I think you are right that there is some complexity there to resolve and I need to do a bit of research to find the best plan.
I think one solution may be to have a backup “system SSD” on hand - even installed in the computer full-time in an extra slot - on which I install a full macOS installation from scratch using the standard Apple installer. Then if the main SSD ever fails I can boot from the backup system SSD. And then I can either copy my apps/data to this backup system SSD or just execute the apps from backup “apps/Data SSD” which is made daily.
This would also have the advantage of letting me easily test beta OS versions or newly released OS versions with a copy of my current data but without having to give up the older OS until I am convinced there are no conflicts with the new OS.
This is well and good, and perhaps I’m off my rocker, but I thought I read that the PCI slots in the Mac Pro were slower than normal. Might be worth double checking that before throwing money at this.
Maybe it would be helpful to rephrase the question not solely about the new Mac Pro.
For any Apple silcon Mac - what is the best way to have a bullet-proof strategy so if your main SSD fails you can be back up and running as quickly/painlessly as possible using a backup of both the OS and your apps/data?
I’m only mostly joking: If downtime for you can be measured in significant dollars per hour then having a backup machine could be cost effective, especially if the choice is between two mid-tier machines or one high end machine. I have a MacBook Air to suplement my main computer partly for this reason.
Sadly, very high availability requirements tend to come with very high costs, but tend to be justifiable if theyre required.
Your recovery plan appears sound, but it requires you replace or repair your Mac before you can get back to work.
However if you choose PCIe storage you will need another Mac Pro. If you choose external thunderbolt 4 storage you could theoretically use any of the following in an emergency:
Have you considered getting a Studio (or a Studio and a backup Mini) with a smaller internal drive, and then maxing out a couple of external SSDs for your data storage and backup. Use CCC or SuperDuper for nightly backups. If you lose either of the SSDs, you have the other for working. If you lose the Studio, use the backup Mini with the external drives and you’re instantly back in business. Since these are data-only drives, you don’t need to worry about bootable backups.
That’s a nice backup option but I think using an external Thunderbolt SSD as my main working drive would reduce performance considerably over an internal SSD.
I have a 2019 Mac Pro with a 4TB drive plus 24 TB of Fast PCI-E SSD (Two OWC Cards, one Sonnet). In hindsight, a huge mistake. I have 3 large monitors on all the time, sometimes 4. Mac Studios for me from now on. Here’s why:
Never buy fast expensive SSD space for BACKUP purposes. I use Chronosync to back up 6 Macs all on a small home LAN. My main machine has 32 Terabytes of SSD space I back up. In real life, only a small fraction of that changes between backups. I used to run Chronosync on my 2019 Mac Pro machine, but now use an old 2013 Mac as a server (You install ChronoAgent on your remote Macs to make this all work) That’s hooked up to my backup sets (OWC Thunderbay Enclosures with 40TB of HDD Storage each on 4 HDDs). Two onsite, one offsite, rotated through.
Two of my machines have different Devonthink DBs totaling about 30 GB each (ten or so DB’s in that 30 GB total) . When changed in any way they have to be backed up in their entirety, but it’s fast. Usually, only 2 or 3 of the ten DBs are changed between each backup. The HDD storage is the slowest link in the chain, but with incremental backup S/W, they are fast. HDD space if far more cost-effective than SSDs space for backups. I shut my HDD Thunderbays off when I’m not using them and I only use them to backup. My wife’s iPhone photo library is the other thing that takes a few minutes.
Chronosync lets you set up incremental synchronizers and then put multiple synchronizers in containers that run the synchronizers sequentially. Multiple containers can run at once even on a 2013 Mac. A long-winded way of pointing out I can run 20 or more backups with only a few containers. I’ve setup Chronosync to email me if any errors. There rarely are.
I just screen share into my server, fire up a few backup containers (this could all be automated), and then go back to work on my machine. Takes about 60 seconds to do this. Everything gets back up in far less than an hour, often 15 minutes or so, usually during dinner for me.
I have never needed to restore any Mac ever in 15 years. I could if I had to, but it hasn’t happened. Sometimes, I need to restore a file, usually because I deleted it by mistake. Chronosync backups are finder-compatible. Don’t build your system based upon things you rarely, if ever do.
In hindsight, I rationalized the 2019 Mac Pro simply because I wanted one. You can rationalize anything, especially shiny new tech toys. Don’t buy tech whose capabilities you won’t use.
No matter how great you think your system is, in a few years it will be slower than the latest and newest. You’ll then want the lastest and newest. Far easier & cheaper to swap out a Mac Studio with an External PCI-E Box (Sonnet’s are quiet) or SSD storage you can keep than pay for a new Mac Pro. There will be a resale market for mac Studio or give it to someone you know. You go the MacPro route, that’s far more expensive with no secondary market. Not something you’d give your parents or kids. So you’ll replace it less - and be bummed about how slow your pricey system is in a few years when a MacBook Air beats it in the geekbench benchmarks.
You don’t need PCI-E storage for anything you mentioned. Professional video editors and top photographers work on Mac Studios. Even the pro apps photo/video apps don’t use the huge speed you get with internal PCI-E on a Mac Pro. Be like buying a Ferrari to commute on a gridlocked highway. Watch some of ArtIsRight videos on youtube. He does a great job of showing this.
Reviewing PDF files on multiple monitors is a simple low resource task - for the computer (maybe not for the reviewer). Any Mac could do it, limited by the monitors it can drive. Certainly trivial for a Mac Studio.
My SSD space is used for video and photo work. But I spend lots of my time on my Mac doing low-resource activities, often not doing Photo or Video work for days. PDF files, paying bills, surfing the web etc… Putting your PCI-E SSD cards in an external box allows you to keep it off when not using it. Keep the stuff you use regularly on your internal SSD. Less heat (by far) and less power.
I didn’t think this through when I bought the 2019 Mac - Even though I have 20TB or so of Photos and Video files, at any one time, I’m usually only working on a project or two that max out at 2 TB or less. When done, they might (rarely) need to be accessed, but usually a finished project is archived, and it’s on to the next. So get a 4TB internal drive. Don’t use expensive internal SSD space for achives. Your 8TB drive is a huge amount for PDF files or Deventhink DBs. Do you really need that?
My 2019 Mac Pro ran hot with all the internal SSDs. Really hot - actually an issue warming my office which led to air conditioning needs which led to…. You get the idea… The Mac studio - not at all.
It took a while to set this all up, but for years it “just works.” I do this all myself - no IT department in my house
There is a lot of merit to your detailed analysis.
That said - I had to restore my Mac once. I did [or at least attempted] the restoration from Time Machine, only to realize the Time Machine backup was corrupted somehwere and as a result the entire restoration process was rejected. I was able to restore critical data through other means - but it soured me on incremental backups for life.
Am I too jaded or paranoid from that one event? Maybe. But losing client data would be a really big deal.
Your problem isn’t really with incremental backups but with TimeMachine. TimeMachine fails me at least once a year, so only really suitable to restore accidental deletions of the past few days. But I use incremental backups (actually “smart” incremental backups that compare the source to destination drives and makes the destination drive match the source) and these have never failed me in decades of use.
I agree with tomalmy. I would never use Time Machine for anything I cared about. I don’t use it at all. Professional Backup software like Chronosync is a different animal.
For many users, the fact that Time Machine is built-in, easy to set up, and free means that it is the backup system that they enable. So that is a good thing. Time Machine is a great first line of defense.
MPU readers know that a second and third line of defense is also needed. In addition to (1) wireless Time Machine backups via an old Mac mini, I use (2) Carbon Copy Cloner and a rotating collection of external spinning drives kept in a fire-resistant safe and (3) nightly remote backups via an Arq Premium subscription.
That’s unfortunate. I use and rely on Time Machine, and have for years. I’ve successfully been able to restore files from it more times than I can count. Anecdotal evidence, I suppose, but for me it’s been solid.
It’s a fact - not anecdotal - that Time Machine backups are not validated. Thus while you may have gotten lucky, there is no question that there is a real risk that when you need to restore your data (especially a need to restore your entire backup) it may entirely fail.
That was my experience also. Recently, my wireless Time Machine backups via an old Mac mini have gotten flaky and I have abandoned Time Machine, for good, this time.
So my current 3-2-1 backup system is (1) automatic hourly backups of MacBook Air using Carbon Copy Cloner to an always attached spinning disk drive via the USB hub that is part of my Thunderbolt-connected display monitor, (2) manual daily backups using Carbon Copy Cloner to a rotating collection of external spinning drives kept in a fire-resistant safe, and (3) automatic nightly remote backups via an Arq Premium subscription.
