I'm looking for something to store data on for longer periods. The data will be the accounting stuff for my brother, he started working for himself instead of a boss. All fine, but as plasterer he isn't very computer savvy. No problem he has his little brother to help him. All the bills and accounting goes great, but i'm wondering about what would be the best option for back ups and storage. Now we're using 3 different computer to have some redundancy in case one computer dies. But i'm wondering what kind of removeable media could be used, that isn't too expensive. I mean we could buy back up tapes and the hardware, but of a one man business that's a bit overkill. Burning cds doesn't seem like an good idea because i get errors within a year, but maybe this is if they are stored in a safe. Another idea is usb storage, it's cheap i never had one fail on me, well one but then i pulls it out of a computer will it was still writing on it. This whole story is about 100 MB a year, so it's not massive amounts of data we're talking about. But it's very important to not lose it, and i will keep it on the three computer, but i want extra safety. So wht would you guys advice?
Could use Amazons S3. At 100MB per year it would basically cost you nothing ($0.14/GB/Month). You should still do a local backup as well. Since one is free, why not do both
That's what I'd do. Since it's such a small amount of data, you could back it up online. Hell, you could even start up a hotmail/gmail account and use that exclusively to back up the data.
Ye, that works. Only trouble is that there is no guarantee on the data held. With services like S3, they are in the position where people are paying to not lose there data.
At 100mb a year I'd use cd's/dvd's and date them and store in a cd folder (buy a premium brand), i'd also use some flash drives and to be just as safe a new specific hotmail/gmail as above If you willing to pay then get a "vault" service, BT gives one for free if you have their internet
