One thing I hate about Carbonite is that they claim it is "set up once and forget", however, that seems deeply deceptive to me, since most people are only going to find out that their videos aren't backed up until it is too late.

Does this one back up video automatically?

Will it backup USB harddrives or network drives attached to my computer? They never seem to mention that stuff. That or I just couldn't find it in there.

Jessica and Jeff:

Yes, it will back up any files on any file system mounted on your computer. If you are backing up very large files (movies) it will take a long time. Even with FIOS. But, it will do it.

I'm not KK, just a reader and a Crashplan user.

Will it back up Exchange files? That is the big hangup for many backup schemes.

Fred beat me to the punch! Yes - CrashPlan will automatically backup your movies in Windows and Mac. It also does *not* exclude movie files (i.e. .avi, .mov, etc.) by default.

It will also backup your USB drives.

Network shares are a bit trickier - should be ok on Mac. Windows will require a little effort. See here -

http://support.crashplan.com/doku.php/recipe/back_up_windows_mapped_drives

"...CrashPlan makes its strongest case, which is as an offsite complement to local backup strategies like Time Machine, or as a seamless solution for users who otherwise wouldn't back up at all, let alone offsite."

I am a big proponent of offsite backups, but it's worth remembering that relying entirely on an online backup tool like CrashPlan could leave you stranded for the many hours or days it can take to do a restore. That's why I think these servies should best be thought of as "offsite complement to local backup strategies" unless you can afford a day or two of down time. I can't.

For work, my approach is to maintain a backup computer with all my essential programs, and then every day (often several times a day) I sync my active files, email, and bookmarks to a 64-gigabyte USB stick. I keep the stick with me at all times. That way if my work computer crashes, I can immediately plug the stick into my backup computer and continue working without any delay. When traveling, I take my laptop with me and leave the stick at home as my offsite backup.

Crashplan is great, I use it on all my home machines, including one that has about 500GB (and growing) of various files - media, archives, etc.

It does not slow the machines down, and has worked very well for me so far when I needed to get a file.

I would probably agree with the other poster, you want to back up files you need to restore very quickly locally AND to CP - if they are big. Small files should be fine.

"The $60 paid version, called CrashPlan+, removes the ads and grants more control over data retention, hours of operation, and backup frequency (15 minute intervals by default, daily in the free version). "

In Linux, you can do this for free with rsync and cron, and without ads popping up on your screen.

"I wish it could back up varying sets of files to different destinations (like a bigger set to a local disk and a smaller set offsite); the developers tell me this is planned. "

With rsync, no problem. Again, free.

"mailing the disk to its destination, where incremental backups over the internet pick up where the local backup left off."

Again, rsync. Again, for free.

Heck, dd plus ssh and I can shoot an entire image of my computer plus OS and applications to a backup anywhere on the planet.

Linux ought to get its own Cool Tool entry. :)

@8: rsync runs on my behalf many times a day, and I adore it. But it's not a backup tool, it's a kit for constructing backup tools.

Advising non-nerds to use rsync for backup would be madness. Anyone entertaining the notion should be forced to pass a quiz first, including questions like:

* What is the meaning of the flag set '-rlptgoD'?
* Give examples of the correct and incorrect use of '--link-dest', and describe how you would test for correctness
* Explain the use of --del to avoid running out of space on the destination, while preserving deleted files for an arbitrary duration (and not destroying your --link-dest hard-link hierarchy)
* Describe how you will arrange to be notified when your backup fails to run
* Describe your encryption strategy, in transit and on the destination

I'm sure you could pass such a quiz. I'll let my mom use rsync when she can too. Until then, she can use CrashPlan.

I've been using http://wuala.ch for exactly that purpose since about half a year. Actually, I lost the home disk on my laptop about two months after setting up my first personal backup ever. I only lost five days worth of (unimportant) data. It's needless to say, I enforced a rigid backup plan for all my other systems the day after. Wuala is less of a real backup solution. In fact you only get "Time Machine" like backup after becoming Pro by buying storage or sharing some on wualas peer-to-peer network.

Although I always though having a backup solution is for wimps (on my personal computers most stuff is OSS anyway). I really gained a new perspective after my meltdown. I can only recommend everyone to get one of the readily available backup solutions. Right now their as cheap as an internet access and an external HD.

I tried several of these online backup systems (mozy, carbonite, spideroak etc), and settled on crash plan for my mac. All the others are CPU hogs. Their startup scan would take 30 mins and use 90% cpu, which of course made the fans spin up.

Have you tried any test restores yet? All of these remote backup plans sound wonderful, until the time comes that you need to restore.

Also, have you determined that all file metadata from the various operating systems is preserved across backup and restore, and in transfer between systems?

My experience has been that these systems are optimized for Windows, and thus ignore metadata from other OSs. In fact, they may skip Windows metadata too, since it is rarely used.

If you use CrashPlan purely for local backup or backup to a remote computer under your control, does it require the CrashPlan Internet service to be reachable?

One of my main concerns about online backup is what happens when the company running them dies. It's nice if the software would continue to work in a peer to peer fashion even if the online service goes away or is down.

Definitely a CoolTool!

Another way to go, at least for many businesses... Consider purchasing some inexpensive systems for dedicated offsite backup. I like the Mac mini. Sure, you could spend the cash on monthly storage services, but you give up a lot when you do that. Better to have immediate access and full control of your data in many situations.

The Mac mini, as many folks here will likely know, has the ability to operate very effectively without a display, keyboard or mouse. I use LogMeIn when I need to manage them remotely or Jolly’s FastVNC locally. Certainly a KVM switch would work in a server room.

It’s true that the mini’s only sport 5400 RPM hard disk drives, but the real bottleneck for most folks will be their available bandwidth. Drive speed is of minimal concern. If it becomes an issue, we can always use 7200 RPM externals or a Drobo. Since we plan to rotate them out of service once every 36 months we’re really not too concerned that they’re not “Server Grade” drives.

Amortized over a year or two, even with AppleCare, you can easily recoup the initial outlay for almost any Mac mini configuration.

The backups with CrashPlan+ are encrypted using 448-bit Blowfish encryption before they leave your location then reside in encrypted form on a system that is either fully or largely under your control at no additional monthly cost to you.

An actual example; two small State Agencies have agreements to host each other's backed up data using dedicated systems. Agency "A" purchased a Mac mini for less than $600 and hosts the backed up files for Agency "B". Agency "B" did the same for Agency "A".

With the State Agency example above we were obviously concerned with anyone having "ANY" kind of access, even if it's encrypted, to any data that might be at risk. This is particularly important in light of the recent Federal Agency data losses which have exposed the personal data of millions of folks.

Even the perception or the implication that any data exposure might be possible was unacceptable. Of course in that kind of situation we have no choice but to maintain full control of the data 24x7. Remote storage at a service, regardless of their security practices is just too risky.

Another example; a large international agricultural company. Their main office has almost 400 GB of off-site storage requirements. One of their research facilities about 15 miles away has about 20 GB of off-site storage requirements. Each hosts a dedicated backup destination for the other.

Because one site had such a large amount of data, we conducted the initial backup while on-site so we could take advantage of their gigabit LAN connection, sort of a “seed backup” - pun intended. Once completed, we simply moved that Mac mini to it's off-site location and it automatically reconfigured itself to it's new environment. In its final location it only has to backup the deltas that occur throughout the day.

Keep in mind that this is not our only form of backup. This is simply an offsite complement to more traditional onsite backup practices. Because CrashPlan+ is not Exchange Server friendly, we simply use Backup Exec to push a copy of all necessary info to a subdirectory that CrashPlan+ can encrypt and shove offsite.

A Mac, in conjunction with CrashPlan, seems to be a superior choice as opposed to a Windows based solution, because CrashPlan running on Windows does not support network share points. Something about how Windows treats it’s shares... User space versus system space maybe?

I know you can do some magic to get around the limitation as listed on Code42’s site, but that solution is not officially supported by the developers. Instead, we connect to share points that the Mac can read and use CrashPlan to back them up. You do have to monitor this configuration with some regularity as the Mac can drop the shared connection(s), but it’s not been a major issue for us.

A probably obvious side benefit of the Mac mini is that they can easily be repurposed as extremely small Windows, Mac or Linux workstations if our backup strategy ever changes. Since our rotation schedule is approximately 36 months, you can bet at least a few will end up as multi-media resources once they’re retired from backup service.

The type of offsite backup methodology you choose will largely depend on the amount of data you have, what existing hardware resources are available for hosting within your organization and of course whether your setting needs to respect significant privacy issues such as HIPAA laws or other required Federal, State, or Local mandates.

Cheers!

---RASTER

@11: Along with the restorations mentioned in the review, tests with Backup Bouncer have come through as documented.

http://support.crashplan.com/doku.php/articles/supported_metadata

The most significant form of Mac metadata CrashPlan doesn't support are xattrs, which we aren't too worried about. ACLs weren't supported when we started with the product, but that changed not long afterward.

@12: The process by which internet-based backup peers locate each other is indeed dependent on Code 42's servers. To back up to someone else you have to plug in their six-digit ID code, which registers centrally to avoid having to know the destination's current IP address. If the company were to go out of business, this would have to be updated or internet-based backup would stop.

Personally I'm less concerned that they might go out of business than that they'll get acquired by some inept big fish, as happened when Dantz was acquired by EMC.

CrashPlan Pro doesn't use the friend-finding service (clients are supplied with their server's domain name/IP address), so it has no dependency on the Code 42 mothership.

Another local, not online, but very simple, straightforward and for many people free, solution is SyncBack. I use it everyday and it does a good job of letting me sync my desktop to my laptop and to my 3 redundant backup drives. I should note I only use it for my data which for any backup system requires a little thought and discipline to make sure you are backing up all your documents, images, movies, email and bookmarks.

Following from Derrick's rave about rsync and ssh, and Nathaniel's wise rebuttal that rsync is a geek tool for building a backup system, I can suggest backuppc (http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/) - open source, free, gui-oriented system for automating backups for multiple client computers running any of mac, windows, or linux to a shared server. It uses rsync, ssh etc as the underlying tools.

Unfortunately CrashPlan for the Mac (as of 14 Feb 2010 anyway) can't correctly restore all Finder flags (unlike what it says in that "Supported Metadata" page). It also can't correctly restore hard links or symlink ownership, among other things:
http://www.haystacksoftware.com/arq/crashplan-backup-bouncer-test.txt

This page has restore-testing results for several online offerings for the Mac:
http://www.haystacksoftware.com/arq/

Turns out old backup archives created with Crashplan have a bug that can leave files unrestorable. Crashplan silently fixed this (no entry in the release notes), but old archives may have corrupted files. The only solution is to wipe the archive and start from scratch, and the only way to find out is to try a restore and see if it works.

More details at http://try-dot-ch.blogspot.com/2010/03/crashplan.html

CrashPlan staff have responded to Nik's problems with CrashPlan. Whilst they admit to miscommunication from their support staff, CrashPlan has not caused any corruption of backup data. They have also explained the confusion between Nik and CrashPlan support. The CrashPlan software did not corrupt Nik's data and there are no known bugs which cause corruption.
More details at https://crashplan.zendesk.com/entries/140286 with a full explanation on the second page.

To the blog owner, great article and good review. Thanks for posting your experience.

Re: Nik's comment, please do your own research before just believing what is written there. Several of us on the CP forums have followed Nik's blog as well as many detailed responses from CP on their own user forums, and as John Gilbert said above, all is not as black & white as it appears in Nik's blog.

Do your own research, do your own test restores, the product works. I've tested Mozy & Carbonite and they don't even come close to the value CrashPlan provides.

Jason

IMHO the response from the Crashplan team has muddied the waters, rather than clarifying things -- contradicting things their support staff have said, and deleting (paying) customer comments from their forum. More details at http://try-dot-ch.blogspot.com/2010/04/crashplan-part-two.html

Since then, more examples of people having the same restore problems have cropped up (see the comments in both blog posts for links and further details).