Backup guide to OS X (what is your best advice and app)?

ramsesm · Jul 24th, 2005, 03:34 PM

This week I have wondered how other people perform their backups. Besides the obvious advice (do backup and do it often) what advice and application do you recomend to excecute a proper backup?

Also, what devices (drives, tapes etc) do you use for this purpose?

Brian Scully · Jul 24th, 2005, 03:49 PM

	Quote:			Originally Posted by ramsesm
	This week I have wondered how other people perform their backups. Besides the obvious advice (do backup and do it often) what advice and application do you recomend to excecute a proper backup? Also, what devices (drives, tapes etc) do you use for this purpose?

But many of us like Super Duper which allows you to clone the whole drive and do subsequent sequential backups I personally use a 160 gig Maxtor on firewire and rotate thru three different partitions on a daily basis. It takes about 10 minutes to verify permissions and do the changed files. It then reboots into the backed up partition so you can see that it actually works. I then change the boot drive via Start Up Disk so I am back in the MacIntosh internal drive.

Daily backup is an overkill for a retired hobbyist user but none the less a good habit Super Duper is about 20 dollars US and has the BEST support I have ever seen on any program. Email questions are often answered in less time that it takes to get connected to a phone tech person. A prudent business person would probably do a backup to CD or DVD for off site storage

Pelao · Jul 24th, 2005, 06:22 PM

Totally agree with Brian Scully ( I was going to use the initials B.S. 'cause it's Sunday and I am lazy, but it seemed a tad insensitive..).
Anyway, SuperDuper is incredibly easy to use. I use it on 2 PBs, 1 eMac and 2 PM G5s at work, all to external drives.

Heart · Jul 24th, 2005, 09:34 PM

I have recently started to use SuperDuper also and like the application.
All you need is the program and a Back-up Hard Drive.
(A sumular program to CarbonCopyCloner but CCC is not yet supported in Tiger, thus SuperDuper has won the race.)

You can do a backup with the shareware application. Right NOW!

harzack86 · Jul 24th, 2005, 10:48 PM

I just started on that this week end, and was looking for various solutions. Although super duper seems great and simple, I need to do a backup of only some folders on various drives (music, my home folder, my images).
I found iBackup, which is free and allows doing this kind of fine selection, plus things like system preferences... It also allows the scheduling of a backup, I haven't checked yet about incremental backup or rotating backup.
I purchased a 200Gb HD which I installed into an external Firewire enclosure for these backups.

comprehab · Jul 24th, 2005, 10:49 PM

More support for super duper here! Works like a charm!

gwillikers · Jul 25th, 2005, 02:22 AM

Yet another vote for SuperDuper.

gmark2000 · Jul 25th, 2005, 02:38 AM

I just got the latest version of Retrospect Desktop 6.0x. I am backing up three CPUs over my network (eventually scripting overnight incremental back-ups) onto a 500Gb FW800 drive.

I'll probably use SuperDuper to copy to a 2.5" firewire that I'll keep off-site.

I'm a hobbyist that farts around with my macs.

mguertin · Jul 25th, 2005, 01:56 PM

word of advice with retrospect backups. Do full restores to test, and do them often. You don't even want to know how much data I've lost to retrospect over the years

ramsesm · Jul 25th, 2005, 02:05 PM

	Quote:			Originally Posted by mguertin
	word of advice with retrospect backups. Do full restores to test, and do them often. You don't even want to know how much data I've lost to retrospect over the years

This is a good sound advice for all backup systems as well... backing up and restoring are not the same thing. I have seen millions of dollars worth of backup data that did not restore due to different issues.

So I guess every one is using an external, firewire drive. No network/tape or DVD users out there? interesting.

Jul 24th, 2005, 03:34 PM	#1
ramsesm Full Citizen Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Toronto Posts: 127	Backup guide to OS X (what is your best advice and app)? This week I have wondered how other people perform their backups. Besides the obvious advice (do backup and do it often) what advice and application do you recomend to excecute a proper backup? Also, what devices (drives, tapes etc) do you use for this purpose? __________________ Octo 2.66 Nehalem 16 Gb RAM, MacBook Pro 4Gb, PowerMac G5, 6Gb RAM, 8Tb storage iPhone 3G, iPod http://www.ramsesmoya.com

Jul 24th, 2005, 06:22 PM	#3
Pelao Honourable Citizen Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: GTA ish Posts: 3,165	Totally agree with Brian Scully ( I was going to use the initials B.S. 'cause it's Sunday and I am lazy, but it seemed a tad insensitive..). Anyway, SuperDuper is incredibly easy to use. I use it on 2 PBs, 1 eMac and 2 PM G5s at work, all to external drives. __________________ A MacPro 2.66 Xeon, an iMac G5, a Uni MB, a wee PowerBook 12" 1.5, an eMac, a couple of cameras, a lens collection and a wonderful iPod. Oh, and a delicious wife. "Words are sacred. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones in the right order, you can nudge the world a little." Tom Stoppard “No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader". Robert Frost

Jul 24th, 2005, 09:34 PM	#4
Heart Honourable Citizen Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: YKF Posts: 3,230	I have recently started to use SuperDuper also and like the application. All you need is the program and a Back-up Hard Drive. (A sumular program to CarbonCopyCloner but CCC is not yet supported in Tiger, thus SuperDuper has won the race.) You can do a backup with the shareware application. Right NOW! __________________ \| Hart & Associates Fine Art - - Wanna buy a picture? Apple Product Professional ehMac.ca \| Enjoy, Post, Donate ... \| Official ehMac.ca Podcast : Available Here \| Become an ehMac.ca Sponsored Member! Twitter Me! \| ]

Jul 24th, 2005, 10:48 PM	#5
harzack86 Full Citizen Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Ottawa Posts: 679	I just started on that this week end, and was looking for various solutions. Although super duper seems great and simple, I need to do a backup of only some folders on various drives (music, my home folder, my images). I found iBackup, which is free and allows doing this kind of fine selection, plus things like system preferences... It also allows the scheduling of a backup, I haven't checked yet about incremental backup or rotating backup. I purchased a 200Gb HD which I installed into an external Firewire enclosure for these backups. __________________ iMac 24' Alu 2.8Ghz - Macbook Pro 13" Unibody - Mac Mini Owned: G4 iBook, G4 Dual 1GHz MDD (still active), Beige desktop G3, Powermac 6300, LC II iPods: 3rd Gen 20Gb, 4Gb Nano, 32 Gb Touch, 32Gb iPhone 4

Jul 25th, 2005, 02:22 AM	#7
gwillikers Cook/Chief Bottle Washer Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: The Left Coast Posts: 3,162	Yet another vote for SuperDuper. __________________ IIci / IIsi / LC475 / Radius 81/110 / 7200/90 / UMAX S900 / UMAX S900/G3 / G4/466 / G4/867 / G4 1.25 MDD / G5 Dual 2.0 / Powerbook G4 15" 1.67 / MacBook Pro 15" 2.2 C2D + MacPro 2.8 Octo / Dell Mini 10v Netbook running OS X 10.6.2

Jul 24th, 2005, 10:49 PM	#6
comprehab Honourable Citizen Join Date: May 2005 Location: Waterloo, Ontario Posts: 2,139	More support for super duper here! Works like a charm!

Jul 25th, 2005, 02:38 AM	#8
gmark2000 Honourable Citizen Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Oakville, ON Posts: 2,687	I just got the latest version of Retrospect Desktop 6.0x. I am backing up three CPUs over my network (eventually scripting overnight incremental back-ups) onto a 500Gb FW800 drive. I'll probably use SuperDuper to copy to a 2.5" firewire that I'll keep off-site. I'm a hobbyist that farts around with my macs. __________________ Gary PMG5 Dual 2.5 • G5 iMac 20 • AlBook 17HD • BlackBook Core Duo • iPhone 3G • 2G 20Gb iPod • 60Gb iPod photo • 3G 4Gb Nano • 4x G3 iMacs • PM6100/60 (why am I keeping this?) Original Apple eWorld member • Apple user since 1982 • Yorkdale t-shirt #3! • Eaton Centre #7 • Sherway Gardens #5 • Pacific Centre • Fairview #5 Got any OS9 educational/kids' software?

Jul 25th, 2005, 01:56 PM	#9
mguertin Honourable Citizen Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Oakville, ON Posts: 5,018	word of advice with retrospect backups. Do full restores to test, and do them often. You don't even want to know how much data I've lost to retrospect over the years

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