Best backup practice using 2 NAS for mainly multimedia & photos

[Phone Guy]

Sorry for posting a new thread. I am obviously a little confused by Snapshots. So again I am kindly asking for advice. Thank you in advance!

I am trying to establish whats the best practice for back ups using 2 nas, both BTRFS capable and running DSM 7.1 and have SHR1 volumes.

The Source nas is mainly being used for multimedia (movies, photos, etc) Synology photos backing up family phones pictures. Movies and TV for local streaming. Docker running a couple containers. And is a general storage point on my LAN where downloads go like apps, iso, pdf, etc. I am also using ABB to backup a couple HDDs of PCs on the LAN. (I am sure more, but thats all I can remember right now)

This Destination nas is empty at this point, also running BTRFS SHR1 volume.

Essentially I have more data that does not change once stored, movies/tv and pictures and videos from phones. Once its on the source nas, those things do not change, in that I mean pictures from 2019 will never change, they are static. Movies stored do not change, they are static. And thats the bulk of the data stored on the source nas.

What is the smartest way to backup when you have 2 nas's on your LAN? There is snapshots, hyperbackup, versioning, etc. I want to make sure I have a backup in the event of ransomware or data corruption. On another third nas I am using weekly scheduled folder sync currently to backup the source nas, and in another topic, it was mentioned as not being the correct method or least not the method that user would have used. That is why I am asking here. To be clear, I am unsure if the 3rd nas with the scheduled shared folder sync will stay in this backup strategy? as I am not sure I need 2 destination nas's to backup 1 source nas, but I have not decided yet.

 

[Phone Guy]

I used ABB restore to restore a C: drive in a Windows PC. Creating the restore usb was painfully slow, required 2 different installation packages, which fun fact, would not install on the machine I was trying to restore too! After downloading the usb creator from Synology, which links to 3 different versions depending where you click the download link from (web site, help page or abb itself) you get v2.2.0 v2.3.0 or v2.4.0, I found that strange... then after you install and load the usb creator it wants to install up to 9gb (depending on the options you select) of Windows ADK!? After which the creator failed to build the usb or iso saying the ADK was not installed or corrupted, I removed and installed that ADK package 3+ times, even downloading the latest version directly from Microsoft.... never got it to work on this certain pc. I was forced to install both packages again on another different Windows PC to make a simple 1gb iso/usb to boot from to restore from ABB. VERY MESSY BEGINNING. I don't know why it needs a 9gb package to create a 1gb usb or iso. I don't know why that process took me 2 hours to navigate. And I don't know why a generic iso wasn't available for downloading anywhere online? In the end its a bootable usb that loads directly to an ABB login screen. That's it. It obviously doesn't matter what machine the usb/iso is created on, it doesn't load specific drivers for that exact machine, because I couldn't make the usb on the target machine I was restoring to (AMD w/Gigabyte board) I had to build the usb on another machine (Intel w/Intel board) not even the same NIC ports (Realtek vs Intel). I was not impressed with how clumsy that part was...

However, in the end, the v2.4.0 usb drive I finally created worked, boots directly to an ABB 3 line screen for IP/Username/Password and it logs you in, you select what you want and away it goes. My other issue was I had to disconnect the additional HDD on the target, because it wouldn't let me select restore just the boot partition and overwrite existing boot partition. It kept saying it was going to restore the C: (boot) to the free space on E: which did have enough space to restore all 111gb on to it but obviously that's not what I wanted, or I needed to restore the entire device (both HDDs) which I didn't want to do. The program brings up a graphical chart with colors showing you what you have backed up (versions, dates, drives, etc) you choose one, and what you're wanting restored, entire device, boot partition, etc. BUT I couldn't figure out how to make it restore C: and overwrite the existing C: ? After I disconnect all other HDDs it showed the restore procedure correctly. I know I am right on this, but I am willing to admit I was frustrated by that time and maybe I missed something. The restoring process was for me about 1% a minute, so about 100 minutes (over an hour and half) to restore 111gb of data on to a SSD over 1gbe LAN. I don't know if that's fast or slow?

ABB backup is super nice, easy and smooth. The restore process can use some work.

 

[Gerard]

Well the thing about backup is that you should not need it, but it is priceless when you do. Increasing the number or restore points, locations, and media that you can restore from, will give you a peace of mind but also make you spend more $. That's a fact but it comes down how much you value your data, noting more.

This is a very true statement. A friend of mine was storing photos on an external hard drive, thinking he was backing it up. It was only one copy of the data and he thought because he unplugged it nothing would ever happen to it because it wasn’t running. The inevitable happened and the disk stopped working. He said he had pictures of his 9 year old daughter on there since birth. He had to send the disk out to a recovery company on the other side of the country and ultimately had to pay $2,000. He said at this point he’d pay anything to get it back because that was all he had. As rusty said you’ll have to invest, but what’s the price tag if you lost it all. Forget even the price, what if they data recovery failed and it’s gone for good.

 

[Phone Guy]

The whole thing is, right now I have 2 nas backing up 1 nas so 3 total.... I feel a little silly