Cloud sync of Time Machine backups

[int3]

Hi all,

I've recently set up a Synology DS220 to act as a target for Apple Time Machine backups. I'm now trying to find a way to periodically back up those Time Machine backups to the cloud (probably S3 or Glacier, but I'd be open to others).

Cloud Sync seems like what I want, but it doesn't seem like there's a way to get it to take a snapshot of the shared folder with the Time Machine backups and copy that to S3. It would seem that would be necessary to prevent corruption, since a Time Machine job will likely run while Cloud Sync is doing its thing. Is there a way to get it to do a btrfs snapshot and upload that to S3? Maybe I've missed something.

Hyper Backup looks like it will work, but seems overkill for what I need since I don't need its own rotation features, versioning, etc. I also can't find an easy way to throttle the upload speed.

How do other Time Machine users have things configured? Especially interested in how you're all handling off site backups.

Thanks!

 

[Seaprobe]

Time Machine keeps its backup in a disk image, and as you've pointed out, unless you are certain it is closed and flushed, making a copy will likely result in an unusable image. Snapshots would be similarly susceptible.

Generally speaking, it is better to make a separate backup to another destination rather than making a backup of a (Time Machine) backup. Any corruption or error would make the backup of a backup useless.

If you want a cloud-based backup, Backblaze and its peers are good options. Putting my money where my mouth is, I have local TM backups on my NAS and cloud-based backups with Backblaze.

 

[Rusty]

Another option would be to use Acronis True Image to snap your macOS and then back up that image up to the cloud. For me, I use True Image weekly for example (and have TM running every 3 hours). So for a pure disaster recovery scenario, I have an Acronis image.

Considering it is on a weekly schedule, I can back it up to the cloud (or a remote location) at any point (.tib file) during that 1w period. Targeting Synology C2 with HyperBackup.