I use Novabackup. It is really fast and simple. I backup to a portable hard drive.
1 Like
I use Macās time machine as well as Carbon Copy Cloner.
On top of that I backup critical folders and files on 2 16GB USB drives
1 Like
Like johnn31 I use Acronis True Image on an auto backup each day to a NAS with 16TB. What upsets me is that most NAS boxes are sold as a safe backup system if they set the RAID. What they donāt tell you is that if one of the HDDās in the NAS fails, your rebuild can take up to 48 hours!!! So I do an incremental BU each day and a full image BU once a week. But you need offsite BU, and a number of different sources and sites for a true safe BU if you want to store your pictures. I use a paid Google Drive account, Dropbox, OneNote and Acronis Cloud.
When I was writing my Masters Thesis I had 6 current copies and they were up to 100Klm away from me. The true sign of terrorā¦grin!
Hehe. Luxury, luxury. I had a dispute with the dean of faculty and had to retype all 110 pages with a particular word removed every time it appeared as we disagreed on its applicability. In those days it was with a typewriter since āpublishing softwareā was $$$$$ and only for mainframes (PCās and minicomputers were just being rolled out). āHigh technologyā xerox copies at a point in time was as good as you could do, if you could afford them.
A colleague had his only copy in his backpack on his motorcycle, and it blew open. He spent hours crawling around and under the local trailer park (USA) looking for the pages. He got most of them, as well as an in-depth interrogation by the local police. 
3 Likes
I use mostly Easeus Todo Backup Workstation (have used the free version as well on friends computers) and have been very happy with the reliability. When storing in the Cloud I encrypt the backups before uploading.
Further to my earlier endorsement of Macrium Reflect, I had 2 occasions to use it for recovery recently, 2 problems on 2 PCs. (1) Something Windows ābrokeā and after a few hours of trying to correct it I decided on an image restore that was only hours old and just āpre breakā.
The restoration process worked brilliantly and has an āintelligentā option to only write back sectors that changed so it was only minutes rather than hours.
(2) HDD crash. Installed a new HDD, booted from the Reflect recovery media, the menus were reasonably clear, it ādiscoveredā the backups and rebuilt the C: drive with zero drama.
If there is any fault with the product, the menu presentation and documentation do not do justice to how slick the product is, and how easy it is to use.
I just use the default Windows backup software āFile Historyā. It backs up everything in designated folders regularly to an external hard drive. Iāve never had any problems using it and have been able to retrieve a number of important documents that I would otherwise have lost.
Hi Brendan
I am looking to purchase an external hard drive. Choice found Toshiba and Seagate reliable and says I need to choose the type of HDD. No further information there. I have a Desktop PC.
1 Like
Hi @wrice,
if youāre viewing the article online, there is some information about types in the section headed External hard drive reliability rating. If you canāt access it online, let me know.
3 Likes
I use Time Machine and cloning software. My first choice for cloning was SuperDuper! but I find that Carbon Copy Cloner is a better option when cloning multiple drives to multiple locations. That said, it was SD which saved my bacon when the HD in my old iMac failedā¦ it simply booted from the clone (automatically) and went on as if nothing was wrong. That let me continue working until I could afford to take the Mac to a local repairer (this was years before there were Apple Stores all over).
All my backups are on WD externals. Iāve just had to replace two but went with the same brand.
1 Like
I use Windows backup, Ashampoo Backup 12 (which is fantastically easy), and Carbonite. Only one of these is mentioned in Choiceās review.
I am also a little disappointed that the guide linked by the OP waits until the end to mention the appropriate backup strategy (3-2-1, though not put that way). It also doesnāt mention any āPeter Zaluznyā - although the original iteration presumably did.
I use the same approach, @SueW. Iām happy with SuperDuper!, but nowadays only use it to clone my boot volume. Time Machine looks after everything else, with multiple backup volumes, including one offsite. Iām about to transition from a 2010 desktop Mac Pro to a new Mac Mini. Goodbye to five onboard hard drives. Hello to a new NAS. ( The upcoming new Mac Pro is all about SSDs, and not much provision for āspinning rustā ) 
2 Likes
Youāre brave. Iām sticking with my 2012 Mini until such time as Apple takes pity on those of us who do like to replace our bits, ourselves. And those of us who cant afford to upgrade every year.
1 Like
Or foolish ? 
My Mac Pro 5,1 cannot be upgraded to Catalina. The newest Pro is both overkill and inadequate for my requirements 
I donāt want an iMac as I have a 27" monitor that Iām very happy with.
I could stick with my existing Pro, but my previous one died twice - firstly the power supply, and then a motherboard component.
I have a love/hate relationship with Apple, and I donāt really believe that pity is part of their lexicon 
3 Likes
aaahahahaa! True. I actually donāt care if I cant run Catalina (but I think my Mini is acceptable) ā¦ I just downgraded it from Mojave which I wanted to like, to High Sierra which I dont much like at all. Might u/g again. And Iām still powering along on my 2010 Macbook on Sierra because even though it could run HS (and Mojave with the help of dosdude1ās patch) it seems happy to be on Sierra. There are app incompatibilities too, for a Mojave installā¦ I have Drive Genius 4 and that + Mojave seemed to have totalled two of my external drives. Soā¦ meh, as long as what I have continues to work for meā¦
1 Like
Hi Scott
I found this site without the information on allToshiba HDD.
Is there another site?
There is no other site. The reliability data we presented was that all the brands were equally reliable, but that buyers should consider the type of HDD, ie portable and desktop drives were more reliable than NAS drives. Of course, NAS drives could have been reported less reliable due to being used much more extensively than others, but we donāt have sufficient data to prove or disprove that.
3 Likes
If youāre looking for reliable hard drives, Toshiba and HGST (formerly Hitachi, now owned by WD) are both considered good choices.
Backblaze is a cloud backup company that uses a wide variety of hard drives, and publishes regular reports on their reliability. It is important to note that their data is not based upon an āaverage home userā scenario - they work their drives hard, and kill a lot. You also should only compare like with like - failure rates will generally go up with storage density, so larger drives should fail more often.
You should read the details, as drives (along with other electronics) have a tendency to either fail early or live quite a while - so this affects the failure rates if a particular model has just been rolled out.
3 Likes
Thanks for the information. I have chosen Toshiba Canvio Basic.
Thanks everyone who has responded to my concerns!
5 Likes
Thanks for the extra information. Toshiba Canvio Basic has a 3 year warranty and 1TB is enough for me. I compared like with like.
2 Likes
