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From: William R. Walsh on 15 Dec 2009 10:52
Hi!

> Not at all.  I will look over your suggestion below and see if
> it will work for me.  The issue with all back up systems is
> to make them as idiot proof (read: lazy or distracted people
> like me won't neglect using them).

That's what a backup system simply must be. Otherwise, backups just
don't get done no matter how good your intentions.

What I've got going now with FreeNAS and rsync requires no involvement
from myself, it is fully automated. I have plans to invest in some
external hard disks that I will rotate offsite. Although that will be
a manual process, I will have another rsync job scheduled between the
currently existing FreeNAS box and another one in a house next door. A
high speed wireless link connects the two houses.

I can say that FreeNAS running on an older computer is much more
reliable and feature-filled than *any* sort of NAS device you can buy
in a store. (And most of the premade ones are disappointing.)

That should be pretty darn fault tolerant and foolproof. Plus, there's
little cost to doing it outside of the hard disks needed.

>  Losing 6 months of email was not fun, and I haven't fully
> realized the consequences!

No, data loss is *never* fun. Back in 2004, I lost almost all of my
data to a flood: http://greyghost.mooo.com/04flood/

We really did try to have a sense of humor about the whole thing:
http://greyghost.mooo.com/04flood/before/DSC02255.JPG
http://greyghost.mooo.com/04flood/before/DSC02257.JPG
http://greyghost.mooo.com/04flood/before/DSC02272.JPG
http://greyghost.mooo.com/04flood/before/DSC02260.JPG

(all of those show my brother and all are about ~500KB in size except
for the last one, which shows my computer room)

Even my backup tapes went under. It was only by luck that I found
copies of a lot of things or hard drives that lived just long enough
to get the data off of them. I've kept the other waterlogged hard
drives in storage since then, thinking that one day when I have just
tons of money (oh yeah right!) to throw at the problem, I will send
them off for data recovery.

Sorry, I got a little bit off the topic there. :-)

Good luck in finding a backup solution that meets your needs. If you'd
want any further information, do not hesitate to send me private e-
mail. The reply-to is no good, but you can send mail to wct <atsign>
walshcomptech <dot> com.

William
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