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Backblaze question

mrs2a50

mrs2a50

Pretty much the best.ever.
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Jenn's thread about EHDs and storage got me looking into online back up, and I have a question (probably several, but this is the main one): Everyone keeps talking about automatic scheduled back ups of your computer. What if I don't want that, and I just want to manually plug in a EHD and have backblaze back THAT up when it's convenient? Is that doable? Basically use backblaze as an offsite EHD, if you will? I keep my laptop pretty cleaned off, and my main concern is more my photos and digital kits.
 
Yes, it will do that but I believe backblazes rule is that you'd have to plug in your EHD at least once every 30 days to be scanned or else it will drop all the files from that drive from your backup pool.
 
The thing with backblaze is that it just automatically backs up your computer because they say it's easier to back up everything than to remember exactly which folders/files you want to back up. They're afraid that we, its users, will forget something important. Anyway, you can have it also back up an EHD, but I don't think there's a way to NOT back up your computer. You could try to tell it not to back up your C: drive but IDK if that'd work and I can't try it for you since I have it back up mine and I don't want to mess with that lol! I figure I pay $5 per month no matter how much it backs up, so why not have it back up (most) of my laptop [I do have some exclusions set up]? Like you, I'm more worried about my EHD being backed up. It's quite simple to do: there are instructions on the website to include your EHD. For me and my laptop, BB is to back up the pics and DS stuff not yet moved to my EHD. It gives me a stop-gap, if you will, until I back things up onto my EHDs, which I try to do once a month.
 
You can choose what you wanted backed up. Take off certain files and such. I only have it do documents on my puter, and then my whole ehd. It is faster for backup this way also.
my ehd is plugged in all the time.
btw
I lost an ehd and in 2 days I had a returnable ehd in my mailbox. I am a lover of Backblaze.
 
I have it set for Auto backups because like Sara mentioned - it scans and just identifies the new stuff that way. There are options for continuous versus scheduled back ups - you can pick what works for you. I couldn't find anything about the 30 day use it or lose thing that @MrsEm is mentioning but I haven't dug deep enough into the whole rules and regulations thing w/Back Blaze. I'm brand new to it. I just like the fact that although I try to move things to EHDs and mirror them (which for me clearly isn't a perfect system, ugh), now I also have BackBlaze in case something happens to any of my EHDs individually or knock on wood, my home and everything in my home.
 
So, my EHD is portable, so I would have to plug it in and do a manual back up. Which I'm fine with. I don't have an issue with doing it, it's more to have an offsite location as my second back up, instead of having two EHDs.
 
jenn mccabe said:
I have it set for Auto backups because like Sara mentioned - it scans and just identifies the new stuff that way. There are options for continuous versus scheduled back ups - you can pick what works for you. I couldn't find anything about the 30 day use it or lose thing that @MrsEm is mentioning but I haven't dug deep enough into the whole rules and regulations thing w/Back Blaze. I'm brand new to it. I just like the fact that although I try to move things to EHDs and mirror them (which for me clearly isn't a perfect system, ugh), now I also have BackBlaze in case something happens to any of my EHDs individually or knock on wood, my home and everything in my home.
Click to expand...

This would just be an added bonus, but yes, very helpful just in case!
 
I guess my question is more "Can I also manually do an EHD, in addition to an auto back up of my computer?"
 
mrs2a50 said:
I guess my question is more "Can I also manually do an EHD, in addition to an auto back up of my computer?"
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this is the screen to choose your schedule - it's continuous or manual - not both.
bb.jpg

BUT ...here's the screen where you select your drives:
bb2.jpg

So if your EHD isn't plugged in all the time it won't/can't scan it all the time. Or you can simply uncheck it. ***I don't know how that plays with dropping/backing up files though.

I'd go for the trial if I were you ... I think they have chat help available too. The customer service might be the best to handle your specific set up needs. I love it so far though. $5 a month - it's so worth it! (you pay for the full year at once - but it comes out to $5 a month -it's a crazy good deal!)
 
If you have "continuous" selected but don't keep your EHD plugged in, then BB will just start backing it up once you plug it in. (well, give it about 15 min to do a scan and recognize that it's plugged in.) That's what I do cuz "manual" wasn't working for me. For some reason BB stopped backing up even when I clicked Backup. It was weird, but the issue resolved by selecting Continuous so NBD.

@jenn mccabe I do have experience with what happens if you don't plug it in every 30 days: BB deletes EVERYTHING. I had plugged it in but I hadn't left it in long enough for a scan to commence and recognize it was there. You can set up email reminders, which I'd done, but it doesn't send you a second email stating "seriously, where's your EHD?" so once I got the email and plugged it in after 14 days, I thought I was okay.
 
Tree City said:
If you have "continuous" selected but don't keep your EHD plugged in, then BB will just start backing it up once you plug it in. (well, give it about 15 min to do a scan and recognize that it's plugged in.) That's what I do cuz "manual" wasn't working for me. For some reason BB stopped backing up even when I clicked Backup. It was weird, but the issue resolved by selecting Continuous so NBD.

@jenn mccabe I do have experience with what happens if you don't plug it in every 30 days: BB deletes EVERYTHING. I had plugged it in but I hadn't left it in long enough for a scan to commence and recognize it was there. You can set up email reminders, which I'd done, but it doesn't send you a second email stating "seriously, where's your EHD?" so once I got the email and plugged it in after 14 days, I thought I was okay.
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YIKES, Not crazy about that! They don't advertise that part either. I tried looking for that kind of info on the site - since you and Emma brought it up - but couldn't come up with anything.

But - I'm keeping everything plugged in and on continuous so I should be OK.
 
jenn mccabe said:
I couldn't find anything about the 30 day use it or lose thing that @MrsEm is mentioning but I haven't dug deep enough into the whole rules and regulations thing w/Back Blaze.
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It used to be on the front page :-) Looks like it moved to a different page - Backing Up External Hard Drives.

"Deleted Files
Backblaze will keep versions of a file that changes for up to 30 days. However, Backblaze is not designed as an additional storage system when you run out of space. Backblaze mirrors your drive. If you delete your data, it will be deleted from Backblaze after 30 days.

Disconnected External Hard Drives
Your external hard drives need to be connected to your computer and scanned by Backblaze at least once every 30 days in order to keep them backed up."

jenn mccabe said:
So if your EHD isn't plugged in all the time it won't/can't scan it all the time. Or you can simply uncheck it. ***I don't know how that plays with dropping/backing up files though.
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I do this often actually. Backblaze will back it up like Sara said - when you plug it in, after about 15 minutes or so. You can force it to scan by holding in ctrl (on PC) and clicking the Restore Options button. Then it will scan.

Tree City said:
You can set up email reminders, which I'd done, but it doesn't send you a second email stating "seriously, where's your EHD?" so once I got the email and plugged it in after 14 days, I thought I was okay
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Um, weird. I have mine set up to email me, and it sends me one at 14 days, 21 days, and 28 days.
 
mrs2a50 said:
Basically use backblaze as an offsite EHD, if you will? I keep my laptop pretty cleaned off, and my main concern is more my photos and digital kits.
Click to expand...
So, you got pretty good advice above.
I would add to it that I think it would work just fine for your intent, as long as you know that Backblaze mirrors what you have. So, it will work as an offsite EHD backup, but it you delete everything on the EHD, then Backblaze will delete it too. It's not Cloud storage or Cloud Sync, like Dropbox, Google Drive, or Amazon S3.
I used to only backup my Downloads folders on my computer, and then my EHD because I kept nothing on that crappy laptop.
 
Tree City said:
so once I got the email and plugged it in after 14 days, I thought I was okay.
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When I want to double check, I log into the website and make sure it's acknowledged my drives. It's pretty fast, although I usually only worry about it when I get the 28 day email!
 
@bestcee I thought I was signed up for those same emails but I only got the 14 day one. I checked that BB knew the drive was plugged in (the little check mark by the drive name) and then I didn't worry. I figured everything was fine. But I should have checked the website to check that "Last updated" date.

Or maybe I'm wrong and something else happened. I'm no IT expert lol but that's my experience and I find it so weird. I still like BB but I'm just much more careful now.
 
bestcee said:
So, you got pretty good advice above.
I would add to it that I think it would work just fine for your intent, as long as you know that Backblaze mirrors what you have. So, it will work as an offsite EHD backup, but it you delete everything on the EHD, then Backblaze will delete it too. It's not Cloud storage or Cloud Sync, like Dropbox, Google Drive, or Amazon S3.
I used to only backup my Downloads folders on my computer, and then my EHD because I kept nothing on that crappy laptop.
Click to expand...

Yep, I am okay with this. I've never "timed" it, but I don't think I've ever gone more than 30 days without moving photos and recently purchased kits to my EHD. What I DO like about BB is that I could also use it to back up my laptop, which I don't currently do. An added piece of security if you will. I may give the free trial a shot and see if I like it.
 
EHStudios said:
*goal for myself*

FINALLY do an online backup thing!

This thread makes it sound easier. And I thought it was more expensive, so I put it off.
Click to expand...

its worth it’s weight in gold to be honest. The initial back up takes time but as long as your computer is on and online the back up will be uploading behind the scenes
 
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