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Forum Discussion
Alternating drives in target NAS when backing up? Any advice?
I currently have a RN104 with four x 2TB WD Red drives in RAID5 configuration, giving me 6TB of storage.
Every night this backs up to a RN102 with two x 3TB WD Red drives in RAID 0, giving another 6TB so we can copy everything.
The RN104 is in our house and the RN102 is hidden in the garage. The garage is not connected to the main house so if the house burns down or is burgled the RN102 should survive fire and be undetected in the event of the house being burgled.
I am wondering how practical it would be to buy two more 3TB drives and caddys so that I can switch the drives every month in the RN102.
The theory is that if I had a virus that wiped out the whole network I could still recover my data and only loose changes in the last month.
I am guessing whenever I switch the hard drives in the RN102 it will cause the RN104 to back up the whole volume again. I am wondering if there's a way of telling my RN104 what I am up to so it only backs up thing that changed since I last switched the discs rather than the whole volume.
The link to the garage is currently Ethernet over Mains which is pretty slow, we get about 20Mbps on a good day, I could add a wired Gigabit connection but I’d rather not and this would still take almost a day to backup the entire volume if I did.
Additionally, does anyone know what the re-insertion life of the connectors in the Netgear drive caddy's is? I am guessing it's in the hundreds so it shouldn't cause any issues for at least a decade but if it’s less than 100 I may re-visit my plan or buy a 2nd hand RN102.
If this turns out to be a can of worms and more likely to cause problems then I will probably just leave it, I am not that tech savvy and I don't want anthing too complicated and requires too much intervention.
We have the antivirus software running on the main NAS which I am guessing is pretty good and so far the backup system is working faultlessly. Bar one of the drives failing in the RN104 after a week it's been very stable, I don't think I've touched any of the drives for a year they just seem to get on with it - which is what I want!
Any advice would be appreciated!
2 Replies
montybiggleswor wrote:I am guessing whenever I switch the hard drives in the RN102 it will cause the RN104 to back up the whole volume again. I am wondering if there's a way of telling my RN104 what I am up to so it only backs up thing that changed since I last switched the discs rather than the whole volume.
The link to the garage is currently Ethernet over Mains which is pretty slow, we get about 20Mbps on a good day, I could add a wired Gigabit connection but I’d rather not and this would still take almost a day to backup the entire volume if I did.If you use rsync for the backup job, it compares the source and destination, so it won't backup the whole volume again, just the difference.
montybiggleswor wrote:I am wondering how practical it would be to buy two more 3TB drives and caddys so that I can switch the drives every month in the RN102.
The theory is that if I had a virus that wiped out the whole network I could still recover my data and only loose changes in the last month.Let me suggest another way. Get a 6TB USB HDD, connect to the main NAS every now and then to perform your backup. To me, this seems less hassle and you achieve the same protection, and you don't need to go through the powerline adapters.
Some info about my backup plan (second part of the post + some more further down): https://community.netgear.com/t5/Using-your-ReadyNAS/My-recommendation-Don-t-use-ReadyCloud-user-home-shares/m-p/1258463#M127461
I perform backups to two external HDDs, that I rotate weekly (so fortnight back up to each external HDD).
I didn't want to have two USB enclosures and the mess that go with it, so I use bare HDDs stored in ESD protective packaging and have an "easy-swap" enclosure tethered to the NAS:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Icy-Box-3-5-Inch-Enclosure-USB3/dp/B003PHRQ16
http://www.raidsonic.de/products/external_cases/external_cases_35/index_en.php?we_objectID=469
In your scenario, each set of drives will be a "virual NAS" All configuration information is stored on the drives, so swapping the drives out is tantamount to swapping the whole NAS. There are a couple of exceptions: OS updates and cloud services (ReadyCloud, ReadyDR). If you update the OS with one set of drives, it will only update the drives currently installed. While the other set should update when you install them, it's a risk. I believe that some of the Netgear cloud services are tied to serial number, so that could cause problems if you use those.
All in all, a NAS is not really intended to be used that way and you are taking a risk. But are you likely to lose both sets of drives? Probably not.
FWIW, the fire department is going to soak your garage if your house burns down and your NAS will probably be a loss. And burglers can be more clever than you give them credit for.. But you would have your other set of drives you could put in a replacement NAS if they are stored off site. A cloud backup service is probably a better plan
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