[SOLVED] Overhead for backups

[Bongert]

I want to do a backup of my stuff using macrium reflect and saw the grandfather father son system recommended. Isnt that basically three different backups at the same time? wouldnt i then also need some storage space overhead? lets say i have 1TB and do a traditional 1:1 backup. then i have 2TB, two times 1TB. but when i do the GFS backup, would i end up with more than 2TB (it should be less than 3TB for the backups because they arent 1:1 copies as far as i know)? then i would need more space for my backups than my original files, basically requiring a certain amount of overhead, or am i misunderstanding this?

 

[USAFRet]

I want to do a backup of my stuff using macrium reflect and saw the grandfather father son system recommended. Isnt that basically three different backups at the same time? wouldnt i then also need some storage space overhead? lets say i have 1TB and do a traditional 1:1 backup. then i have 2TB, two times 1TB. but when i do the GFS backup, would i end up with more than 2TB (it should be less than 3TB for the backups because they arent 1:1 copies as far as i know)? then i would need more space for my backups than my original files, basically requiring a certain amount of overhead, or am i misunderstanding this?

Not necessarily.
Incremental or Differential backups are your friend.

A Full, followed by a rolling series of Incrementals or Differentials.

Plus, an Image in Macrium is NOT the full drive size, but only the data size. And even not all of that. It leaves off things that don't matter, like the pagefile and hibernbation file.
A 1TB drive, with 400GB actual consumed space, may only consume 350ish GB.

My system, all 7 drives (see list below)....
They total 4.5TB in capacity.
The folder containing the Full backup image and 30 days of Incrementals consumes ~ 3.3TB. Each physical drive in its own subfolder, on its own schedule.
Of course, the second copy of that consumes another 3.3TB, off in another storage space.

 

[jay32267]

In general it isn't bad to have more backup space then your main drive....that way you can have multiple backups...and hard drive space is pretty cheap these days.

What I do...is make an image of my main drive every so often (you can do this as often as you see necessary)....and save it to another drive. This way I can always go back. For instance...if a file gets corrupted...you can go back....if you get a virus....you can go back...if you install a driver that screws things up....you can go back...etc.

 

[USAFRet]

Drive space is cheap and replaceable.
Your data is not.

I could store a moths backups for all my house systems (3 desktops, 2 laptops), my grandkids PCs, my ex's....and not fill a single $140 8TB external HDD.