I have just ordered a combination USB/Firewire CD/DVD writer and will let you know how it works once it arrives. Until recently, DVD writers were more expensive than external hard drives, but this one was only $180 and came with a rewritable DVD. I’m thinking it’s a good option for backing up those items which change occasionally and are too large to fit on a CD—not to mention for producing backups that can be stored off-site.
I’m also going to be attending a seminar tomorrow entitled “A Plain English Conversation about Computer and Network Security for the Small Business,” part of which promises to focus on backups. I’ll include any new insights in Friday’s backup notice.
Meanwhile, the storage technology industry—which I am coming to think of as backup technology industry—continues to produce new media and devices. Iomega, the maker of my venerable 100-MB parallel ZIP drive, is now offering a Removable Hard Disk System (which it calls the REV). The drive (available either as an external USB 2 drive or an internal ATAPI drive for desktop PCs) takes 35 GB removable disks and claims to be 7 times faster than tape backups.
At $350 for the drive and $60/disk, it’s not an inexpensive solution, though the drive ships both with Iomega Backup Pro and Norton Ghost. The REV system claims to be more cost-effective than DDS-4 tape backups, but if any of you are currently using, or considering investing in, tape backups, it’s news to me. The REV system also suffers from the same problem that Iomega’s ZIP and JAZ do: although you can transport a lot of data on one disk, only another REV drive can read it.
Personally, I still prefer the external hard drive option: simpler, more portable, and less expensive. But I’d love to hear anyone’s opinions to the contrary and reasons for them.
Stay tuned for more backup news,
Sallie
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