Backup Music

[DaHood]

Hi

I have a large collection of music, a mix of flac and m4a, approx. 500GB in size. I'm looking at backup solutions and came across a company called Mozy that charges $4.95 per month for unlimited storage.

Has any used them? If so what is your feedback and are there any better alternatives?

Many thanks

[jeffmeh]

I looked into online backups, but unless one has tremendous upload and download bandwidth it would just take too long to backup and recover.

Let's say that you have 768Kb/sec upload speed. To backup 500 GB:

500G bytes x 8 bits/byte x 1 sec/768K bits X 1 min/60 sec x 1 hr/60 min x 1 day/24 hr =~ 60 days.

Some of the services also limit your download bandwidth, so check that out also. But if you achieved 8Mb/sec, it would still take about 6 days to get your data back.

[dougwise]

With drives as inexpensive as they have become (500GB $100 / 750GB $200 at http://www.pricewatch.com/hard_drives/), I keep two backup copies of my music- one on a second computer at home which is updated daily, and another in a drawer at my office which is updated every quarter.

Doug Wise
dougwise (AT) yahoo (DOT) com

[aubuti]

Also, compare that $5/month to the cost of an external USB hard drive. A quick search turned up a 500GB drive for $120, which is what you would have paid after 2 years with that service. As long as the drive lasts longer than 2 years, it's less expensive as well as more convenient.

To get the same or similar security benefits of an off-site backup service, store the external drive somewhere else (office, friend's house, relative's, etc.) in between backups. Don't do like some people and plug it in to the same power strip next to your computer, where it is subject to the same threats of theft, fire, flood, electrical spike, etc.

[DaHood]

Also, compare that $5/month to the cost of an external USB hard drive. A quick search turned up a 500GB drive for $120, which is what you would have paid after 2 years with that service. As long as the drive lasts longer than 2 years, it's less expensive as well as more convenient.

To get the same or similar security benefits of an off-site backup service, store the external drive somewhere else (office, friend's house, relative's, etc.) in between backups. Don't do like some people and plug it in to the same power strip next to your computer, where it is subject to the same threats of theft, fire, flood, electrical spike, etc.

Thanks everyone for your rational. I went ahead and bought a years subscription to Mozy. It's taking about 5/6 hours to do a backup of 2GB. In a strange way I do prefer this to having an alternate drive that I have to get from wherever I choose to store it each I need to update it and then return it. Also any extra space will be used to house a new drive when the 500GB one gets full.

I also like the idea of just setting it to backup and forgeting about it. My ADSL connection is reality fast about 1.3MB upstream and my ISP is about to trial a 2MB upstream service so I hear.