Simple Backup for Customers

[allanc]

It would be nice to have a script to unhide/hide the external drive before/after running the back-up on a schedule. That would keep the the back-up safe from ransomware except during the actual backing-up process. Most back-up programs let you run such scripts before/after performing the back-up. While diskpart can be used in the script, as suggested here, I'm not sure the drive order would be predictable and unaffected by forgetting that you left a USB flash drive or other drive connected before running the script. Need to experiment a bit.

Anyone do this reliably?

I don't know if this helps, but you can use USBDLM to try to force the drive letter based upon its attributes. I have been using this utility for many years.

 

[Larry Sabo]

This is a great idea! Maybe assign it to drive Z or use a mount point.

I guess installing a permanent drive on SATA port 0 would give it a stable disk number Not portable, but still not a bad idea. At least it wouldn't depend on the customer plugging it in/disconnecting it regularly, and keeping it somewhere safe.

 

[Philippe]

You can give the backup drive a name / label and use a script to find the drive with the correct name...

 

[Bill Tech]

I think if you walk them through kicking off a backup once you have everything set up, many of those who are hesitant will change their minds.

I have a substantial number of both senior citizen and blind clients, and after learning just how simple it is to take a backup once someone has installed the software and set up a drive for them the fears disappear.

One thing I don't get into with those clients, as they don't need to know it, is the importance of using disk management to assign the backup drive a drive letter way up the alphabet on any machine on which it will be used. When you have a drive letter such as X, there is pretty much zero probability of any "plug in order conflict" for the backup software.

I use two different backup drives on my machines, alternating the drives each month, so that a failure in any one of the drives means that I am no more than 2 months behind. They have the letters W and X.

Do you mind sharing what backup software you use with your clients?

 

[Larry Sabo]

You can give the backup drive a name / label and use a script to find the drive with the correct name...

Thanks @Philippe. Too bad all back-up/imaging programs don't incorporate such a script and run it when the user makes his first back-up/image, capturing the serial number of the drive and asking the user if they want to hide the drive from ransomware between back-ups. The program (running as a service) could periodically check whether the drive is connected, unhide the drive by asigning a drive letter, update the back-up, then hide the drive again. Of course it would also have to offer to unhide and mount the drive for access for reasons other than updating the back-up, e.g., so the user could peruse or access the data, and hide it immediately thereafter.

 

[Diggs]

Do you mind sharing what backup software you use with your clients?

I have recommended free Cobian Backup to those that want something simple that keeps their files in native uncompressed format. It's been around a long time without any change but now I see Mr. Cobian has created a new and improved backup app called Reflector. I haven't used the new one yet.

 

[nlinecomputers]

I guess installing a permanent drive on SATA port 0 would give it a stable disk number Not portable, but still not a bad idea. At least it wouldn't depend on the customer plugging it in/disconnecting it regularly, and keeping it somewhere safe.

Until the fire...

Unless the internet sucks I don't even offer onsite backups anymore. People just DON'T remember to changeout the drives.

 

[britechguy]

Do you mind sharing what backup software you use with your clients?

That depends on the client. My current favorite for home users who want a free option and the least intimidating UI is EaseUS To Do Backup Free.

If something more sophisticated is wanted or needed, or my client is blind and accessibility for taking the backup is an issue, Macrium Reflect Free is my go to.

Backing up, much like safe behavior in interacting with cyberspace, is something every individual has to learn, either by desire or from hard experience with a disaster. Although these things are not therapy, they are parallel to therapy (regardless of type) in that if the person does not want to engage, there is nothing you can really do to improve their situation.

Automating backups to a fixed drive (whether internal or external) eliminates the need for someone to develop a habit and ritual, but it also exposes them to ransomware attacks if the backup is local. For most home users, and even very small business users, that's where the backup is. In areas like mine, where fiber optic internet is just now entering the market, doing backups to the cloud remains very impractical, even though that's ideally where I'd prefer they be. I don't even back up to the cloud, but use two alternating backup drives that are stored in a fireproof box when they are not in use. If I wanted to be really, really careful, one of those would spend its "off month" stored away from my house entirely, but if I were to have a fire, the very last concern I'd have is for my computer and its data. That would not be true for many individuals or businesses.

I want, and prefer, active engagement from the end user. If it's "too much to expect" that they set a reminder once per month (which is usually way more than enough for the demographic I serve) to plug in a drive, fire up EaseUS, and click the backup button, then they really do not care about having a backup, even after having been educated about why it's so important to have one. I've had a couple of clients who have had to learn the hard way, from a catastrophic drive failure with no backup, how much they actually did care about something that their behavior had suggested they didn't give a flying rat's patootie about. Choices about what actions you are, and are not, willing to take have consequences. And they should.

I am not responsible for making other people responsible computer owners. My obligation ends at educating them about what they need to do and, if they agree, getting the mechanism in place for them to do it themselves on the cycle that works for them.

 

[Larry Sabo]

Until the fire...

Unless the internet sucks I don't even offer onsite backups anymore. People just DON'T remember to changeout the drives.

True, but I suspect fires are a far less frequent cause of data loss than hard drive failures. Wish I knew the probability of loss by cause, but don't. Just allocating a portion of the over-sized drives commonly found in PCs today for use as a hidden back-up partition would be better than no back-up at all, which is what I most frequently encounter. My market is almost exclusively residential customers; the business market can afford and deserves a more comprehensive approach, obviously.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

With todays fast internet, and dirt cheap prices of online backup/sync services, if not already existing services like OneDrive with MS accounts, or even DropBox...I just set those to backup the user libraries and BOOM, all done.

Eliminate the human error factor of backups and swapping drives...cuz you know the majority don't do it.

 

[britechguy]

Just allocating a portion of the over-sized drives commonly found in PCs today for use as a hidden back-up partition would be better than no back-up at all, which is what I most frequently encounter.

But that doesn't help for drive failures, or at least any that I've ever dealt with. If it's a drive failure, access to all partitions is "toast."

That's why backups have always been done to a separate physical, not logical, drive.

 

[Larry Sabo]

But that doesn't help for drive failures

Yeah, you're right. It should be a separate drive if this is going to be done at all.

 

[britechguy]

With todays fast internet

It's not that I disagree with everything you've said if what I quoted actually exists, but you definitely need to disabuse yourself of the notion that it's anywhere near to ubiquitous.

In a very large swath of Virginia, including the city where I live if you are not one of the early adopters of the very recently introduced fiber optic service (and many residential clients will never have this, as it's too expensive and overkill for them), doing cloud backups for any significant volume of data is utterly impractical.

 

[Sky-Knight]

"Fast" Internet in this context means anything 200mbit or greater. That's available in most markets and more than enough to do Onedrive and the like.

For the rest, I've been using Synology devices. A magic BOX on the network that's almost self maintaining, but can do image backups of machines WITHOUT exposing a normal service port, and can easily replicate off to Backblaze or whatever for pennies?

The only real problem is you need another Synology to 'restore" the offsite data to, to do a restore if you lose the Synology itself. So it does take some planning, but otherwise it's Datto without monthly service fees.

oh, and it does M365 and GSuite too... without a / user cost... I'm starting to roll these out everywhere. Slap them into their own VLAN and watch them sing.

 

[britechguy]

"Fast" Internet in this context means anything 200mbit or greater.

And, thus, my original comments stand with zero revision. This simply is not available anywhere near to everywhere. (And I'm taking that Mbps as being what you mean, not a typo).

 

[sapphirescales]

Unless the internet sucks I don't even offer onsite backups anymore. People just DON'T remember to changeout the drives.

What about NAS devices or servers? I sometimes deploy Synology NAS's. Active Backup For Business combined with Snapshot Replication is pretty darned safe from drive failure and ransomware. I only like to use NAS devices in RAID 10. RAID 5/6 just isn't safe. The only problem is, even a basic 2-bay Synology NAS with a couple of hard drives can easily exceed $700 plus installation and configuration you're looking at $1,500 minimum to have me set one of these up. Most home users aren't going to spend that kind of money on a backup. Sure makes $20/month for cloud backup seem a lot more appealing though!

 

[nlinecomputers]

What about NAS devices or servers? I sometimes deploy Synology NAS's. Active Backup For Business combined with Snapshot Replication is pretty darned safe from drive failure and ransomware. I only like to use NAS devices in RAID 10. RAID 5/6 just isn't safe. The only problem is, even a basic 2-bay Synology NAS with a couple of hard drives can easily exceed $700 plus installation and configuration you're looking at $1,500 minimum to have me set one of these up. Most home users aren't going to spend that kind of money on a backup. Sure makes $20/month for cloud backup seem a lot more appealing though!

Depends on the amount of data or if databases are involved. Datto for servers which is a local backup plus cloud backups. The Datto or the cloud can be spun up as a VM should you have a catistophic failure.

 

[Sky-Knight]

What about NAS devices or servers? I sometimes deploy Synology NAS's. Active Backup For Business combined with Snapshot Replication is pretty darned safe from drive failure and ransomware. I only like to use NAS devices in RAID 10. RAID 5/6 just isn't safe. The only problem is, even a basic 2-bay Synology NAS with a couple of hard drives can easily exceed $700 plus installation and configuration you're looking at $1,500 minimum to have me set one of these up. Most home users aren't going to spend that kind of money on a backup. Sure makes $20/month for cloud backup seem a lot more appealing though!

Exactly, so I quote both and let people choose. I know my local SMB market is vastly more receptive to the capital investment than they are the constant monthly charge.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I've done Office 365 implementations on an office that was just under 20 users, on a 3x meg bonded T-1 connection (no DSL or cable was available to this building at the time).

Yes...initial sync took a bit, but once the initial sync was done, it worked...and worked greater than OK.
Surely even rural areas have near a 3-5 meg link, if not more.

Yeah, not the answer for all. But for me, if someone asks, that's my answer. Versus...having a typical end user "forget" to unplug and/or swap external USB drives. Or having one plugged into the computer at the time of a power surge, so that both get cooked....how handy is that backup now? That it went..up..in..smoke. Yup, seen that!

 

[britechguy]

Surely even rural areas have near a 3-5 meg link, if not more.

All I can tell you, definitively, is, "Not in rural Virginia, they don't."

Areas not all that far (less than 20 miles) outside the Staunton City limits have no wired broadband access whatsoever. What's available to them is either cellular (and that's if they're very, very lucky) or satellite (which is far more typical and unstable just based on weather conditions).

I had a customer "out in the county" for years, who's now moved into the city after her husband passed away, that had to rely on satellite internet service for years and still would be were she still living at the farm.

High-speed broadband is very far from ubiquitous in large swaths of the country in rural areas, and even some "not quite rural, but certainly not urban in the classic sense" areas.

The Northeast as a whole is somewhat better off given the exurbs of NYC, Washington, DC, and Boston are involved.