Backup strategies for large DV drives

[Crocuta]

If you saw my last topic, you'll understand why this one bears on my mind. Having just (probably) lost all of my DV projects in progress due to a hard drive crash, I'm going back in my mind to figure out how I could have backed up such massive amounts of data. I mean, if money were no object sure, but money is an object to me. I could barely afford the large Maxtor 5000DV external drive that died and buying two of them was out of the question. I do put finished projects back on DV tape and I always keep important original footage (but not casual stuff), but that's clearly not sufficient. And my digital stills are easy since I can fit tons of even original TIFFs on a DVD.

So I'm just wondering what everyone else does for back up solutions for their digital video. I've put together a little poll that I thought might be interesting and I also welcome any comments and / or solutions.

[Jason Dunn]

I wish I could say that I backed up my works in progress, but the truth is that I don't. I keep my MiniDV tapes with the raw footage until I'm done my edits, I usually print it back out to tape if it's important. But in terms of backing up the project while I'm working on it....nope, I don't do that. And I really should.

I think an external HD would be the best solution - relatively cheap, fast, and simple to implement.

[Crocuta]

I wish I could say that I backed up my works in progress, but the truth is that I don't. I keep my MiniDV tapes with the raw footage until I'm done my edits, I usually print it back out to tape if it's important. But in terms of backing up the project while I'm working on it....nope, I don't do that. And I really should.

I think an external HD would be the best solution - relatively cheap, fast, and simple to implement.

That's how I was doing it too, but this experience has changed my mind big time. I really dodged a bullet and have decided I'll go ahead and buy a large (say 160GB or so) internal ATA drive. I've always used the Maxtor for direct capture, but when my replacement arrives from Maxtor, I think I'll use it just as a backup drive.

I backup my work files daily with three copies: one each on my work and home computers and one on the portable hard drive that I use to synchronize them. I am extremely careful of the work from which I make my living, but I always considered my DV hobby files to be less than life-and-death. Once faced with losing them, though, I re-evaluated the cost of going back, to original source on tape and losing all the editing I'd done for months. From now on, I shall have my DV files in at least two places.