You could put the data in a rar file. If you use a good password no one should be able to get in it. The only known methods that work (that I've seen) are brute force which only works on weak passwords.

Although I would just keep two backup copies in different places if it's that important to me(not online). If you don't want anyone getting into the data just encrypt it or put it in something like a password protected rar file. You could also store the backup drives in a lockbox so no one tries to plug it in and fucks it up.

It's funny though, I don't think anyone here said jack about S.M.A.R.T. features. If you use software such as http://www.hdtune.com you can see when there's a problem with your hdd. If people would just do that most data lost to bad drives wouldn't happen.

Mozy, aren't they the ones with that commercial about the guy having a computer failure..... which was actually a stove blasting out of no where, into his backyard and landing on his laptop which made it spontaneously burst into flames for no reason?

SMART is a system that attempts to provide early warning of impending failure. I've experienced a number of drive failures, but I've only seen one drive actually "trigger" a SMART warning prior to taking all of its data off to nowhere land.

A hard drive is a mechanical device that WILL fail eventually... not MAY... WILL!

i always keep important stuff on some sort of centralized storage in multiple locations.

I'd say RAID is probably a better early warning system than SMART. RAID will disconnect a drive pretty much as soon as it starts playing up, and a manual inspection of the SMART values will usually show why (eg reallocated sector count has suddenly changed from 0 to 50). SMART is obviously going to be more conservative before announcing a drive has failed; if the trigger thresholds are too low then it's going to significantly increase the warranty load on the manufacturer.

Yeah, if you're not using hardware raid you're just an idiot. It's so lost cost these days, that it just makes sense. I keep a monthly backup, or so, off site. Otherwise, I've had drive fails, I haven't lost whole raid arrays ever though.

To raid, or not to raid? That is the question.

We keep rotating BOOTABLE backup copies of our desktops and
our servers by using Clonebox. We can grab a single file or directory
lrom the back up, or boot the whole thing up and use the machine as
it was last night, yesterday, last week, or last month. To protect against
fire, burglary, etc. Clonebox provides off site back up, which we like.

Given what we do, we are of course very much aware of these types
of issues, so to some extent we continue to use our old multi-layer system
with DVDs in the safe deposit box, a local rotating on a USB drive using
an older, more basic version the technology which later became Clonebox, etc.

I do now and I learned the hard way too.

All my work for the month of Sept. Gone, capputskys , no more , vanished. I almost cried. Ok I cried but just a little :)

With all of the posts about RAID, I should mention something about a
\common misconception. Many people seem to think that RAID is a backup
of some sort. You ask them about backup and they say "we have RAID".
For those who are reading this and aren't clear, let me say it very clearly:

RAID IS NOT BACKUP.

RAID will not help you when you accidentally delete a file or mess up a
setting or a database. RAID will not help you when you get hacked.
RAID will not help when you get a virus. RAID will not help when your
important files, like your password file and Windows registry are wiped
out because the drive is full. RAID, on your server, will not help when
your host disappears Alphared style. RAID will not help when your
power supply shorts, blowing your drives. RAID is simply and only a
way to reduce the chance of the physical failure of the drive itself,
when used in combination with proper monitoring systems. RAID
without proper monitoring is almost worthless because you don't know
when one of the drives fails. RAID doesn't even help THAT much
with making the hardware more reliable. A RAID rebuild is one of the
toughest jobs a drive will ever be asked to to do so it's common for
the "good" drive to fail in the middle of a rebuild. In fact, with some
RAID configurations there's a better than 50% chance that the rebuild
will fail. So all RAID does is make it a little less likely that you'll be
taken out by the drive hardware itself failing. It does not protect
you against most of the causes of data loss - RAID is not backup.

Nah... I suck at it! Better do it fast!

This thread has made me rethink my backup strategy... currently I stick the disk in and make a backup when I'm about to go and see my mum, but this means that if I had a catastrophic failure on that same day the backup at her place would be getting quite stale (eg on a 2 week cycle the backup would be 4 weeks old)

Instead I'm going to set it up so that the drive stays in and powered on 24/7, then the contents of the NAS box are rsync'd at least once per day to the drive. This means if the NAS toasts itself I'll still have the single drive as a current backup. If there's a fire or some other event which destroys my rack of equipment then all bets are off, it's back to the stale backup. :)

truecrypt...

All the time!