BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan
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@BBigford said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@Dashrender said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@scottalanmiller said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@BBigford said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@scottalanmiller said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@BBigford said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@Dashrender said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@BBigford said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@Dashrender said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
Depending on what you're backing up, how large your internet pipe is, etc - I'm not surprised it could take 8-24 (or way more) hours before the first backup shows up.
No no, it takes that long for EVERY backup (whether it is a new file or a change to an existing file) to show up. Have an old file opened and you just made a significant change to it? If your computer crashes within 8 hours of that time frame, your changes are all gone. Haven't closed the application in 4 days cause you always lock the PC? It's not backing up. That is straight from the horse's mouth.
Huh - again, not surprised on the open files not being backed up - do other desktop backup solutions backup open files? - are you sure?
But you're saying that once your computer sends a file to their servers, it takes their server 8 hours to make it available to you? or that your PC will only sync once every 8-24 hours?
They're not saying it takes 8-24 hours to be available, they're saying it could take 8-24 hours to upload.
Propagate would not be the term then. Propagate implies that it was uploaded somewhere and just isn't visible from all online nodes. 8+ hours to upload is what they would say. But that sounds fishy, they actually are waiting eight hours before considering uploading a file? I think that we need to double check that, that's very weird and does not mimic any behaviour that I have seen.
Maybe propagate isn't the right term. Double checking it though, I'd have to talk to someone else in the company cause everytime I chat them, I get the same Ryan. But there is no confusion there unless Ryan is the one who is confused because that is exactly how he described it.
Let's see if @aaron can shed some light on it. That BB just sits idle for eight hours waiting for your data to get old before uploading it seems crazy. Why would they have done that? I can't think of a reason why it would be good for them and it certainly is not good for you. Maybe I'm missing something, but this seems fishy. And if I kick off a backup, it backs things up right away. Just try installing a fresh OS and kick off a backup, it does stuff.
It's good for them, potentially, because it could save them bandwidth.
I'm guessing that's why they do that. Saves bandwidth, but at a high cost to the company paying for the service, if a PC goes down and the upload hasn't run yet. Pretty disappointing. Hoping @aaron might be able to explain cause BB chat (Ryan) was super clear on the matter.
How much would it save, though? It still needs to back up. Having a one time eight hour latency benefit would be absolutely trivial. The same total backup volume would be needed.
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Unless the goal is to avoid uploading lots of incremental changes on a single file?
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But here is what seems wrong... if editing a file causes it to be blocked from backing up for eight hours, imagine if someone had a heavily used file that is modified once every eight hours or more... it would literally be super critical and never eligible for backup whatsoever.
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Even if they didn't edit for eight hours, if they edited at the beginning of a shift and turned their computer off at the end of the day (a common scenario) you would still get a "never backed up" file, even though it had existed for years and was used every day.
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@aaron @BBigford
Hola! My name is Christopher and I am one of the senior support guys @ Backblaze. Just want to clarify a few points, as it seems there's a little confusion.
Under the "Continuous" backup schedule setting (the default), the Backblaze software will automatically index the computer for new or changed files roughly once every 1-2 hours, depending on the system configuration. Following the completion of each indexing cycle, the Backblaze software will upload all the new or changed files that were just indexed. Once a file has been uploaded, it can take 1-2 hours for the file to appear and be available for restore through the Backblaze website.
In regards to open files, this is generally not an issue unless the file has not actually been saved to disk OR the application locks or prevents other applications from reading the file on disk (like Outlook does, for example). So long as the Backblaze software has the ability to read the file, it should be able to be included in the following Backblaze backup. We do not support VSS/Shadowcopy.
It's likely worth noting that any time the computer is shutdown or asleep, neither the file indexing nor upload processes can run. The user's power settings and usage patterns may effect the frequency with which either the indexing or upload processes complete.
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@ChristopherBB Welcome to MangoLassi!!
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@ChristopherBB said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@aaron @BBigford
Under the "Continuous" backup schedule setting (the default), the Backblaze software will automatically index the computer for new or changed files roughly once every 1-2 hours, depending on the system configuration. Following the completion of each indexing cycle, the Backblaze software will upload all the new or changed files that were just indexed. Once a file has been uploaded, it can take 1-2 hours for the file to appear and be available for restore through the Backblaze website.
So, if I read this right.... with a 1-2 hour upload cycle and a 1-2 hour propagation cycle the results should be...
Zero to a little more than two hours before a file gets backed up (zero if it is saved and the run happens immediately, two hours plus if the file gets created the instant that the last run stops, the run is set to two hours and there is a bit to upload causing it to not be uploaded immediately.
And then one to two hours to propagate on the site.
So on the low end, a file can be created and be visible in as little as an hour and might have a reasonable upper bound of about 4.5 hours in extreme cases (not including systems turned off, offline, etc.)
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@scottalanmiller 100% correct!
PS. Thanks for the welcome!
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Can this delay in scanning for changes be eliminated or at least shortened.
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@scottalanmiller said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@ChristopherBB said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@aaron @BBigford
Under the "Continuous" backup schedule setting (the default), the Backblaze software will automatically index the computer for new or changed files roughly once every 1-2 hours, depending on the system configuration. Following the completion of each indexing cycle, the Backblaze software will upload all the new or changed files that were just indexed. Once a file has been uploaded, it can take 1-2 hours for the file to appear and be available for restore through the Backblaze website.
So, if I read this right.... with a 1-2 hour upload cycle and a 1-2 hour propagation cycle the results should be...
Zero to a little more than two hours before a file gets backed up (zero if it is saved and the run happens immediately, two hours plus if the file gets created the instant that the last run stops, the run is set to two hours and there is a bit to upload causing it to not be uploaded immediately.
<snip>This is the way CrashPlan works as well. In that you tell it to back up every X (default is 1, I think), and then it backs up any files that have changed.
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Question for @ChristopherBB -- Does the Backblaze backup client have the option to back up to a local drive or a USB drive as well as to your servers?
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@dafyre said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
Question for @ChristopherBB -- Does the Backblaze backup client have the option to back up to a local drive or a USB drive as well as to your servers?
If it does, that is very new.
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Hi.
I looked at CrashPlan and BackBlaze years ago.
CrashPlan, I dropped because of the requirement for Java on the end clients. It might be the most amazing tool in the world but Java sucks, so when choosing which to go for, I went with BackBlaze.
I've got people using the home & business backup of Backblaze, no problems or complaints so far. For 1-2 years now.
By default, the Backblaze client throttles it's own speed, but in the client you can turn off the throttle and let it use as much as you want if you prefer. So if speed of upload is a concern, have a look in the client settings.
@dafyre said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
Does the Backblaze backup client have the option to back up to a local drive or a USB drive as well as to your servers?
Nope, the BackBlaze client is there purely to upload & download from BackBlaze servers. Which I prefer because it means their focus is on making that feature work rather than other bits.
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@BBigford said
Prefer to leave your apps open, lock your computer, and go home for the weekend? No backup is taking place.
Don't machines get rebooted for patching & updates out of office hours?
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I wonder if @aaron and @ChristopherBB have relayed on the Java issue to BB? I'm sure product teams would love to hear that them avoiding Java and using a native tool set alone is a cause for customer acquisition. That's a metric or anecdote that they would love to have in their collection, I'm sure.
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@scottalanmiller said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
I wonder if @aaron and @ChristopherBB have relayed on the Java issue to BB? I'm sure product teams would love to hear that them avoiding Java and using a native tool set alone is a cause for customer acquisition. That's a metric or anecdote that they would love to have in their collection, I'm sure.
No no. They use it on their marketing already
https://www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup.html
Native Software
Java is responsible for 91%* of security attacks. Backblaze's code is native to Mac and PC and doesn't use Java.Do I want to support a company who does not use Java? Absolutely. Until CrashPlan changes their app, they won't get clients from my end.
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@Breffni-Potter BackBlaze seems to be better but I am sticking to CrashPlan due to the family plan. 10 computer for 13.99 is hard to beat.
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@aaronstuder said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@Breffni-Potter BackBlaze seems to be better but I am sticking to CrashPlan due to the family plan. 10 computer for 13.99 is hard to beat.
But I'd question why they are much cheaper than BackBlaze.
Either BackBlaze just want more money or CrashPlan are cutting corners somewhere.
For me, cloud backup is insurance against either my stupidity, theft/fire/flood. I prefer spending a bit more and not having to worry about it but to each their own.
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@Breffni-Potter said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@aaronstuder said in BackBlaze vs. CrashPlan:
@Breffni-Potter BackBlaze seems to be better but I am sticking to CrashPlan due to the family plan. 10 computer for 13.99 is hard to beat.
But I'd question why they are much cheaper than BackBlaze.
Either BackBlaze just want more money or CrashPlan are cutting corners somewhere.
For me, cloud backup is insurance against either my stupidity, theft/fire/flood. I prefer spending a bit more and not having to worry about it but to each their own.
Or CP has some brilliant means of making the backups cost less. I doubt that they do, just saying it's a possibility.
