Hi Folks,

 

I have searched around, but cannot find an answer to my question.

 

I'm looking to backup a large amount of data using the built in Windows 7 backup tool (I like bare metal backups and it's free!).

 

Unfortunately it needs more than the 2TB drive I'm currently pointing it at so I'm looking at unRAID as a potential solution. If I split a user share (e.g. disk0/backup (2TB) and disk1/backup (2TB)) can unRAID split the single file across both drives? or would it need to put the full file on one drive? Will Windows 7 see and use this as a single 4TB drive or will it choke once the file fills the first 2TB drive in the user share?

Hi Folks,

 

I have searched around, but cannot find an answer to my question.

 

I'm looking to backup a large amount of data using the built in Windows 7 backup tool (I like bare metal backups and it's free!).

 

Unfortunately it needs more than the 2TB drive I'm currently pointing it at so I'm looking at unRAID as a potential solution. If I split a user share (e.g. disk0/backup (2TB) and disk1/backup (2TB)) can unRAID split the single file across both drives? or would it need to put the full file on one drive? Will Windows 7 see and use this as a single 4TB drive or will it choke once the file fills the first 2TB drive in the user share?

Any single file must fit on a single disk.  The windows7 tool will choke.

thanks for the quick response!

 

what if it's multiple files (two large files)? If it puts one on the first 2TB drive and there is still a fairly significant amount of space remaining (but not enough for file 2), would unRAID (or W7) be smart enough to realize the 2nd file won't fit in the remaining space and put it on the next disk?

 

Are there any recommendations on better software for accomplishing this task? W7 backup tool is not very efficient - with a system image selected it cannot fit 1.5 TB of data on a 2 TB backup destination.

thanks for the quick response!

 

what if it's multiple files (two large files)? If it puts one on the first 2TB drive and there is still a fairly significant amount of space remaining (but not enough for file 2), would unRAID (or W7) be smart enough to realize the 2nd file won't fit in the remaining space and put it on the next disk?

No, but that is exactly why unRAID has a "min-free" setting for each user-share.  Set it to a value larger than the largest file you want to transfer. If a given disk does not have that amount free, the next disk in the user-share will be used.

Are there any recommendations on better software for accomplishing this task? W7 backup tool is not very efficient - with a system image selected it cannot fit 1.5 TB of data on a 2 TB backup destination.

I use Acronis true-image.  (But I do not have Win7, so there may be better programs for you)

Hey there - just wondering exactly what it is you are backing up? I have used the Win7 tool and played with it. I do not like it's scheduled imaging solution as it will only image the "system" drives and will not let you add other drives. If you run a manual image, then you can do all your drives. Acronis will let you run scheduled images of all your drives, do differential images and also re-do full ones at set times. Really cool tool.

But, your image will be more the 1.5TB? That is a LOT of data for a Windows install.

 

Since you have an unRaid system, maybe you could move a bunch of your data to it instead of having it on the local box. Then the data on the unRaid will be protected by the unRaid system and you can do a system image backup of your Win7 box, to protect against disk failure for instance, which should be much smaller, as you have moved all that data to unRaid.

 

I am in the process of moving almost a TB of data off my main system and putting it onto my unRaid server which will then free up disks in my Win7 PC that will eventually be moved into unRaid... A never ending cycle.

 

Cheers,

Shawn

 

But, your image will be more the 1.5TB? That is a LOT of data for a Windows install.

 

iTunes, RAW image files, and an archive everything mentality

 

I'm a WHS v1 orphan which was point, shoot, forget. It worked well for backups when the server wasn't falling over itself. I'm not 100% comfortable with having my only copy of data reside on any box (including unRAID) and I have read a lot about performance issues with iTunes and unRAID - seems like a network / SMB problem on Mac, but I'm having enough iTunes trouble as it is with poor response time on my local discs.

Not much of an iTunes user myself, but could try this. Move iTunes library to another drive on the local system, therby removing it from the normal location on your C drive. This would in turn remove from your Win7 "image". Keeps the image smaller. Then you could use Win7 file backup, or something free like Crashplan, to backup your iTunes library to unRaid as well...

 

I'm not 100% comfortable with having my only copy of data reside on any box (including unRAID)

 

Then you have a conundrum I am also a WHS user as well. System worked fine... except if you ever lost that primary disk... then bye bye data. With unRaid and parity, be a pretty rare circumstance where you lose all your data...

 

Shawn

 

Not much of an iTunes user myself, but could try this. Move iTunes library to another drive on the local system, therby removing it from the normal location on your C drive. This would in turn remove from your Win7 "image". Keeps the image smaller. Then you could use Win7 file backup, or something free like Crashplan, to backup your iTunes library to unRaid as well...

 

I already have my iTunes library on a separate 1TB drive - I really don't understand what W7 is actually backing up. The backup data file and system image sizes don't correlate to anything shown in Windows Explorer. The system image is about 2x the size of my C: drive.

 

I am also a WHS user as well. System worked fine... except if you ever lost that primary disk... then bye bye data. With unRaid and parity, be a pretty rare circumstance where you lose all your data...

 

I liked WHS v1 a lot on paper - the specified functionality was great and when it actually worked it was great. I got sick and tired of rebuilding the server due to various issues - my backup DB kept getting corrupt and having to be manually flushed, it felt like a straw house just waiting to fall down.

 

I am really, really interested in unRAID - especially since I just found out that WHS2011 imposes a 2TB max drive size (including RAID arrays) - I just need to find a software solution that'll work well with unRAID to backup the large amount of data I have.

What type of backup are you doing with Win7?

A system image, or just a backup of the data, etc?

 

My system image backups are pretty big, just one huge file.

But the regular backup seems to be split between many zip files... that are not that large.

So I guess that if you do a regular backup that takes 2TB, it won't actually be one huge file that big, but a lot of small ones (by small I mean several gigs).

 

 

What type of backup are you doing with Win7?

A system image, or just a backup of the data, etc?

 

I have W7 setup to backup my user folder files, my iTunes library (separate drive), and do a system image.

 

W7 will successfully run one backup and then start failing since it has run out of disk space - even though it's set to only save the most current backup.

I already have my iTunes library on a separate 1TB drive - I really don't understand what W7 is actually backing up. The backup data file and system image sizes don't correlate to anything shown in Windows Explorer. The system image is about 2x the size of my C: drive.

 

Ya, I noticed that on mine as well - it also grabed another drive on me as I have moved the "temp". That is why I like Acronis, can manage it a lot more and exclude things... I always exclude *.tmp, pagefile, "temp", etc.

 

I liked WHS v1 a lot on paper - the specified functionality was great and when it actually worked it was great. I got sick and tired of rebuilding the server due to various issues - my backup DB kept getting corrupt and having to be manually flushed, it felt like a straw house just waiting to fall down.

I am really, really interested in unRAID - especially since I just found out that WHS2011 imposes a 2TB max drive size (including RAID arrays) - I just need to find a software solution that'll work well with unRAID to backup the large amount of data I have.

 

And with 2011, no more drive extender, the only thing that really made WHS worth anything...

 

 

And with 2011, no more drive extender, the only thing that really made WHS worth anything...

 

Ya, I was really upset when that was announced - I started to get over it though thinking I'd just build a large RAID0 array for backup within WHS2011 - but since they limit the backup drive to 2TB it is a 100% useless product.

 

I will most likely setup unRAID as a backup target server and then play around with different Windows software packages for backup.

 

As I understand it, unRAID 5 will support AFP / TimeMachine backups for Mac?

You can check the roadmap http://download.lime-technology.com/develop/infusions/aw_todo/project.php?id=1&view=roadmap to see. I believe AFP is coming, not sure about timemachine...

 

You can check the roadmap http://download.lime-technology.com/develop/infusions/aw_todo/project.php?id=1&view=roadmap to see. I believe AFP is coming, not sure about timemachine...

 

 

AFP and TimeMachine both work in the latest 5.0bX series but I would NOT suggest using it right now.  It is still under development and is changing a lot right now.

 

There are probably still some rough edges to work out with AFP and TimeMachine but that can be worked on after other 5.0 stuff is figured out.