Okey dokey

[ksmith]

Came home from Ravinia–Joshua Bell, wonderful as always–played with pups, did dishes, had a piece of toast. Opened up the laptop. Time Machine kicked in as I was phutzing around…

…and it’s telling me it can’t find the Airport Extreme Base Station. I can go online, and everything–the external HD, the Base Station, the laptop–is functioning.

So I go online and find out that Apple doesn’t support Time Machine with Airport Extreme. People use the set-up, but it isn’t reliable and data can become corrupted and I may not even know it.

Okay.

If that’s the case, I don’t feel comfortable using it anymore. What’s the point? So what’s the best way to save works-in-progress? Save directly to an external HD with a hardwire connection? DropBox? I can’t use iCloud because it doesn’t work with Scrivener.

(A few minutes pass)

Okay, I unplugged the external HD, waited a few seconds, and plugged it back in. External HD woke up, AEBS read it, everything is talking to everything else again. I did see that sometimes TM/AEBS can’t wake up a sleeping HD, and the connection fails. But the fact remains that this is an unsupported, unreliable set-up.

If I use DropBox, does it function as a back-up, or do I save my files directly to DropBox?

See, I miss the old Backup application that worked with Mobile Me. I set up the files I wanted backed up–not the whole damn laptop, but just the writing files–and it backed up on the schedule I set up. Clockwork. Never failed.

Guess I could burn a DVD. Does anyone do that anymore?

Mirrored from Kristine Smith.

Comments

[e-moon60.livejournal.com]

Yes, sometimes. I use external wired HD, thumb drives, and DVDs. Though I'm behind on DVD backup, thanks for reminding me.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I might start using a thumb drive again.

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

You have to save files directly to Dropbox, resulting in (me, at least) having different versions of folders on DB than on either of my computers. I need some kind of automagic cloud saver, I think.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I recall when I first tried using DropBox that I moved the wip files there--when my old Backup program looked for them later, they couldn't find them because they were no longer on my laptop. Which bothers me a little.

[nlbarber]

I'm using Dropbox with my iMac (still on Snow Leopard), a work MacBook Pro, and my iPad. On the iMac, I have a local folder that I access just like any other Mac folder, except that every change I make in it is copied up to Dropbox. If I'm offline and make a change, Dropbox will start the sync automatically once I'm reconnected.

I like Dropbox so well because I always have a loca copy, yet I don't have to think about pushing changes up to "the cloud". Sort of the same way I can forget about Time Machine and its backups until I need it...or like you, until something goes awry and the iMac can't see my TM.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Are there step by step instructions for setting up the Local file/Dropbox? IIRC, when I tried to set up my wip file, I moved it to Dropbox so it was no longer housed in my laptop. It sounds as though you are saving to a regular old file that regularly talks to Dropbox. I didn't see a way to do that, but I confess I tried to feel my way through a set-up instead of, you know, reading instructions.

[nlbarber]

As best I remember I just grabbed their Mac installer, and this was the default setup. I think I initially set up my account on the Web page, then ran the installer on my iMac, signed in, and the files started to sync.

This help page reinforces that memory:
https://www.dropbox.com/help/4/en

[thebluerose.livejournal.com]

Sounds like what you need is a small home NAS box with wireless capability. You would probably benefit from investing in a better grade of backup software to give you some flexibility but there are quite a lot of home options that have everything you need.

http://computershopper.com/storage/nas-drives

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2402433,00.asp

If you do get one, get one with RAID capability and get it set to RAID 1 so that the drives mirror each other. So that if one fails, then you still have the data stored in the other one. Its the first level of redundancy and once setup easy as because the mirror works instantly with no further intervention required by the user.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Thanks--I've been using the 1 TB My Book with TM (not sure if it's the World edition or not). Maybe I just need to use its software instead of TM?

[silvergryphyn.livejournal.com]

I use SpiderOak (to backup and sync between a Mac desktop, Mac laptop, and Win 7 laptop) and Carbonite (for straight backup of large amounts of data files). Mizkit, this would absolutely work for you I think. That way everything's in at least 2 places (if not more) of which one is the cloud. Initial backup and take a _long_ time but after that it's incremental. Please feel free to comment here/PM me if anyone has any questions.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I've heard of Carbonite. How does it differ from Dropbox?

[silvergryphyn.livejournal.com]

Pretty much the same except Carbonite's a bit cheaper ($60/year for unlimited backup from one computer vs. $120/year for the larger home plans from Dropbox). And I think at the time when I was researching, I didn't like their interface as much (although that may have improved). I'm always a big fan of good multiplatform support including iPhone and Dropbox wasn't always so great on Macs (no longer the case I believe). I use Carbonite for mp3 and audiobook backup from just one machine (200+ GB) and then SpiderOak for all the stuff, Docs & Pictures, I want to keep in sync and backed up.

Fortunately, most of these places have free small accounts or a time limited trial so you can check out the interface before committing.

[barbarienne.livejournal.com]

I backup work-in-progress to a thumb drive. It's functionally equivalent to backing up off-site, since I bring the thumb drive around with me. The house could burn down, but I've got my stuff.