----- Original Message ----- From: "Neon John" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement" <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, August 26, 2008 1:10 PM Subject: Re: [time-nuts] While we're discussing backups...
> On Tue, 26 Aug 2008 03:34:11 +0000, Mark Sims <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> >>Pointless overkill? Ask those people in New Orleans what happens when >>originals and backups are kept in the same city. I know of several (ex) >>businesses that wisely kept their backups in different buildings there... >>all were lost. >> >>Ask my friends in Jarrell, Texas (or what's left of them after a tornado >>leveled the city)... one friend kept backups at his and his parent's >>house... a lifetime's work lost... not to mention a lot of friends and >>family. >> >>All legitimate disaster plans specify that backups (and contingency >>operating sites) are not to be kept in the same geographic area. Failure >>to do so in a corporate setting would expose you to major liability >>claims. > > It's a big old world out there and if you look hard enough, you can find > something to justify most any plan, regardless of how outrageous, if a > single > occurance is acceptable justification. Of course, by that standard we all > should walk around wearing Kevlar helmets. After all, there has been a > single > instance of someone being hit by a meteorite in recorded history. > > If I'd lived and operated a data center in NO even before Katrina, I'd > have > considered flooding to be a high percentage risk and done something > appropriate about it. If I lived in the high desert, I'd not worry too > much > about flooding. > > The silliness in your "advice" is that you offered up one of the most > extreme > "solutions" as generic advice and said that anything less was no backup at > all > or something to that effect even though you don't know my or any other > list > member's circumstances. Let's see how your advice and its associate > expense > fits my situation since I'm the one you replied to. > > I'm retired so total loss of my data would have no financial impact. A > huge > sentimental and legacy impact, in terms of both my writings, designs and > digital photos. Interestingly enough, all those types of data are backed > up > multiple ways including on a set of DVDs resting in a friend's safe who > lives > a few miles away. My past design work is completely static, my photos > mostly > static and my writings a little less static so updates to that collection > need > be done only a couple of times a year. They'd only be needed if my cabin > and > its contents suddenly and completely disappeared somehow. > > I live in a cabin on gentle sloping ground about 200 feet above the > Tellico > river. Short of The Great Flood 2.0, water on the ground cannot reach my > place. Period. That takes NO-style flooding off the table. The basement > of > my cabin sits on bedrock. The combination of the gradual slope and the > mere > skim of topsoil takes land slides off the table. > > In my basement there is one of the largest gun safes made, one that I can > stand up in. It is set through the concrete block wall, back into the > soil > bank behind my cabin so that the door is flush with the wall. In other > words, > like a vault. The safe itself weighs about 2 tons. The bottom few inches > are > filled with another ton of concrete and the foot of the safe is embedded > in > about 3 yards of steel-reinforced concrete, some of the steel welded to > the > safe's body. > > The lockworks are US government crypto-certified. I paid a bunch extra > for > that quality of lockwork. The combination lock is a Sergent and Green > crypto-grade unit and the key lock is a Medico high security one. Both > locks > must be manipulated to open the safe. Inside the safe is another smaller > "valuables" safe, also secured with a S&G crypto-grade combo lock. It was > intended for jewelry but I use it for backup media storage. > > Even sitting in the open it has the highest UL fire rating available. Set > back in the dirt bank, it is impervious to fire. The safe is both alarmed > and > booby-trapped. > > (certain immaterial-to-this-discussion have been changed for obvious > reasons.) > > I installed this safe years ago when I traveled a lot to protect my gun > collection. It makes a damned fine data safe. So let's evaluate the > risks > > Risk Covered? > Fire check > Earthquake check > general flood NA > local flood check* > explosion check > land slide NA > B&E check** > Tornado check > Riot check > Nuclear attack check*** > Nosey neighbors check > > * broken water pipe, etc. The basement is drained by gravity plus my > alarm > system has a leak detection facility that kills power to my well pump. > ** adding to my protection against breaking and entering are all my > heavily > armed and dangerous neighbors. We put teeth in the term "Neighborhood > Watch". > *** of any nearby strategic target such as Oak Ridge. Can't imagine > anyone > nuking Tellico Plains :-) Even if they did, I'm still 25 miles and a > mountain > range away. > > My lights-out server sits inside the safe with the power and ethernet > cables > brought out through suitable secure penetrations. I put the server in the > safe after the experience of a previous fire. My backups were good but > the > hassle, time and cost involved in setting up a new server made using > available > space in the safe for this one a no-brainer. > > Also sitting in the safe is another laptop just like this one. I stay on > the > trailing edge of technology so buying a second one cost me almost nothing. > This totally eliminates the risk of even an hour of down-time if I break > this > laptop or it just quits. I swap them occasionally to equalize the wear > and > tear and to keep the capacitors in the power supply well-formed. > > There is a small CO2 cylinder in the back of the safe equipped with a > spring > loaded, solenoid tripped valve. The valve came directly out of an Ansul > automatic fire protection system. If triggered by an external thermal > rate-of-rise Fenwal switch, it provides a steady flow of inerting gas, > good > for a couple of hours. > > This setup is a lessons-learned from my house fire when steam and acidic > smoke > got past the "air tight" gun safe seal and damaged thousands of dollars > worth > of guns, even before the fire was completely out. I had the safe open > even > while the firemen were watering hot spots and my guns were already > corroding. > Insurance paid OK but some of the guns were literally irreplaceable so I > still > suffered great loss. > > Ansul systems can't be reused so the valve setup is a throw-away item at > most > any used restaurant supply company. The CO2 bottle is an off-the-shelf 20 > lb > soft drink dispenser cylinder. > > So. Given my setup, tell me what risk I'm exposed to that would make > shipping > backup media a hundred miles away and paying someone to store them make > economic sense? I think that I have a very well thought-out and complete > data > security system but I'm always open to second opinions. > > John > -- > John De Armond "tell me what risk I'm exposed to" An angry wife ! _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
