At 8:19 PM -0800 12/6/2008, John Hokanson wrote:
>I need to start backing up some stuff on my Indigo Blue iMac. Not a 
>total hard drive backup, but something more along the lines of 
>backing up documents, music, and certain downloaded programs.

How much data?

>Ploblem is that it doesn't have Firewire or an internal CD-R, so my 
>options are limited. I've been weighing the pros and cons of every 
>solution and have settled on three options:
>
>1. Zip Drive (100 or 250MB)
>2. SuperDisk Drive (120 MB)
>3. External CD-R(W) using USB 1.1 Bus (650+ MB)

4) An external HD.

>I'm loathe to shell out for the CD-R(W), because eventually I'll be
>trading in this iMac for something that has Firewire, and I'll get a
>full blown external DVD-RW setup then.

Choices 1 and 2 are obsolete technology; a waste of $.

Choice 3 is ok, but as you mention - obsolete when you upgrade the machine.

So do the external drive.  Yea, it will be slow at USB 1.1, but who 
cares - just let the backup run in the background, or go get dinner. 
Given the Xmas sale prices, they're quite inexpensive.  For a few 
bucks more you could pop for one that has both USB and FW - then it 
will be useful for your newer machine.

Use an app like SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner to make a full backup. 
Then set it up to do appropriate incrementals daily or weekly.... 
Very easy.  Very reliable.  And a bootable FULL backup is a heck of 
lot more useful than a piecemeal solution.

FWIW, my full backup, over USB 1.1, to an external La Cie d2 Quadra, 
took all night; 40+ GB.  But my daily (scheduled) incremental backup 
take less than 45 minutes.  I'm a bit paranoid, so I quit my email 
app and dismount my encrypted disk images (dmg) before letting the 
backup run.  Other than that, it just runs happily in the background. 
This on my 300-MHz Smurf, Tiger, CarbonCopyCloner.

HTH,
- Dan.
-- 
- Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth

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