I plan on using unraid to hold the image repository for a growing photo studio.  This will make it mission critical, and requires a solid 2nd level backup.  All images are stored locally on workstations so technically the first unraid will be first level backup, and the 2nd unraid will be 2nd level backup. 

 

Will a 10TB server reliably backup to a 2nd server over gige using crashplan?  This would be a weekly backup with the backup server being carried offsite.  Each week, there could be up to 1TB of new data during the busy season and several hundred GB of changed files.  Crashplan would be comparing up to 1 million files during this backup.  Might this backup take longer than 24 hrs?

 

Server will have 2gb RAM with AMD 140 in an Asus M4A 785M mobo.

 

Is Crashplan the ticket for this, or are there simpler faster solutions I should consider?

 

Based upon your description, I think something else would probably be better for you.  Something you easily 'start' when you want to backup.  Although I don't have another solution for you since I am using CrashPlan myself, others might suggest robocopy or some sort of rsync.

others might suggest robocopy or some sort of rsync.

 

Yes, perhaps a script like the following.

 

rsync tower1/disk1 -> tower2/disk1

rsync tower1/disk2 -> tower2/disk2

rsync tower1/disk3 -> tower2/disk3

rsync tower1/disk4 -> tower2/disk4

rsync tower1/disk5 -> tower2/disk5

 

Robocopy as a windows tool would require a windows machine to do the backup from tower1 to tower2.  I would prefer an unraid only solution that doesn't require other computers to run.  However, my knowledge of linux is limited so don't try my rsync script above and expect it to work.

Being a Crashplan user myself I can say that if you are doing a localized direct backup, a much simpler solution would be an asynchronous rsync cronjob.  Very simple and easy to configure and tinker with as needed.  I would look at using Crashplan to do an offsite backup of your second server, giving you triple redundancy and that all important offsite component.

Just to throw out a Windows solution, I would recommend SyncbackSE. It's pretty good with large number of files and has lots of options given the version. The free version does basic backup/sync and more sophisticated options in the SE and Pro version.

 

Only drawback is that all the data will be going though an intermediary, rather than directly from one unRAID to another.

Loved Syncback SE for a windows solution.  Matter of fact, CrashPlan replaced it.  However, based upon ease and speed, I don't think you will beat rsync.  I use to take home a hacked nas that ran rsync on it and I would use it to 'backup' my windows machines.  Then take it back to work when I was done.  Very easy and very fast.

However, based upon ease and speed, I don't think you will beat rsync.  I use to take home a hacked nas that ran rsync on it and I would use it to 'backup' my windows machines.  Then take it back to work when I was done.  Very easy and very fast.

 

I guess I need to get started playing with it.  Is there an rsync for unraid dummys reference to get started with? 

 

Here's the rsync man page, http://www.samba.org/ftp/rsync/rsync.html.  If you're looking for a tutorial, google is your friend

 

Here's the script I am using to sync to a freenas server with rsync running.  The thought being that if something happened with unraid that was software issue, at least I have a good copy available.

 

I found this somewhere on this forum, just modified the rsync flags.  If you want to run this in cron, you'll want to take out the -v and the --progress.

 

 

#!/bin/sh

cd /mnt

for DIR in `ls user`
do
rsync -avrH --progress user/$DIR vault::unraid
done

 

 

 

I found this somewhere on this forum, just modified the rsync flags.  If you want to run this in cron, you'll want to take out the -v and the --progress.

 

This is exactly what I need.  A real live example that is somewhat close to what I want to do.  I've been to the rsync man pages many times and they are not a good starting point for me. 

 

Thanks again.