Re: Backup media; comments would be appreciated.

From: Chuck Bridgeland (gn32900_at_news-central.giganews.com)
Date: 12/28/03 

Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2003 08:00:55 -0600

On Fri, 26 Dec 2003 09:31:13 -0500, Gaetan Martineau <gmartiPASDESPAM@mediom.qc.ca> wrote:

> Chuck Bridgeland wrote:
>
> > Not really. Look into the cdbackup package. It allows you to
> > pipe the output of a traditional backup utility like tar directly
> > to CDR. It works, and media is _way_ cheaper than Zip disks.
>
> Just simply; wow. I read the above maybe 30 minutes ago, did a search,
> downloaded, compiled, installed, then
>
> tar -cvf - /home | cdbackup -d /dev/scd0 -r 0,0 -l 700 -a "/home backup"
>
> and voilą, I apparently made my first backup on CD with Linux ever...
> Just plainly terrific and simple.

You'll probably want to do some experimenting with recording speed. I had a
50 pack of (I think it was) Maxell disks, that didn't want to record at 4x
(the speed of my burner at the time) but worked fine at 2x.

> - I backup every night, on a circular list of seven media (monday,
> tuesday backup and so) the week after, each media is overwritten.
>
> - From time to time, when going at the bank, one media is put in a safe.
>
> - We have small files (texts, spreadsheets, quicken data from 12 years
> ago, some programs and archives from my work) Not too much, but quite
> important.
>
> Question: We can use a list of seven CD on which we can write over and
> over and over?

Don't know. I don't use CDRW. What I do is a full backup, once per week.
That fits on 2 disks. I keep 3 backup sets around, discard the 4th. I
figure the most I'll be missing, if the worst comes, is a weeks worth of
mail.

Your needs are different. If your stuff is that important, is it worth a
cheap CDR disk every day? 

-- 
"Kittens circled high above them, curiosity battling with arachnophobia."
    Chuck Bridgeland, chuckbri at computerdyn dot com
        http://www.essex1.com/people/chuckbri
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