Home Networked Storage Setup - Your Recommendations

Hi all,

I'm new to the forums, I hope you guys can help me out here . I did a search and didn't really find information specific to what I was looking for, but if you know of a thread that can help then feel free to point me in that direction.

I'm looking for a storage solution that meets the following needs:

1. Automatic backups or safety against hardware failure, e.g. mirrored drives
2. Networked, e.g. accessible from any device in my home (I'll worry about mapping drives, etc.)
3. Power-friendly and easy on the mechanical parts. For example, drive(s) turn off when not in use, but no need for manual activation (i.e. I don't want to flip a switch every time I want to access it). This minimizes power use when I'm out of the house or sleeping (the majority of the day) and minimizes wear and tear on the drives themselves, for longer lifespan.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions, I would love to hear them. Feel free to get technical, I'll do my best to follow along! Thanks for your time!

 

I suppose I should also clarify what I plan to use the drive for... it will be used for storing all kinds of data -- documents, media, etc., and will be used as an archive for older data and backups, e.g. RAW/uncompressed photos/videos, software backups, and so forth.

 

Too many variables. I use a pocket drive to keep stuff on in case I cannot connect to my box.com cloud storage space. You really do not want to put all of your eggs in one basket, when it comes to backups, and also do not want to backup stuff that is not needed to be.

 

I will likely be backing up online as well, at least for items that are sensitive or important enough that need to be. But for everyday use, I would like to find a local/in-home solution as I described.

 

Pocket drive if you want them on something portable. Backing up daily for home use is non-necessary. If for a business, you would use something like Iron Mountain backup solutions for offsite data storage, and a NAS for in house storage, along with tape or DVD or Blu-Ray backups.

In all reality, if doing just updates on say a spreadsheet, use something like Box.com or Dropbox. I personally like box.com since it has various apps that allow integration of Windows, and if you upgrade to the next package, you can use WebDav or FTP for backups and file lookup.

I keep no personal files on my computers, everything as I stated before is on a 1TB pocket drive & in my box.com account. If I need another copy somewhere else, I also have a dropbox, google drive, Skydrive, Ubuntu One, iCloud. Pretty much covered every base out there for options.

It just gets to the point that some take it too far for backup, thinking that just like their paper stuff, they need to keep it forever. Set a limit on how long you keep stuff, otherwise your back up will grow exponentially larger than you expect over time.