NAS vs Cloud Backup

[darklord700]

I'm now using Crashplan for my online backup. It started at USD $3 a month a few years back but now it is $USD 60 a year which is almost $100 CAD/year nowadays. I find it getting to be a little too expensive for what I need.

I need about 2-3TB of space so I figure I can build my own NAS with two 4TB WD reds running in mirroring RAID mode. That will cost me about $700CAD which is about 7 years of subscription to Crashplan.

But the downside to NAS which was the reason I subscribe to Crashplan in the first place, is that local NAS doesn't protect you from fire, flood and theft.

What do you think I should do, build my own NAS or keep my Crashplan?

[woob]

What are you backing up to Crashplan? Can you reduce that at all to reduce the cost?

I run a hybrid of sorts: I have my music/movies/etc. local only. My pictures and important docs are local and cloud sync'd.

[TorqueDog]

If your goal is to have a backup to serve as a proper disaster recovery store for your data, an off-site or cloud backup is what you need.

If your goal is to have your data available quickly in the event of a local failure (PC hard drive dies, data corruption, etc.), a NAS will get you back on your feet faster. Caveat here is that a machine issue such as a virus could traverse your network and infect data on your NAS.

For personal backups, it's your call. If you run your business off of this machine, I would actually say it's wise to have both options.

[darklord700]

I use Crashplan to backup mostly my pictures and Crashplan charges $60 USD for unlimited storage so less storage won't save me any money.

If the payback period for a NAS comparing to Crashplan is 7 year, I think Crashplan still makes sense. Because 7 years from now, the $700 NAS I build today will be worthless and I have to rebuy a new NAS+harddisks and start over. Plus I lose the offsite backup advantages provided by Crashplan in these 7 years.

[Fuzz]

If you have somewhere else to store a drive, like work, you can just buy a couple USB drives and keep one onsite and one at work, and swap them every month or so. That's pretty much what I do. I'm pretty cheap though.

[BlackArcher101]

Do you have family or friends that would allow you to use Crashplan to backup to their PC? It's a free off-site backup solution.

[darklord700]

Thanks for the suggestions and I think I have found my solution. Get a WD Mybook or something like that. Back up the the 2TB of stuff in it and bring it to my office. That's my offsite backup as long as I get to keep my job.

[Fuzz]

Depending on your office security, and how much you care, you might want to encrypt it to. That's what I do with mine. At home I just backup from one PC to the other, so I've got a current active backup at home, and I only do the one at work every few months.

[darklord700]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Depending on your office security, and how much you care, you might want to encrypt it to. That's what I do with mine.

Good idea, I think Mybook comes with encryption or I'll buy one with encryption.