Backup and retrieving backed up files

[rpcrowe]

A backup system is worthless unless you can retrieve your files with accuracy and ease.

I had my old computer backed up using Carbonite.com. When the files were transferred to my new computer, I was horrified to find that all of my genealogy files were missing.

I have always been extremely careful to back up my images and had these on two external hard drives. However, all that I backed up for my genealogy files was the information that I inputted onto my Genealogy program. These had to do specifically with my ancestors. However, ten years of other research was lost when I switched computers.

I simply went to Carbonite.com, put in my email address and password, told Carbonite that I wanted to download selected files and the program showed me a cloud image of my old hard drive. From there, all I had to do was select the specific files I wanted and down load these to my present computer. What a relief

There may be better backup programs and cheaper ones but, I do like Carbonite.com....

[Shadowman]

Richard,
Was the lost files an OS or file format issue? I had some image files from a WIN 98 backup that were corrupted for some when viewed witn WIN10.

[rpcrowe]

No, it was an error by a technician who somehow just dumped the files. I didn't notice the loss until quite a bit later because information on these files that concerned my direct ancestors had been transferred to my genealogy program. What was missing was back-up information such as transcripts of books and articles. Only needed that information when I needed it.

My genealogy goes in spurts... I leave it alone for a while and then quite often a breakthrough will happen resulting from answers to my posts on various genealogy forums.

I happened to need the transcript of a book as well as a transcript of a deposition from a famous trial of the 1850's concerning the ownership of land. The deposition pretty well gives a full story of the Irish colonists in what is now Texas but, which had been a state of Mexico before Texas Independence.

I believe that a bit of information sent to me was erroneous but, needed the book transcript as well as the court deposition to prove that.

As I mentioned to Donald in another string, the study of genealogy (especially for someone who enjoys studying history) is quite addictive...

[Cogito]

This is a photo oriented website and I think that we should keep it that way.

[rpcrowe]

Tony,

Quite humorous

I stand corrected

I could easily have retrieved my photo image files using Carbonite. if that satisfies you as a photo oriented posting

[DanK]

I think this is relevant to a photo site. It happened to be that the files in question weren't photos, but they could have been. There have been any number of posts here inquiring about backup methods for photos.

And to make this directly relevant: I back up all of my image files to the cloud via CrashPlan, a competitor of Carbonite. I've never needed it, as I have a local backup--a simple copy of the files to an external hard drive--but I would never rely solely on a local backup of anything important, including my photos.

And to keep it relevant: one drawback of an automatic cloud-based backup is that it won't wait for you to finish culling your files after you upload them to your computer. Any number of times, I have been happily throwing out photos when the OS suddenly refuses to delete a file. The reason is that my backup program is working on the photo. So my drill is to do a local backup before reformatting the card in the camera. Then I turn off the cloud backup, cull the photos, and then turn it back on. The next time I sync new photos to the local external drive, it will discard all the ones I culled.

[Manfred M]

I have never been a great fan of the automated backup software available out there. It never seems to be able to do exactly what I want it to do. I have used a 100% manual process where I copy the images to my backup system right after culling the imported files. I do not delete the memory cards or in the case where I do a field backup onto portable hard drives until I have files on my main computer and two different RAID storage units. As I have this routine down pat, I see no compelling reason for an automated software approach.

I started using a Buffalo NAS unit about 15 years ago and switched to a Drobo setup about 10 years ago. I added using a Cloud based solution (DropBox about 3 years ago) as an addition to the twin Drobo units.

[DanK]

As I have this routine down pat, I see no compelling reason for an automated software approach.

Automation isn't my main reason for doing it. Years ago, when personal computing was new, a cousin of mine who taught computer science said to me that for important material, one should always have an off-site backup. You are using synchronization to Dropbox for this purpose; I am using a backup to Crashplan. In my work, I do both: I have a synced copy and a backup.

There are only two differences, it seems to me. The minor one is that Crashplan takes less effort, and I don't have to remember to do anything. The major one is that if I accidentally delete or overwrite something and don't catch the error before syncing, I can retrieve the lost files from my backup. This hasn't happened to me yet with photos, but it has happened at work. One backup is a user-end encrypted cloud backup; the other is a synced copy on my home computer. On at least one occasion, I discovered after syncing that I had lost something I needed. With a few minutes work, I retrieved it from the backup.

[Manfred M]

On at least one occasion, I discovered after syncing that I had lost something I needed. With a few minutes work, I retrieved it from the backup.

The reason for my mistrust is that I have had an automated backup fail big time, but that was a long time ago. I had a hard drive that was starting to fail. The automated backup system nicely backed up corrupted data for me, replacing good date with bad data.

I needed to recover the data after the hard drive failed and lo and behold the material that I recovered was useless. The backup program kept up its weekly backup cycle and while I had several months worth of backups, they were all corrupted.

[rpcrowe]

I am happy that I did not switch my Carbonite Back Up to my new computer. If I had, all that I would have recovered is what files are on my new computer.

My old computer was getting pretty cranky - so I replaced it with the new computer before it failed.

I am glad that everything went this easy. I will examine my old files that exist on Carbonite and see which, if any. I want to back up. My back up and reference genealogy files were (I think) the most important. I say "THINK" because I don't really remember what was on the old computer's hard drive...