3-2-1 Backup Strategy

To be safe backups should follow a 3-2-1 strategy:

  • Three copies of your data: Your three copies include your original or production data plus two more copies.
  • On two different media: You should store your data on two different forms of media.
  • One copy off-site: You should keep one copy of your data off-site in a remote location, ideally more than a few miles away from your other two copies.

The problem

I’ve been updating my backup strategy as I’m currently spending more than I want to be for my Backblaze B2 storage. It’s not their fault, they are excellent and I’m a very happy customer, but I have too much unimportant stuff kept there and want to fix it.

I’ve been keeping everything either on local hard drives or my Synology Diskstation which means there is loads of duplication, and for some reason the backup archive for my iMac has ballooned to 4TB.

The Plan

I’ve decided instead to have more stuff backed up to my own systems that are kept in two different locations, and only keep irreplaceable data on the cloud. As such I need to have three plans:

  • Irreplaceable Data - photos, documents, old music rips, taxes, financial information, etc.

  • Replaceable Data - everything else I want to keep, but can replace if needed.

  • Junk - all the downloads and temporary stuff that fills up hard drives

Irreplaceable Data

The primary storage will on my primary NAS server, with a mirror to another on-site server, and also to an offsite server. Additionally there will be a copy archived with Backblaze.

Nothing important will be on laptops or desktops.

Replaceable Data

This will only be on my primary NAS server, and the on-site and off-site servers, with nothing on Backblaze.

Junk

Can be on the primary server, but will ot be replicated any where else.

The Solution

I’ve built an additional server from a 1 unit rackmount server made by Supermicro. I purchased it from UnixSurplusCom. It has an Intel Xeon CPU, and 16GiB of memory, along with 4 drive bays. I purchased 4 x refurbished 12 TB WD Ultrastar drives from Server Part Deals. Total cost was about $600.

For an OS I am using Unraid which is an easy to use operating system that combines disks together to maximise storage capacity. With my 4 x 12TB drives I have 36TB of useable space. It also will run Docker for various services I’m planning on running.

I’m also building an old computer to be a server that will live in my office. It will have 4 x 4TB drives that I had spare. It will be running TrueNAS Scale and should have about 10TB of available storage. It will not be doing anything apart from be a backup target.

Everything will be connected together using Tailscale which lets me create a private, secure network that works across the internet.

The hardest part has been choosing what back up software to use…