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My girlfriend has one of these, ethernet-connected to her router and thus available on her home network.  However, in order for any computer, Windows or Mac (what about linux?) to access it, it is necessary (aside from any hacky-workarounds that may possibly exist) to install the Iomega Home Storage Manager.   This makes volume(s) offered by the NAS appear, on the Mac in Finder under SHARED, or on a Windows machine as additional drive letter(s).

To acquire the Iomega Home Storage Manager, go to https://iomega-eu-en.custhelp.com/app/platform/p/1031,1043 or else try https://iomega-eu-en.custhelp.com/ and click on [Desktop Network Storage > Home Media Network Hard Drive].  May need to establish and login-to an iomega support account (free) first.

I wondered at first about enabling the NAS as a Mac OS Time Machine (backup) disk.  An iomega article I saw suggested that should be possible, for iomega firmware 2.0 and above.  But the disk as it stands is NTFS-formatted - because when it was set up we had only Windows machines.  Now that disk contains much material in that NTFS.  I guess it might be possible to partrition the disk e.g. to keep the existing NTFS and add alongside it a HFS+ partition for Time Machine to use.  But it’s guesswork that carries risks (of disruption/damage to existing contents).  We want an easy geeking-minimal life, so maybe better to repurpose that NAS and get a purpose-made Apple Time Capsule instead. Either way, the evening wears on, so I’ll shelve that idea/investigation for now…

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Carbonite was drawn to my attention by a colleague, Mr. True, while we were discussing cloud-based services.

So here I just web-trawled a little. From that, it sounds like:

• One must be wary of the “small print” about throttling.
  • Then again could anyone reasonably expect massive video file type storage for such a low price?
• One alternative is Mozy
  • Some people find this better in terms of bandwidth,  service level and applications quality
  • It has apps for both iphone and android.

http://www.carbonite.co.uk/company

• Carbonite automatically backs up new and changed files. You don’t have to do anything
• One of Carbonite’s key advantages is offering unlimited backup for one fixed price
  • e.g. £41.95 / Year
• PC & Mac
• Carbonite for iPhone allows you to browse and share files from your iPhone.
• Carbonite uses the same technology as banks to encrypt your data making it completely secure so only you can ever see it.
• We have our own data centers where the the disk arrays are far more reliable than your computer’s hard drive.
• Limitations?
  • “Bandwidth throttling - Yes (35GB, 200GB)” (?)
  • “Default max file size” (?)

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r22910253-Rant-Carbonite-Backup-is-not-unlimited-as-they-claim

• 2009-08-23, thedragonmas:
  • I have used both Carbonite and MOZY. I had Carbonite for 2+ years, worked as advertised, had over 450 gigs backed up no problem, always maxed out my connection. However, problem came from their client, which is a buggy piece of shit.
  • Switched to mozy, managed to re-back up all 450 gigs in 2 months using my Sprint EVDO Cellular (I get awesome speeds on my data card!).
  • Real problem with Carbonite is, when you select to backup “Everything” it in fact, does NOT backup everything. Such as video files, files over a certain gig size and what not, which will then need to be done manually.
    With MOZY, when I told it to backup EVERYTHING, it DID BACKUP EVERYTHING!
  • I am now a happy MOZY Customer. I am now pushing over 1tb of backed up data.
  • Only problem I have now, is if I need to restore my data, you get 30 days to restore your data before it is removed from their servers, and my present internet connection, that is not possible
•  2009-09-11, Kramer:
  •  I was uploading about 5GB/day for the first 50GB or so and then was throttled back significantly after that.

Want a mobile “suitcase” editing system, something more (and more expandable) than a laptop but not too expensive.  Primarily to be used for Adobe CS5.5 for media enhancement / editing / compositing etc.

Nearest I found was NextDimension’s range around $7000 I think (but just guesswork - could be way off - would need to get a quote).   That would (if true) be around £4500 at current rates.  Plus import…  NextDimension call such machines “flextops” (Maybe they coined the term? Google searches on it mostly come up with them.)

Apart from the (mil/broadcast-lite but me-heavy) price, it might possibly be undesirably heavy to lug around much.   If so (just guessing, not assuming), it would make more sense to go for a modular quick-setup system.  So, starting to “think different” in this direction:

• Standard tower, capable of taking new CUDA etc. graphics cards etc. as they emerge, but no need for more than say a couple of disks, maybe if SSD could even get away with just a single disk? (For system and media - inadvisable for traditional disks of course, what about for SSD’s?  I have much to learn about SSD’s though).
• “Laptop-Lite” to talk to it.  With robust shuttered-stereoscopic HD monitor.
• Gigabit network to NAS fast storage (SSD and/or RAID ?).

Maybe in that case it would be far more logical/affordable to use an existing laptop as a client working together with a luggable tower server, sufficiently light and robust for frequent dis/re -connection and travel.  And remote access of course (no heavy data to be exchanged, assume that’s already sync’d).  And some means to easily swap/sync applications and projects (data) between laptop and tower, giving the option to use just the (old) laptop on its own if needed.  All such options are handy for the travelling dude (working on train, social visits etc.) who also occasionally has to do heavy processing.  Then would just need a protective suitcase for the tower, plus another one for a decent monitor for grading etc.

I certainly won’t be spending anything just yet, but it’s good to have at least some kind of “radar”.

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I’ve been using Winclone, a Mac OS app, to back-up my Boot Camp - Windows 7 partition onto a HFS+ (Mac OS compatible) external disk drive.  However tonight it failed, early in the attempt, repeatedly.  Also when I asked it to look for updates, it failed to connect to the internet, whereas I could access websites OK over Safari.  Searching round, I found a later version, downloaded it, deleted the existing one (2.2) and installed the new one (2.3).

The new one similarly failed to access the internet.  On the other hand it did not fail early on in the process.  I aborted it anyhow, for reasons that will become clear (below).

Web-Search:

• Google: [winclone alternative]
  • Several posts stated:
    • Mixed experiences when using Winclone under Snow Leopard and the impossibility of using it (straight) under Lion)
    • To minimise problems under Snow Leopard, [Compressed] should be disabled.  Also select [.dmg] format.
    • This product (Winclone) was no longer being developed
  • Best Example:
    • http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1046365
      • Link to further information: http://www.google.com/search?q=http://twocanoes.com/discontinued/winclone/slwin7.html+site:forums.macrumors.com
      • <<I suspect that a big part of the change may actually be changes to hdiutil in the point releases of OS X that have been released since the Winclone authors posted their suggestion due to an uproar of issues in their forums. (Winclone is really just a GUI front end for hdituil, ntfsclone, and other tools>>
      • The “Demi-God (Moderator)”, balamw, indicated he might possibly develop a follow-on product.

I’m doing a tidy-up of the MacBook. The application [Disk Inventory] revealed that one of my largest disk-occupying items is MobileSync Backups, which I assume to be from synchronizing iPhone with MacBook.  It consists of several roughly equally-sized files.  Overall I wonder:

• Is there a way to store the backups somewhere else than the system disk?
• Do the  ”several roughly equally-sized files” imply I have more than one backup on the disk (in which case I’d like to purge all but the most recent).

Google: [mobilesync backup files]

• https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2617941?start=0&tstart=0
  •  how to move MobileSync backup folder?
• http://www.techzilo.com/save-disk-space-delete-old-iphone-ipod-touch-backups/
  • Save disk space by deleting old iPhone/iPod Touch backups
• http://www.appleexaminer.com/iPhoneiPad/iPhoneBackup/iPhoneBackup.html
  • Processing iPhone / iPod Touch Backup Files on a Computer
  • (What’s inside the files etc.)

Backup & Restore via Disk Utility (DU) - on Mac OS install-disk - to a fresh hard-drive:

1. Routine: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1553
2. Complication: Backed-up not the whole disk but aMac OS partition alongside a Boot Camp partition.

• DU restores the partition (as a sole partition) but it won’t boot.
• Try install fresh OS X from install-dvd, then use it to create Boot Camp partition (and presumably boot-selection menu) then restore (with erase) to the OS X partition (only).  To save time (hopefully), didn’t actually install Windows.
  • Both the fresh-install and the restoration of OS X took about an hour.
  • Yes it worked! Booted into Mac OS just fine.
  • Left it to “settle” a bit - e.g. until CPU level down around zero.
  • Restart in Shift-Boot mode (to refresh OS’s tables etc.) and log-in as “DefaultEverything” (dummy user created as per advice - I think from Larry Jordan).  Maybe should have done that the first time…
  • Restarted in normal user account, again left awhile.
  • Started WinClone (App, started from MacOS)
    • It appeared to first scan the backup then began to install it.  Not quick, maybe an hour for each of these (two) tasks.
    • Source partition was 232.57 GB - as compared to the destination partition of around 250 GB.
  • Alt-Booted into W7 just fine.
  • Being on the internet, it began downloading numerous system updates - furiously (like it was hard to web-browse even on another computer on the network.
  • Correspondingly, on ShutDown, W7 installed numerous (61) updates.  Took ages - so if ever repeating such a recovery, allow for this…
  • Also on subsequent start-up, updating & registering stuff - took a few minutes - wish I’d run it straight (boot camp) not within Parallels.  But it seemed “happy”.
  • (to be continued…)

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http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/final-cut-suite/125182-how-update-your-os-apps-properly-save-your-system.html

A physical DVD could be played but not copied, despite attempts on multiple computers (each with own drive).  The main VOB file was corrupted.  The disk appeared to the eye to be in good condition.  Wanted to copy a repaired version of that file, maybe with gaps or truncations, whatever could be salvaged.  Workaround was to do a ‘dd’.  That’s a unix command to “convert and copy a file”.  Mac OS X is based on a variant of unix, so chose to execute it from there.  The successful command was as follows:

• dd if=/Volumes/’DVD VR’/VIDEO_TS/VTS_01_1.VOB of=tmp/vts_01_1.vob conv=noerror

Prior to this, naively-and-unsuccessfully tried Windows 7 PowerShell (PS) ‘cp’ command with ‘-Force’ option, but that was “barking up the wrong tree”.  An alternative suggestion, not attempted, was to use a streaming video processor such as VirtualDub. (more…)

Looks like I’ve evolved a hybrid system:

1. Proper backup / synch tool: SuperFlexibleFileSynchronizer (abbrev to “SuperFlex”).
2. Procedural with lower-level tools: File drag-copy combined with MD5Summer.

The idea is that normally I would use SuperFlex, but for occasions where I already have manually-created (supposed) mirrors, I can retrospectively check consistency at content (not just datetime and size) level.  Have yet to experiment with SuperFlex to see if it can verify existing copies of files (as opposed to copies that it is making).

I was looking for an app to assist in synchronizing of copies of file systems, for example main and back-up copies.  I chose a good-looking application available for both Windows and Mac:

•  Super Flexible File Synchronizer [http://www.superflexible.com]

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