5400RPM drives run cooler. "Cooler is > better", because cooler drives tend to last longer, and because you > may have fewer cooling problems if you ever decide to put the IDE > drive into a cartridge module for drive swapping. ] > > For simple home use, a couple of "dump 0"s and a few incrementals are > enough. However, if your home backup requirements need more than > this, then backing up to hard disks is probably not for you. > > * It can be as fast as a *good*, high-capacity tape drive. Even with > 'gzip -9', I'm getting around 490KB/sec; I recently backed up 8145292K > in 16605sec. If I was smart, and used lower compression, I could get > higher throughput (but I'd be limited by my 10BT network). If I used a > 100BT LAN and was smart about compression, my backup system would > probably be faster than a low-end DLT system. > > * You don't have to play tape swapping games to backup your system. > Most (all?), under US$500 (new) DAT drives have an uncompressed > capacity of 4GB or less, which is much smaller than an inexpensive IDE > drive. Yes, Travan-based drives are cheaper and hold more, but I'm > not sure I trust Travan drives. > > * You can turn off the "backup system" to swap drives. I haven't done > this, but it wouldn't be difficult to make the IDE drive swappable. > IDE drive modules for swapping are widely available (the non-hot- > swappable ones, at least) and are inexpensive. Swapping drives > becomes easier if you have a separate drive for root (you might even > be able to use picobsd for that). > > Disadvantages: > > * If your backup drive crashes, you're screwed. In my case, I care > about the data on my main system, and, if the backup drive dies, I > just replace it and redo the backups (and pray that none of the disks > in my main system crashes in the meantime ;-). I've also thought > about using one of the "no-slot" IDE mirroring solutions (RAID 1) from > http://www.arcoide.com, but I don't know if it's really worth it *for > me*. > > * If you use your backup system for version control ("help, I need the > version of xxx.c that existed on April 1!"), you're probably screwed. > You can't keep too many backups on an hard drive. > > * Off-site backups can be difficult. If your house burns down, you're > really screwed. ;-( > > Still, for "simple home use", an hard disk backup device is often "good > enough". I would defintely not use or recommend it for commercial or > business purposes, though. > > -- > Darryl Okahata > darrylo@sr.hp.com > > DISCLAIMER: this message is the author's personal opinion and does not > constitute the support, opinion, or policy of Hewlett-Packard, or of the > little green men that have been following him all day. > > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message > > -- Michael Hughes email:mhughes@bridge.com Bridge Information Systems, Inc. Pager pin:3142245953 St Louis MO Pager email:3142245953@scout.pagemark.net To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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