[mythtv-users] Options for Backing up Myth data

[Greg Oliver]

On Thu, Dec 9, 2010 at 9:03 AM, Brian Wood <beww at beww.org> wrote:
> On Wednesday, December 08, 2010 08:56:35 pm Raymond Wagner wrote:
>> On 12/8/2010 22:30, Brian Wood wrote:
>> > On Wednesday, December 08, 2010 06:07:20 pm Dave Badia wrote:
>> >> Suppose I'll chime in too...
>> >> Myth DB gets backed up nightly via the contrib script.
>> >> All of my servers non-media files get backed up nightly via
>> >> backuppc
>> >>
>> >> My important media (family photos and videos) live on raid-1 until
>> >> they get backed up quarterly to DVD-R,  They then get moved to
>> >> "off-site storage" which is my desk drawer at work.  It's pretty
>> >> simple and lets me sleep at night knowing I've got things backed
>> >> up.
>> >>
>> >> I personally don't like hard drives for long term off-site storage
>> >> as I feel a hard drive is always one drop away from being wiped
>> >> out due to mechanical failure.  Optical media show at least be
>> >> reliable for a few years.  Just my 2 cents
>> >
>> > Seems few people are using BR, it can't be the burner cost, BR
>> > burners are cheaper today than DVD writers were 2 or 4 years ago,
>> > and lots of people used DVD for backup then.
>>
>> The cheapest burner you can buy is $100.  DVD burners have been stuck
>> around $30 - $40 for around five years now.

I payed $80 for this burner last week.  Just have to grab them on sale:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136181

And today, buy dot com has 25GB discs for <$1 (and they are well
reviewed on Amazon)

http://www.buy.com/prod/memorex-4x-bd-r-media-25gb-120mm-standard-2-x-15-pack-spindle/q/loc/101/219035936.html

Granted, at the same time I purchased (2) lightscribe DVD burners and
200 blanks for total $64  :)

> Four years ago you could get a bare bones OEM DVD burner for $40-$50,
> but "full featured" (ie: Lightscribe, mounting hardware, software and
> retail packaging) units were closer to $90. Not that those "features"
> were of much use to Myth users though.
>
> But I would expect some reduction in BR burner cost in the next year or
> two.
>
>>
>> > Or folks are using some other option
>>
>> Flash drives are simply more convenient, and while smaller than
>> BD-Rs, still offer plenty of space for most people.  The fact that
>> they are read/writable on just about any computer also makes them
>> far more useful.
>
> Flash drives are OK for documents and photos, but they are pretty much
> useless for any significant amount of video, especially HD. The amount of
> data you can store on a flash drive is about what is practical to store
> online.
>
> But I'm just trying to find out what people are using, I'll put you down
> as a vote for "flash drives" :-)

I know that when I rsync to flash drives it can cripple the machine
until complete if they are USB based.  The same device plugged into
E-Sata behaves quite a bit better.