Any backblaze users?
Discussion
We've been using backblaze for a few years now across two computers, one a PC, the other a Mac. Over the last year or so, on the Mac, I seem to be constantly running into issues where backblaze's backup gets stuck in a loop and cannot complete a full backup. I'll notice this when I finally get a warning that there has been no backup for 'x' days. Backblaze's solution to this is basically to uninstall and then reinstall it and inherit the old backup. This seemed to work initially (though a massive pain in the arse) but actually even that doesn't seem to work every time now. If I had to guess, this problem started when we upgraded to an M1 Macbook air and I'm beginning to wonder if there is just a fundamental compatibility issue.
As I type this, backblaze is in the process of doing yet another full backup, having just reinstalled it for the third time this year. If I cannot resolve it for good, I think I need to look for another option.
Anyone else seeing this issue?
As I type this, backblaze is in the process of doing yet another full backup, having just reinstalled it for the third time this year. If I cannot resolve it for good, I think I need to look for another option.
Anyone else seeing this issue?
Thanks both. I like the way back blaze works in terms of only ever looking at changes between what's on HDD and what is in latest backup so it's just beavering away in the background without ever seeming intrusive.
My understanding of onedrive/google drive etc is that they're more like dropbox (which I also use) in that I would need to store all of my files in their file structure to use it as any kind of effective means of backup and I'm not quite sure I want to work like that. I use lightroom a lot to mange an extensive photo library and the catalogue for that sits on SSD (for speed) where as the photos themselves sit eleswhere because SSD storage on that scale is hugely expensive. So the one location for everything doesn't necessarily work for my usage.
We do have local backup too as primary.
It's just frustrating that Backblaze doesn't seem to be working quite as smoothly as it once did.
My understanding of onedrive/google drive etc is that they're more like dropbox (which I also use) in that I would need to store all of my files in their file structure to use it as any kind of effective means of backup and I'm not quite sure I want to work like that. I use lightroom a lot to mange an extensive photo library and the catalogue for that sits on SSD (for speed) where as the photos themselves sit eleswhere because SSD storage on that scale is hugely expensive. So the one location for everything doesn't necessarily work for my usage.
We do have local backup too as primary.
It's just frustrating that Backblaze doesn't seem to be working quite as smoothly as it once did.
From some advice I recently posted elsewhere, it might be of interest.
It depends on what kind of risks you are trying to mitigate, I’ll admit I haven’t looked at Dropbox for a while but last time I did it was very much like onedrive & google drive which are file sync mechanisms with versioning & cloud storage.
This means they work very well with keeping a copy of your data of site & in sync on multiple systems if you wish & accidental deletion/file corruption is also easy to recover from with the versioning aspect.
Where they are less able is the maleware/ransomware attacks, this is where a device becomes compromised & then your data is infected & subsequently encrypted effectively locking you out of your data, at this point you’d say great I’ll restore from my backup & that works well until you are locked out again because the files you restored were already infected just not encrypted, so you restore again but not from the live ‘backup’ but a earlier version & find the same thing happening again.
This is because now days the creators of said maleware/ransomware are aware of online backups with versioning & infect the data then make numerous small changes to files so that they ‘use up’ the versions of a file meaning whatever version you restore it’s already compromised.
In a ideal world you’d mix something like Dropbox/onedrive/google drive with something like backblaze / arcronis or another true backup product.
Set up monthly or weekly these give real point in time restore points rather than simple versioning.
This might explain more.
https://youtu.be/RB4kwfY2w7A
It depends on what kind of risks you are trying to mitigate, I’ll admit I haven’t looked at Dropbox for a while but last time I did it was very much like onedrive & google drive which are file sync mechanisms with versioning & cloud storage.
This means they work very well with keeping a copy of your data of site & in sync on multiple systems if you wish & accidental deletion/file corruption is also easy to recover from with the versioning aspect.
Where they are less able is the maleware/ransomware attacks, this is where a device becomes compromised & then your data is infected & subsequently encrypted effectively locking you out of your data, at this point you’d say great I’ll restore from my backup & that works well until you are locked out again because the files you restored were already infected just not encrypted, so you restore again but not from the live ‘backup’ but a earlier version & find the same thing happening again.
This is because now days the creators of said maleware/ransomware are aware of online backups with versioning & infect the data then make numerous small changes to files so that they ‘use up’ the versions of a file meaning whatever version you restore it’s already compromised.
In a ideal world you’d mix something like Dropbox/onedrive/google drive with something like backblaze / arcronis or another true backup product.
Set up monthly or weekly these give real point in time restore points rather than simple versioning.
This might explain more.
https://youtu.be/RB4kwfY2w7A
Captain_Morgan said:
From some advice I recently posted elsewhere, it might be of interest.
It depends on what kind of risks you are trying to mitigate, I’ll admit I haven’t looked at Dropbox for a while but last time I did it was very much like onedrive & google drive which are file sync mechanisms with versioning & cloud storage.
This means they work very well with keeping a copy of your data of site & in sync on multiple systems if you wish & accidental deletion/file corruption is also easy to recover from with the versioning aspect.
Where they are less able is the maleware/ransomware attacks, this is where a device becomes compromised & then your data is infected & subsequently encrypted effectively locking you out of your data, at this point you’d say great I’ll restore from my backup & that works well until you are locked out again because the files you restored were already infected just not encrypted, so you restore again but not from the live ‘backup’ but a earlier version & find the same thing happening again.
This is because now days the creators of said maleware/ransomware are aware of online backups with versioning & infect the data then make numerous small changes to files so that they ‘use up’ the versions of a file meaning whatever version you restore it’s already compromised.
In a ideal world you’d mix something like Dropbox/onedrive/google drive with something like backblaze / arcronis or another true backup product.
Set up monthly or weekly these give real point in time restore points rather than simple versioning.
This might explain more.
https://youtu.be/RB4kwfY2w7A
Much appreciated. I shall take a look through that. Though it sounds like I'm basically already doing as you suggest + local backup. It's just that I seem to have a specific problem with backblaze that I'd like to resolve. It depends on what kind of risks you are trying to mitigate, I’ll admit I haven’t looked at Dropbox for a while but last time I did it was very much like onedrive & google drive which are file sync mechanisms with versioning & cloud storage.
This means they work very well with keeping a copy of your data of site & in sync on multiple systems if you wish & accidental deletion/file corruption is also easy to recover from with the versioning aspect.
Where they are less able is the maleware/ransomware attacks, this is where a device becomes compromised & then your data is infected & subsequently encrypted effectively locking you out of your data, at this point you’d say great I’ll restore from my backup & that works well until you are locked out again because the files you restored were already infected just not encrypted, so you restore again but not from the live ‘backup’ but a earlier version & find the same thing happening again.
This is because now days the creators of said maleware/ransomware are aware of online backups with versioning & infect the data then make numerous small changes to files so that they ‘use up’ the versions of a file meaning whatever version you restore it’s already compromised.
In a ideal world you’d mix something like Dropbox/onedrive/google drive with something like backblaze / arcronis or another true backup product.
Set up monthly or weekly these give real point in time restore points rather than simple versioning.
This might explain more.
https://youtu.be/RB4kwfY2w7A
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