Recommended Blu-Ray software for backing up, then restoring an HD.

[Hotobu]

I've got several HDs that I want to prepare for a RAID array, so I want to format them first. Before I do this I'd like to backup the data. Basically what I'm looking for is a program where I can drag and drop several TB of data and have the program automatically organize the data and then span that data across several BD disks. After setting up the RAID array I'd like to be able to insert the disks in sequence and have the program restore the data back to its original file structure.

I'm almost positive Nero ver. 157 does this, and I can probably get a copy of that easily, but are there any other programs people would recommend?

 

[Peter1986C]

Hell why would one waste money on buying and burning Blu-ray disks while an external HDD is probably cheaper and also way more reliable? If your burner misburns a disk you will loose data.

 

[Hotobu]

Hell why would one waste money on buying and burning Blu-ray disks while an external HDD is probably cheaper and also way more reliable? If your burner misburns a disk you will loose data.

Nothing about this post makes any sense. A 30 pack of BDs is about 30 dollars which comes to ~7.5TB. Show me where I can get this much data in an HDD for that price and I'll buy it. Also if the burner misburns a disk... you can... wait for it burn it again. There's also such a thing as checking the data to make sure it burned correctly.

 

[digibucc]

i initially thought the same as chevlr1c, it seems blu ray media has dropped
ENORMOUSLY in the past year. a 30 pack couldn't be had for less than $110
last i looked, and in that case he would be right.

but that's no longer the case. as for a backup/burning software , i have always used
ghost and the new version advertises blu ray compatibility. Norton Ghost.

I don't know of a free piece of software that both images AND burns to blu-ray at the same time.

if you count the price of the software, and how much more time consuming burning so many blu-ray discs will
be, i would still go for the hard drive route. a $75-$100 2tb hdd gives you similar space, and it is much , MUCH
faster to just copy to a hard drive than to burn blu rays. it's insane how much faster. blu rays are big but slow.

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

i initially thought the same as chevlr1c, it seems blu ray media has dropped
ENORMOUSLY in the past year. a 30 pack couldn't be had for less than $110
last i looked, and in that case he would be right.

but that's no longer the case. as for a backup/burning software , i have always used
ghost and the new version advertises blu ray compatibility. Norton Ghost.

I don't know of a free piece of software that both images AND burns to blu-ray at the same time.

if you count the price of the software, and how much more time consuming burning so many blu-ray discs will
be, i would still go for the hard drive route. a $75-$100 2tb hdd gives you similar space, and it is much , MUCH
faster to just copy to a hard drive than to burn blu rays. it's insane how much faster. blu rays are big but slow.

Second the entire sentiment. You can get a pack of cheap blu-rays for 30-40 USD, but they burn sooo slow. A 2 TB drive would provide both permanent backup, and a much much faster transfer.

If you're bent on blu-ray, Ghost is the only real option. Most backup utilities haven't yet gone blu-ray because of the initially high cost of the media. In 6 to 12 months blu-ray compatibility may well be a given, but right now it's the exception and not the rule.

 

[Hotobu]

I could do the HDD route, but with 4.5 TB of data. That's at least $150, compared to ~$20. Sure I'd get to keep the HD afterwards, but that's a big difference in price. Also saving the BDs would give me better piece of mind to set up a RAID0 array as opposed to RAID5, and any new data I'd just throw on some more BDs in the future, or I could still set up the RAID5, not put the data back on and just pop in the disks as necessary.

I'm not concerned at all with the amount of time, and I'd be more than happy to manually prepare the data and use free software.

 

[digibucc]

the issue with manual though, is you can't image the whole drive at once, as you don't have
the hdd space to hold it even temporarily. so without getting ghost or finding a free piece that
does both, you would be stuck with simply drag and dropping files to a burner software, which
will not preserve the structure needed to restore it to a working system.

if it's just backing up stuff like pics, vids, etc, that'll work. but if you are trying to image
a working system so that if it goes wrong you can just restore that image and have it work
again, that will not work with the drag and drop method.

 

[Hotobu]

No it's not intricately intertwined data like an OS. It's just JBOF(files) so drag and drop will definitely work. I just was looking for something a bit more automatic, and less manual.

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

Perhaps my math is incorrect, but here's what I am getting:
25 GB per disc (this is max possible, but just a thought exercise)
1000 GB per TB -> 40 Blu-ray discs per terrabyte
4.5 TB -> 180 Blu-ray discs

180 Blu-rays divided by 30 packs (cheapest per disc price I can find) -> 6 packs
30 dollars per pack -> $180

Cheapo 2TB HDD is 79.99 from newegg. 4 TB of storage (assuming you've got 500 GB elsewhere for temporary storage) -> $160

The $20 difference doesn't account for 500 GB, but a cheap 500 GB drive will cost less than the price difference and the discs you're likely to turn into coasters.


Am I making some sort of faulty assumption here, or is this correct?

 

[digibucc]

looks right to me, i should've done the math!

as for software than spans discs while burning,
i know nero and roxio software's do this, but free software idk.

a lot of burners come with nero though, so you may have a copy.
that would also be the easiest one to get a free version for, imo.

 

[Hotobu]

Yeah I'll stand corrected. I did 25 * 30 got 750 and somehow (don't know how) made that into 7.5TB. Maybe because I've been working with a lot of percentages lately 750 became 7.5 I dunno.

 

[Kreij]

You can set the hard disk (or use archive software) to compress the data too, so you would not need 4.5TB of space to store that you have collected (unless what you have won't compress much).