Hands up if you have ever done a backup! If you haven’t then go do one now, we’ll wait. Done? Good, let’s move on.
Today we wanted to talk about doing online backups, as there are several advantages to doing this compared to backing up to external hard drives. The obvious one is that you will be able to access your data no matter where you are in the world, so you will never forget a presentation again. Plus, you will never have to shuffle data between hard drives when you run out of space, just tell your provider that you need some more room and within minutes you have hundreds of gigabytes at your disposal.
To make things even better, Mac OS X makes backups much easier to deal with compared to Windows since all your settings are saved in just one place: your Home folder. This means restoring your computer is just a matter of restoring your Home folder. Magically, all emails, photos, documents, application settings (and licenses), wallpapers, screen savers and whatnot will be restored and your computer will behave exactly as it did before breaking down.
The convenience is nice but there is a much more serious issue with local backups, reliability. Tools such as Apple’s Time Machine are great since they don’t only back up your data but they also save older versions of files so that you can recreate them later. But what happens when your Time Machine drive fails? Well, you’ve lost half a year’s worth of files. Even worse, what happens if someone breaks in and steals your computer? Your data is gone forever.
This problem is solved by having remote backups, where data is always backed up at several locations to ensure that your data is safe no matter what happens. Unfortunately Time Machine doesn’t support this and it can take quite a bit of command line magic to set up at home (never mind convincing a friend to let you set up a server in his closet!), however there are several online services that will do this for you quickly and easily.
We have had a look at some of these services and picked our favorites. The main things we looked at is price and user friendliness, in other words how easy is it to set it and forget it? You could argue that speed is an issue, especially since the first backup can take weeks (!), but as soon as the first backup is done all of these services tend to be very fast. If you have to restore the entire backup most of these services offer to send you your data on a hard drives to save you the trouble of having to download tens of gigabytes.
CrashPlan - $54/year, unlimited
CrashPlan is a clear winner when it comes to simplicity. Download and install their software, then you’re literally a click away from backing up your entire Home directory. But don’t be fooled by the simplicity, CrashPlan is packed with a lot of useful settings and features. For example it supports alternative backup locations, so CrashPlan can back up your data online as well as to external hard drives, or even your friend’s computer. This feature also happens to be free, meaning if you can convince a friend you can get free remote backups without the hassle!
Mozy - $4.95/month, unlimited
Mozy is just about the cheapest option available at $4.95 a month for unlimited backups. The user interface is a bit cluttered but it lets you pick exactly which folders should be backed up as well as a certain type of data such as pictures. If you want to access files remotely you’ll have to ask Mozy to restore them from their backup, then wait for them to send you an email which contains a link that you download them. In addition to this, there is no way of remotely uploading files or sharing files. In other words: their online interface is a bit bulky.
Spideroak - $10/month, 100 GB
Spideroak is all about security and reliability, the data transferred between you and Spideroak is encrypted and will remain encrypted on their servers so that nobody except you will be able to access the files. On the software side it has a lot of configuration options to let you specify exactly what gets backed up, but the software is a bit slow sometimes. The online interface is pretty decent and it comes with a lot of options for sharing files using a service they call ShareRooms.
Backblaze - $5/month, unlimited
Backblaze is the only one we could find that has thoroughly integrated their software with Mac OS X. You find the settings in System Preferences, where you are presented with a user interface you’d think comes straight from Apple HQ. It is simple, clear and hides away exactly where you expect it to be when you’re not using it. However, when we wanted to know how long the backup would take we casually informed to “Relax... your data will be backed up in 84 days”!
These are just a few of all that are available, you could also have a look at some of these: Norton Online Backup, Carbonite, iDrive or maybe a combo of Apple Backup and Mobile Me?
While online backups have a plenty of advantages there are a few things to keep in mind, first, be patient as it is completely normal for the initial backups to take weeks to complete. The other issue is that the data is likely being transferred to servers in a different country (most of the services are based in the US) who may have different rules for how data can be accessed. Make sure you have a read through the provider’s privacy statement before you transfer top secret files!
Today we wanted to talk about doing online backups, as there are several advantages to doing this compared to backing up to external hard drives. The obvious one is that you will be able to access your data no matter where you are in the world, so you will never forget a presentation again. Plus, you will never have to shuffle data between hard drives when you run out of space, just tell your provider that you need some more room and within minutes you have hundreds of gigabytes at your disposal.
To make things even better, Mac OS X makes backups much easier to deal with compared to Windows since all your settings are saved in just one place: your Home folder. This means restoring your computer is just a matter of restoring your Home folder. Magically, all emails, photos, documents, application settings (and licenses), wallpapers, screen savers and whatnot will be restored and your computer will behave exactly as it did before breaking down.
The convenience is nice but there is a much more serious issue with local backups, reliability. Tools such as Apple’s Time Machine are great since they don’t only back up your data but they also save older versions of files so that you can recreate them later. But what happens when your Time Machine drive fails? Well, you’ve lost half a year’s worth of files. Even worse, what happens if someone breaks in and steals your computer? Your data is gone forever.
This problem is solved by having remote backups, where data is always backed up at several locations to ensure that your data is safe no matter what happens. Unfortunately Time Machine doesn’t support this and it can take quite a bit of command line magic to set up at home (never mind convincing a friend to let you set up a server in his closet!), however there are several online services that will do this for you quickly and easily.
We have had a look at some of these services and picked our favorites. The main things we looked at is price and user friendliness, in other words how easy is it to set it and forget it? You could argue that speed is an issue, especially since the first backup can take weeks (!), but as soon as the first backup is done all of these services tend to be very fast. If you have to restore the entire backup most of these services offer to send you your data on a hard drives to save you the trouble of having to download tens of gigabytes.
CrashPlan - $54/year, unlimited
CrashPlan is a clear winner when it comes to simplicity. Download and install their software, then you’re literally a click away from backing up your entire Home directory. But don’t be fooled by the simplicity, CrashPlan is packed with a lot of useful settings and features. For example it supports alternative backup locations, so CrashPlan can back up your data online as well as to external hard drives, or even your friend’s computer. This feature also happens to be free, meaning if you can convince a friend you can get free remote backups without the hassle!
Mozy - $4.95/month, unlimited
Mozy is just about the cheapest option available at $4.95 a month for unlimited backups. The user interface is a bit cluttered but it lets you pick exactly which folders should be backed up as well as a certain type of data such as pictures. If you want to access files remotely you’ll have to ask Mozy to restore them from their backup, then wait for them to send you an email which contains a link that you download them. In addition to this, there is no way of remotely uploading files or sharing files. In other words: their online interface is a bit bulky.
Spideroak - $10/month, 100 GB
Spideroak is all about security and reliability, the data transferred between you and Spideroak is encrypted and will remain encrypted on their servers so that nobody except you will be able to access the files. On the software side it has a lot of configuration options to let you specify exactly what gets backed up, but the software is a bit slow sometimes. The online interface is pretty decent and it comes with a lot of options for sharing files using a service they call ShareRooms.
Backblaze - $5/month, unlimited
Backblaze is the only one we could find that has thoroughly integrated their software with Mac OS X. You find the settings in System Preferences, where you are presented with a user interface you’d think comes straight from Apple HQ. It is simple, clear and hides away exactly where you expect it to be when you’re not using it. However, when we wanted to know how long the backup would take we casually informed to “Relax... your data will be backed up in 84 days”!
These are just a few of all that are available, you could also have a look at some of these: Norton Online Backup, Carbonite, iDrive or maybe a combo of Apple Backup and Mobile Me?
While online backups have a plenty of advantages there are a few things to keep in mind, first, be patient as it is completely normal for the initial backups to take weeks to complete. The other issue is that the data is likely being transferred to servers in a different country (most of the services are based in the US) who may have different rules for how data can be accessed. Make sure you have a read through the provider’s privacy statement before you transfer top secret files!
MozyHome works pretty well for me – on both Mac and Windows. If you ever need it, their 2nd level support is good.
Use the following link to get 20% more space (512 Mb) on a free MozyHome 2 Gb account:
https://mozy.com/?code=D685JF
Posted by: ChiliPepr | January 11, 2010 at 10:30 PM
Many of us have more than one Mac--either a desktop and laptop or a new and an old. Could we simply back up from the main computer to the secondary one by dragging the Home folder via the Home Network?
Posted by: Irene | January 11, 2010 at 11:23 PM
I use Backblaze and had a similar experience with the initial backup - thought it would never complete. But increments are continuous and seamless. Recovery (which I have had to do) also works well and you can select individual files.
I have not tried the other services yet. But the idea of using Crashplan's backups to other machines is very interesting.
Thanks for your work in maintaining this blog.
Posted by: Hillclimber | January 12, 2010 at 09:52 AM
I signed up with Crash Plan and am very happy. Thank you. Keep your blog postings coming. They are greatly appreciated.
Austin Cooper
Posted by: Austin Cooper | January 12, 2010 at 12:08 PM
Have used Cocktail for years and love it.. It has kept my older Mac in tip top condition.
Thank you for giving us this blog ..with some great additional ideas to help us keep our computer life in exceptional condition.
alice
Posted by: alice | January 14, 2010 at 10:15 PM
Good advice, I guess...unless you work on a lot of big files. At least half of my work days I'm working on jobs where my backups (new high-res photos and large InDesign and QuarkXPress files) will total up to 300mb to 600mb...by the end of the day. With my slow DSL line (it's all I can get out here) thre's no way to do online backups. I'd love to do online backups...for the safety factor...but I guess I'm stuck with multiple disk drive backups into the foreseeable future. By the way...I love your blog.
Posted by: Christian Nelson | February 25, 2010 at 11:50 PM
Backblaze has a great--and very transparent--security model, described on their blog. They also have a very simple interface, and are as cheap as anyone. I think you sold them a little short. I don't work for them, I'm just a happy user!
Posted by: Ethan | March 12, 2010 at 09:41 PM
Arq! I think it's absolutely the best online backup solution for the mac. In my opinion, the developer has really nailed the primary issues. I love the fact that I can go back in time to any date necessary, and that I can access backups from both my macs via the same simple interface. Backups are stored on Amazon S3, and as the icing on the cake, it's comparatively cheaper than other solutions. My first monthly invoice from Amazon was for 85 cents.
http://www.haystacksoftware.com/arq/
Posted by: Nando | June 12, 2010 at 02:11 PM