Managing Backup Strategies

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

I just did my first full back up yesterday. 43.0 GB's worth; with a destination being a 2TB (1.81 after formatting) Hard drive. The thing is: from this point forward, Retrospect will use incremental backups to copy over what hasn't been backed up already by the program. I presume this behavior would continue until I maxed out of the storage space.

 

As it was told to me, you don't want to have long list of incremental backups because: (correct me if I'm wrong) an incremental backup is like a jacket. One or two holes, you could probably still wear the jacket. If the jacket gets a lot of holes, it's probably time to get a new jacket. (The jacket being equivalent to another full backup.) Hence my question. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

 

So, after you have done a full backup with incremental backups associated to it:

 

How would you start another one?

 

What would happen to the pre-existing backup that preceded the new Full initial Backup?

 

And finally:

 

I set up a daily Backup to be backed up to the hard drive. Does his look right?

 

 

I'm using Win 7 (64 bit) and Roxio Retrospect 7.7.562.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Hi Flying Badger

[Lennart_T]

Your schedule look fine.

 

I would strongly recommend you to use at the very least two destinations (backup sets). (The hard drive is a "member" of the backup set.)

So get another hard drive, create a new backup set and use the new drive as a member of that backup set.

 

The store at least one on the drives off site at ALL times. That protects your backups from fire, theft, flooding, hurricanes, lightning, you name it..

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

Your schedule look fine.

 

I would strongly recommend you to use at the very least two destinations (backup sets). (The hard drive is a "member" of the backup set.)

So get another hard drive, create a new backup set and use the new drive as a member of that backup set.

 

The store at least one on the drives off site at ALL times. That protects your backups from fire, theft, flooding, hurricanes, lightning, you name it..

 

 

Thanks for the advice, and for clearing that up...

 

Also, having a backup drive (member) protects your backups against viruses - provided you catch it in time from copying over to the other member that is stored off site. (That actually happened to me) My one and only backup set(on my previous machine/OS)got infected. The program said it was only one file, that needed to be removed but I trashed the whole thing to be on the safe side.

 

Would you (by chance?) happen to know any of the answers to my other questions?

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Hi Flying Badger

[Lennart_T]

I'm afraid I can't answer your questions as I don't understand what you want to do. What is "another one", for instance? A new full backup? To the same backup set? To a new backup set? Or is it an incremental backup?

 

Please explain what you want to do.

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

I'm afraid I can't answer your questions as I don't understand what you want to do. What is "another one", for instance? A new full backup? To the same backup set? To a new backup set? Or is it an incremental backup?

 

Please explain what you want to do.

 

 

 

 

I'd like to start a new full backup to a different backup set to the same "member" as they say in Retrospect parlance. (I only have one 2TB HD)

 

I hope this clears things up.

 

Thanks,

Hi Flying Badger

[Lennart_T]

I only have one 2TB HD

Then I ask you to get another one. What if this single drive fails? Then you have no backups at all.

Considering the low price on hard drives these days, that's a cheap insurance.

 

I'd like to start a new full backup to a different backup set to the same "member" as they say in Retrospect parlance.

You could (in theory) have this drive as the destination to more than one backup set (or rather: member of more than one backup set). For instance, you could have two backup sets, "Workstations" and "Servers". But I would strongly recommend two drives and have "Servers A" and "Workstations A" on "Drive A". Then have "Servers B" and "Workstations B" on "Drive B".

 

Or did you mean wiping out the current backup completely and start a new full backup to the same backup set? I would never recommend that. It's called "recycling". The minute you recycle the single backup set you have, you are at danger. What if the source (original) breaks down?

Edited June 5, 2011 by Lennart Thelander

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

Then I ask you to get another one. What if this single drive fails? Then you have no backups at all.

Considering the low price on hard drives these days, that's a cheap insurance.

 

You could (in theory) have this drive as the destination to more than one backup set (or rather: member of more than one backup set). For instance, you could have two backup sets, "Workstations" and "Servers". But I would strongly recommend two drives and have "Servers A" and "Workstations A" on "Drive A". Then have "Servers B" and "Workstations B" on "Drive B".

 

Or did you mean wiping out the current backup completely and start a new full backup to the same backup set? I would never recommend that. It's called "recycling". The minute you recycle the single backup set you have, you are at danger. What if the source (original) breaks down?

 

 

I'll get a 2nd HD.

 

So do most people just run one backup? i.e. One initial full with incrementals, and let Retrospect manage the length?

[Lennart_T]

I'll get a 2nd HD.

 

So do most people just run one backup? i.e. One initial full with incrementals, and let Retrospect manage the length?

At work, we do disk-to-disk-to-tape. We backup to disk every night (weekdays). Once a week, we transfer the latest backups of each client from the disk backup set to tape. The tapes goes off-site. Then we groom the disk backup sets, to keep the last 5 backups of each client.

 

At home, I have 4 hard drives, with a backup set each. That started in 2006, when the price of hard drives has come down to lower than empty DVDs (per GB). When these drives were full in 2010, I bought a new set of 4 hard drives and intend to backup to them until they are full. I never groom or recycle anything.

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

At work, we do disk-to-disk-to-tape. We backup to disk every night (weekdays). Once a week, we transfer the latest backups of each client from the disk backup set to tape. The tapes goes off-site. Then we groom the disk backup sets, to keep the last 5 backups of each client.

 

At home, I have 4 hard drives, with a backup set each. That started in 2006, when the price of hard drives has come down to lower than empty DVDs (per GB). When these drives were full in 2010, I bought a new set of 4 hard drives and intend to backup to them until they are full. I never groom or recycle anything.

 

Thanks for the info.

 

I have another question:

 

I had my computer backed up on schedule Then I had my computer optimized and cleaned, later that day. So between 5:47 last night (dusk) and this morning, when I wanted to do another backup, there were 778 files to back up that hadn't been since the last backup. I guess that is out of everything on the drive; as everything but cache files were selected.

 

So, because I have so many incrementals, how would I return the system back to the time after the tech finished working on the computer? (This would be a case where I would have loved to have another Full backup. Would there have been a way to do that?)

 

 

Thanks.

 

Hi Flying Badger

[Lennart_T]

Thanks for the info.

 

I have another question:

 

I had my computer backed up on schedule Then I had my computer optimized and cleaned, later that day. So between 5:47 last night (dusk) and this morning, when I wanted to do another backup, there were 778 files to back up that hadn't been since the last backup. I guess that is out of everything on the drive; as everything but cache files were selected.

 

So, because I have so many incrementals, how would I return the system back to the time after the tech finished working on the computer? (This would be a case where I would have loved to have another Full backup. Would there have been a way to do that?)

 

 

Thanks.

 

Hi Flying Badger

I think I see that you are not familiar with the concept of "snapshots". That is a snapshot (a list of files) of the contents of the source volume at the time of the backup (full or not).

Say you perform a full backup and then two "normal" backups (the latter many would call incremental). Then you have three snapshots. The last snapshot may contain the following:

x number of files from the full backup is still there.

y number of files from the first normal backup is still there.

z number of files from the second/last normal backup has been added/modified since the first normal backup.

Restoring from the last snapshot will result is a volume that looks like it did at the time of the last snapshot. It will contain the files x + y + z.

 

You can also restore from the first normal, resulting in the files x + y. (Well, not exactly, but almost.)

Edited June 7, 2011 by Lennart Thelander

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

I think I see that you are not familiar with the concept of "snapshots". That is a snapshot (a list of files) of the contents of the source volume at the time of the backup (full or not).

Say you perform a full backup and then two "normal" backups (the latter many would call incremental). Then you have three snapshots. The last snapshot may contain the following:

x number of files from the full backup is still there.

y number of files from the first normal backup is still there.

z number of files from the second/last normal backup has been added/modified since the first normal backup.

Restoring from the last snapshot will result is a volume that looks like it did at the time of the last snapshot. It will contain the files x + y + z.

 

You can also restore from the first normal, resulting in the files x + y. (Well, not exactly, but almost.)

 

 

Thanks for the information.

 

So, if I'm understanding you correctly, each backup is really a full backup; because today's backup, will not only contain the information/files/folders not present in yesterday's backup - call it A - but yesterday's backup information will be retained in today's backup. So in today's backup you'll wind up with A + B, when the backup is finished.

 

 

Is Retrospect "smart enough" to know that I've deleted files or programs since the last backup?

 

Could you explain to me matching?

 

Thanks again.

 

Hi Flying Badger

[Lennart_T]

Yes, Retrospect is fully aware of deleted files, moved files, renamed files etc.

 

Please see attached file.

 

EDIT:

In your example, the restore would be "part of A + whole B".

 

Matching is when Retrospect figures out which files that are already backed up once, so it doesn't have to be backed up again.

Edited June 8, 2011 by Lennart Thelander

[3bb69905-4f3a-44a9-9edf-ad43239847e0]

Yes, Retrospect is fully aware of deleted files, moved files, renamed files etc.

 

Please see attached file.

 

EDIT:

In your example, the restore would be "part of A + whole B".

 

Matching is when Retrospect figures out which files that are already backed up once, so it doesn't have to be backed up again.

 

 

Thanks for all the help; and the white paper. Are there more white papers available? It was really interesting.

 

Hi Flying Badger