A random Weblog

Backups. Yeah right. Heard these were a good idea. 

The good news is there are lots of hardware and software solutions around, and it’s so easy these days to establish a good system that there’s no excuse not to. I linked to a great “primer” paper from Apple below, and this outlines the chain that goes from Local Storage > Backup > Archive, but if you want to jump straight to a solution – then here’s one you might want to consider – Netgear’s ReadyNAS NV+ (the RAID formerly known as Infrant).

What makes the ReadyNAS so special? Well how about…

1. Built in iTunes server
2. Power-on power-off choices by day
3. USB port so as to back-up the ReadyNAS (or selected contents) to yet another drive
4. Capability to run a Bit-torrent app for overnight downloads – all while your computer is off
5. USB connection can “talk” to compatible UPS’s for graceful power-down on mains failure
6. Speaks a lot of languages and file formats so plays well with Mac, PC and Linux etc
7. Can be purchased with our without disks (Hint: get server-grade disks for 24/7 capability)
8. Host a blog/site/photo share with the outside world
9. Ideal for home or SME’s – no tricky maintenance or seat licenses like a file-server
10. Excellent Web support and forum – a very active community
11. Oh, and not forgetting various levels of RAID, plus XRAID for ease of hot expansion

There’s some good oil right here – well worth a quick read if you’re in the market for a robust backup tool like the ReadyNAS NV+ http://www.readynas.com/