Need Simple Backup Strategy

Hey All, I run my business from a MacBook Pro. My data is in Dropbox and I recently set up Google Drive to mirror my Dropbox folder. That Dropbox folder (and the subfolders) are less than 2GB. I suspect what I’ve done so far isn’t adequate backup since I don’t have a physical backup.

I’m thinking of just getting an external HD to and plug it into the MacBook once a week. What do you think? If this is the way, should I go SSD or spinning drive? Would a 2GB hard drive be enough? What software should I use? I have screwed around with TimeMachine in the past but I’m not too fond of it as I’m never confident I actually have a backup.

I want to keep this simple.

Any suggestions/recommendations?

2TB Samsung T7 SSD, permanently plugged in, running TimeMachine. Restore one of your most important files once a fortnight to check it works.

If you want extra, add a second identical drive that you swap out every month or so with one from a friend/relatives house.

Some sort of cloud backup like e.g. backblaze is also best practice.

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+1


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If it’s only 2gb, you could do that with a thumb drive, or VERY small SSD. You could even keep a FREE back up on iCloud as you are under the free 5gb. If you anticipate your files will grow much larger, I would suggest theSSD route. My two cents.

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What Vincent said.

Dropbox, iCloud, Google drive are not really backup methods

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3-2-1 rule. 3 copies of your data, on 2 different types of media, and 1 offsite. My preference is to use Carbon Copy Cloner in addition to Time Machine. It is important to regularly test your backups. Any system should be as automatic as possible, otherwise you will forget until it’s too late.

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Do you meant 2GB or 2TB?

SSD is more reliable in general than a spinning disc, but get a Samsung T7 or something similar rather than a Thumb Drive. Thumb drives are relatively easy to lose and not made to be in constant use. (I once tried to use one to host a Download folder on a mac to minimise drive wear on more expensive drives, but it barely lasted 48 hours before it died)

Ensure you encrypt your drive so if the drive does somehow fall into someone else’s hands, they won’t be able to access your files.

Don’t rely solely on time machine, it’s great for versioning of files, but is not robust and often fails. I’d recommend Carbon Copy Cloner

As someone else has said, +1 on that fact that Google Drive, iCloud or Onedrive are not backups, I’d definitely spring for Backblaze (in fact I already do)

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Sorry. I meant 2 TB. My bad. I appreciate you taking the time to respond!

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No problem. 2TB is a very different proposition to 2GB.

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Tangent: I remember when in the 1990s the multimedia company I worked for bought me an external LaScie 2 gig SCSI drive to connect to my Mac PowerBook 180.

It seemed unbeliveably huge.

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My fist hard drive was 20 MB for a 512 KE!

It was big enough to serve as a base for the Mac.

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Back in my early PC days, I remember 240 MB MFM/RLL type hard drives going on sale for $200 and me and my friends wondering what anybody could possibly do with 240 MB of space. :smiley:

If you have 2 TB of DATA, you’ll probably want 3 TB or more of drive storage so that you can store revisions/differential backups. If price of an SSD in that size range is an issue (especially when you’re adding extra software/online services), get a spinning disk and don’t stress about it.

A huge +1 on Backblaze for online backups. Pay the extra buck or two per month for 1-year retention.

And if you don’t like Time Machine, Arq does the same type of thing. Plug in the drive, set it, and forget it. Look at the Arq status and do a file restore occasionally to make sure things are working.

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So can Carbon Copy Cloner with an external HDD or SSD. It can be set to run hourly and it can restore past versions from any of its APFS snapshots.

All my backups to external drives are on spinning disks (HDD). They are cheap and plenty fast enough.

I would, however, use an externally connected SSD for its high speed if and when the day comes that my photo collection no longer fits on my internal SSD.

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Actually the one year retention option is now included in the base price for home users, it just needs to be enabled in the account on the Backblaze website.

I’d also recommend setting it up with the private encryption key option.

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Are there any files that you exclude from Backblaze backup even if using a private security key?

No, I backup everything to Backblaze for offsite backup, including some restic backups from my FreeBSD laptop & a couple VMs. Those backups are stored on an external drive attached to my Mac.

No files need to be excluded for security purposes, but the resident process size of the Backblaze software is directly proportional to the number of files that you are backing up.

So on the off chance that you have something like a library folder that contains a couple hundred thousand files that you do not ever actually feel like you would have to restore, excluding that will help with system resource utilization.

It’s an edge case, but I have had it come up with my backup set. And for clarification, my base backup location is /Users/myusername.

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I have exactly this setup (photos on external SSD0 due to my internal SSD only being 256GB.

On my next mac, I will spring for a significantly larger SSD to allow my photo library and Plex install to have space to spread.

One advantage of Arc is that it can also do online backups. Afaik Carbon Copy Cloner can only do local.

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echoing what others have said:

— Dropbox/iCloud/Google Drive/etc. are NOT BACKUPS
— I still use my 2008 Time Capsule (Time Machine WIFI+HDD from Apple), but it craps out monthly, saying it needs to be rebuilt and/or can’t be found.
— Carbon Copy Cloner is your friend. Hook up a drive (dedicated to it) permanently. BONUS: routinely swap it (weekly?) with a second drive.
— Backblaze. Just do it.

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