Backing Up Your Harddrives

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Originally Posted by Xstr8guy

I'm not sure what SATA is. My internal drive is a SCSI RAID 0 drive. And my externals are Firewire

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Ok, you lost me on what you have, but perhaps these links will help?

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1046951,00.asp

http://www.barefeats.com/hard35.html

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Originally Posted by Chilihost

Windows has a built in backup utility called ntbackup. Start -> Run -> type "ntbackup" (no quotes) and click OK.

Its a basic backup utility that works, just make sure you shut down all running apps first.

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So this isn't a solution unless the computer is completely being unused while it backs up the data correct?

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Originally Posted by Bec

Ok, you lost me on what you have, but perhaps these links will help?

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1046951,00.asp

http://www.barefeats.com/hard35.html

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Lol, I'm not the techy... you are! My internal drive(s) use a SCSI interface, not SATA or IDE. I just googled SCSI vs SATA and found this link. I don't quite understand the tech talk but perhaps you can make some sense of it.

http://www.pugetsystems.com/articles.php?id=19


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Btw, I'll only ever buy RAID drives from now on. The performance in RAID 0 is double that of a single drive. And hard drive performance seems to be the biggest bottleneck when performing complex tasks like video and photo editing.

My new 1 TB Maxtor was only $299 at Frys. A year ago it was probably double the cost.

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Originally Posted by Bec

Ok, you lost me on what you have, but perhaps these links will help?

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1046951,00.asp

http://www.barefeats.com/hard35.html

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SCSI (Small Computer Serial Interface) is an old technology that has traditionally been used for high end servers. It offers fast disks (7200, 10K and 15K RPM speeds) but disk size and expense have always been issues.

SATA (Serial ATA) is a newer technology that takes advantage of less expensive components to get fast disk speeds (7200, 10K) for less money. Its the choice of most servers and is fastly becoming the choice for desktops as it supports very large disk sizes. More info on SATA can be found at its official home http://www.serialata.org/

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Originally Posted by Xstr8guy

Lol, I'm not the techy... you are! My internal drive(s) use a SCSI interface, not SATA or IDE. I just googled SCSI vs SATA and found this link. I don't quite understand the tech talk but perhaps you can make some sense of it.

http://www.pugetsystems.com/articles.php?id=19


.

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Actually, all you needed on that page was the results

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Frankly, I was surprised by the results! They show that SATA has a performance advantage! 10K RPM Raptor SATA drives appear to be on par with the performance of even a 15K RPM SCSI drive, and with NCQ, SATA even holds a very significant lead!

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.. and that's based on data that is 2 years old, as the article was written in 2005.

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Originally Posted by Bec

So this isn't a solution unless the computer is completely being unused while it backs up the data correct?

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Its always best to shut your running programs when backing up, unless your software specifically has a plugin to backup data from open programs, and those plugins are usually built for server applications like sql, exchange, etc.

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Originally Posted by Bec

Actually, all you needed on that page was the results
.. and that's based on data that is 2 years old, as the article was written in 2005.

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All I know is that when i bought this computer, this was the biggest and baddest drive config available from HP. :D

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Originally Posted by Xstr8guy

All I know is that when i bought this computer, this was the biggest and baddest drive config available from HP. :D

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I've been building my own systems for so long, I just don't consider buying the types of systems that are coming out from HP or Dell or whoever.

Invariably, they're cutting corners on some feature I want, (drives not big enough, or too little ram, or marginal power supply) or will have to pay to upgrade it to, which usually translates into a better system overall if I just gather up the pieces parts and do it myself.

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Originally Posted by Xstr8guy

Btw, I'll only ever buy RAID drives from now on. The performance in RAID 0 is double that of a single drive.

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I can't keep up to you two....

WARNING: RAID 0 means you are using striping without any redundancy, so if you lose one of your 2 disks you are fucked.

FYI, RAID levels are:
RAID0 - striping: data is spread over 2 disks, written at the same time, so faster, but no redundancy
RAID1 - mirroring: two disks are written with the same data at the same time, so safer
RAID5 - 3 or more disks are written to at the same time, data is written to 2 disks and a checksum is written to the 3rd disk. The checksum is rotated over 3 disks. Technically you can pull out any of the disks in a RAID5 array and still run the computer without any loss of data, but replacing this (failed) disk with a new one causes a lot of overhead as data has to be recalcuated. Advantage is safety and speed, where speed increases if you have more disks in an array. Disadvantage is more overhead contsantly calculating the checksums.
RAID10 = RAID 1 + 0, two RAID 0 arrays that are mirrored with each other. Very fast, very safe, most expensive.

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Originally Posted by Chilihost

I can't keep up to you two....

WARNING: RAID 0 means you are using striping without any redundancy, so if you lose one of your 2 disks you are fucked.

FYI, RAID levels are:
RAID0 - striping: data is spread over 2 disks, written at the same time, so faster, but no redundancy
RAID1 - mirroring: two disks are written with the same data at the same time, so safer
RAID5 - 3 or more disks are written to at the same time, data is written to 2 disks and a checksum is written to the 3rd disk. The checksum is rotated over 3 disks. Technically you can pull out any of the disks in a RAID5 array and still run the computer without any loss of data, but replacing this (failed) disk with a new one causes a lot of overhead as data has to be recalcuated. Advantage is safety and speed, where speed increases if you have more disks in an array. Disadvantage is more overhead contsantly calculating the checksums.
RAID10 = RAID 1 + 0, two RAID 0 arrays that are mirrored with each other. Very fast, very safe, most expensive.

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Very helpful Luke! And the fallibility of RAID 0 is precisely why I want to do backups. HDs are so inexpensive nowdays, maybe RAID 10 is the way to go.

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Originally Posted by Bec

I've been building my own systems for so long, I just don't consider buying the types of systems that are coming out from HP or Dell or whoever.

Invariably, they're cutting corners on some feature I want, (drives not big enough, or too little ram, or marginal power supply) or will have to pay to upgrade it to, which usually translates into a better system overall if I just gather up the pieces parts and do it myself.

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I envy people that have the ability to do that. I just don't have the time or know-how. But some of these high-end computers from the major companies are pretty fucking nice. I just took a look at HP.com and I'm starting to get new computer lust again. And I have to stay off of alienware's site or I'll go insane with jealousy! ;)

Oh god! They have Quad-core processors now! When did this happen and why wasn't I notified?! Lol.

I hate my computer now. :(

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Originally Posted by Xstr8guy

Oh god! They have Quad-core processors now! When did this happen and why wasn't I notified?! Lol.

I hate my computer now. :(

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LOL - don't hate it just yet. Wait til you PRICE the quad-cores! It's why this one is using the dual core ...

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Originally Posted by Bec

LOL - don't hate it just yet. Wait til you PRICE the quad-cores! It's why this one is using the dual core ...

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I'm not ready for a new computer yet anyways. My new philosophy is to buy the best computer I can afford every 2 years. And I still have another year to go. But by then, I'm sure I'll REALLY hate my current computer. Lol.