Photography Thailand Forum

[agitlits]

For PC I use something called Vice Versa PRO for regular backups. Fast and easy and only copies over files that are new or have been modified since the last backup. Also deletes any files from the backup that were removed from the original archive.

Thanks Marc.

Sounds similar to what I'm using now (Synchback).

Cheers
Alex

[epixx]

I am pretty certain 'Time Machine' will not give you a bootable backup and that is the reason I backup to a separate 2 1/2 inch  Sata drive that is bootable and can replace the original drive should and when it fails. I also understand that on a MacBook only an external 'Fire Wire' drive can be made bootable. There is an interesting discussion somewhere on the 'Adobe Lightroom Killer Tips' website in connection with this topic.

Here is another Thread on the subject: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5944356

Any external drive, Firewire or USB, can be made bootable on a Mac. Unfortunately, Apple doesn't support eSata, at least not yet. There are many ways around this, but this is the way I do it:

Mac OS X on the internal drive
Applications and day-to-day work on external drive
Photos on several external drives
One external backup drive for each of the above, plus a large extra backup kept at a "safe" place, changed fortnightly.

I don't use Time Machine yet, since it was launched after I bought my current setup, but that will simplify some of the above. My backup drives are always offline, except when I'm running a backup.

[bjorn slis]

Interesting Dave, you run all your apps from an external drive ?
How does that affect speed ?
And doesn't it install the application support files on your internal one anyway ?

[bkkdave]

Bjorn, No my apps are on the internal drive and I run them from there. My MacBook Pro has a 2.5 Inch SATA drive. I have another 2.5 Inch SATA drive in a Fire Wire 800/400/Usb enclosure that requires no external power supply that I use as my 'back-up' for the internal MacBookPro HD. I can then 'Boot' from the External or I can remove the external 2.5 Sata and place it into the MacBookPro.

In addition to that I do keep all of my images on another external drive {not bootable) that also has another 'back-up' drive strictly for the images. I have not found 'speed' to be a problem with Raw images so far even when using PS CS3 and Lr2 from the internal and having the images on an external drive.

Both drives are backed up daily however the software can be configured to what ever you choose. I do not keep my 'backup' drives connected unless they are in the process of 'backing-up' then I disconnect them.

Works for me.

[epixx]

Macs are extremely flexible with regards to what drives to use for different applications. In theory, it's possible to run each application on separate, external drives. Adobe even recommends Photoshop to be run on a separate drive, or at least a separate partition, on a Mac. That will give you a dedicated scratch area, not shared with OS X or other applications, which in itself speeds up processing. I read a test somewhere, running OS X on an external USB 2 drive compared to the internal disk, and the conclusion was that it was rarely slower, and often faster, using an external drive, particularly on older computers with older HDD technology.

[bkkdave]

Try backing  up to a: "USB Drive" and then Restoring; I would be interested in the result...Can you 'boot' from the the; 'USB drive'?

[epixx]

Try backing  up to a: "USB Drive" and then Restoring; I would be interested in the result...Can you 'boot' from the the; 'USB drive'?

I don't think you can boot from the backup drive (I haven't tried though), but I can boot from any drive connected to the computer. You can specify startup disk under System Preferences/Startup disk, and even have the computer search for a startup disk on the LAN. I haven't tried the latter, but it would be interesting.

Edit:
Here's the instruction directly from the source:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1948

[David Salmanowitz]

I travel with an assortment of portable hard drives, and import images into at least 2 of the drives at the same time using Lightroom on a Mac. When I get home I use a copy program called Retrospect, and transfer all images to a Drobo (love this, and I saw it for sale at a store in Singapore last week which means at least they are now in Asia--had bought mine on a trip back to USA) which stays on site. I have duplicate back ups off site on assorted hard drives, as $ permits I will get another Drobo for off site storage to simplify things. When $ also permits I will get another desktop Mac with 4 internal hard drives--2 would be for operating system and its back up, and the other 2 drives would be for the Lightroom library and its back up. Word of warning to Time Machine and Lightroom users--don't use both. Here is some advice per Seth Resnick. "The problem is that Lightroom writes tasks in the background that occur on a regular basis and Time Machine can't copy those. Should you need to start from the backup you may be unable to start Lightroom. Time Machine and Lightroom should not be used together. This is
acknowledged by both Apple and Adobe."  I see that items can be set not to be copied in Time Machine, but I can have Retrospect do automatic backups without having to worry about the Lightroom conflict. Obviously there are other back up and image editing programs, hard drives, ... but this is what works for me and I am very happy with it.