Using older hard drives your thoughts?

[pcdad]

I am adding hard drives to my desktop and wanted to get opinions on using older hard drives.

My OS and programs reside on a new Crucial 128GB M4.
As I don't understand RAID (one area that I haven't taken the time to read up on, I duplicate my storage on hard drives.

Here is how it will be configured:
HD Movies - Samsung 5400rpm 2TB drive - backup drive same (2nd 2TB drive)
HD TV - WD Caviar Black 7200rpm 1TB drive - backup drive same (2nd 1TB drive)
Music/Pictures/Encoded camcorder videos - Seagate 7200rpm 500MB drive (from my old laptop - need backup drive for this.
Other data - 120GB Seagate drive (from old laptop - backup drive is Seagate Momentus 5400rpm 160GB from another old laptop.

Are there any dangers with this setup? My primary concern is zero loss of data. That is why I duplicated everything.

 

[duxducis]

it's the best way to duplicate your data
I use bay like this for my setup 4x 2TB drives 2 backing up 2.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817993016
this allows only to turn on drives i need and when i need to back up.

then i just use software backup (like Allway Sync) to analyze and synk drives

Messing with raid is more dangerous, I would not recommend.

 

[skaz]

You've basically described a RAID1 set up. A RAID1 setup mirrors an exact copy of your data onto another drive.

The only danger I see with your set up if your main concern is zero data loss is that all the drives are installed in one computer. I assume this at least by your description. If that is the case its kind like putting all your eggs in one basket. This is dependent on your paranoia level though and how concerned you actually are with loosing your data. My recommendation would be to get an external device to back up some of your more important information. And then the next step would be to back up important data onto an external device in a different zip code. =)

 

[pcdad]

All drives are not in the tower. Actually, what I did in the past was to have one set of drives installed in my tower and one set is in a Mediasonic Probox 4 bay enclosure, backed up manually via esata cable.
That was a pain in the butt as I would manually drag and drop the file onto the backup.
Now that I have built a new pc, I would like to get a new USB 3.0 enclosure to do this. Unfortunately my current enclosure is only USB2.0 and is for 3.5" drives.
Paranoia? Well I would like to think of it as safe preservation of data... photos and video of the kids are irreplaceable. I like the separate copy so that it can be stored away from my desktop. More paraniod of a break-in than a fire I guess since the duplicate drives are still in the house.

 

[skaz]

Paranoia? Well I would like to think of it as safe preservation of data... photos and video of the kids are irreplaceable. I like the separate copy so that it can be stored away from my desktop. More paraniod of a break-in than a fire I guess since the duplicate drives are still in the house.

I wasn't calling you paranoid in a negative manner. I was basically trying to tell you that if you have a fear of loosing your data there are other options you can choose.

 

[pcdad]

I took it as you meant it skaz. I agree that it defeats the purpose of a backup if the backup resides in the same location. Now if only the price of hard drives would go back down.