I have started my own journey into Backblaze storage

No affiliation with any of the above, just a happy customer.

Awesome. Keep us updated on how it goes. 

I'm using iDrive and have been very happy so far. The interface is less than stellar, but the price for 20TB is right. 

https://www.idrive.com/pricing

3 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Awesome. Keep us updated on how it goes. 

 

I'm using iDrive and have been very happy so far. The interface is less than stellar, but the price for 20TB is right. 

 

https://www.idrive.com/pricing

You're not wrong, that's a great price!

Currently I am estimating ~300 a year for 5-6TB, but we'll see once it is all uploaded. I specifically like I can set permissions for each "bucket" which is kind of like a dataset on the TrueNAS so my wife or kids cant accidentally delete my music, for example.

Just now, AudioDoctor said:

 

You're not wrong, that's a great price!

I have a feeling the other shoe will drop and the price will shoot up, just like Amazon storage did years ago.

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I have a feeling the other shoe will drop and the price will shoot up, just like Amazon storage did years ago.

That was precisely my thought process when seeing amazing, too good to be true and feasible long term storage deals.

11 minutes ago, Jud said:

I think there’s been one modest price increase, maybe two, since I started using the service. (I’m using the unlimited personal plan, not as capable but substantially cheaper than the B2 storage plan @AudioDoctor has.) The owners said they intended to keep the service low cost. However, I believe ownership has changed since then. As always, we’ll just have to wait and see. But I’ve had no complaints so far.

I did have the B2 storage at one point and thought the capabilities and numerous available interfaces were excellent.

I started with the personal plan and then decided to switch to the B2 Cloud Storage. It is more expensive, but also interfaces with the TrueNAS and Forklift App, and can more easily backup the business data because of it. I personally don't find the price outrageous compared to some of the others and I feel that they will be in business for a while and not disappear overnight unexpectedly as well.

Plus, with this little Applet (Forklet?) I can sync my entire NAS to Backblaze. I need to set it up still, but the point stands.

 I can also keep versioned backups of files for a time I can determine from no time to more than a year. Or Indefinitely. The cost will increase over time with that of course.

@Jud Your previous endorsements of Backblaze also played a role in my decision.

10 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

but also interfaces with the TrueNAS and Forklift App, and can more easily backup the business data because of it.

When I had B2, I was very happy with Rclone (free, open source, mature, capable, works with any OS we’re likely to be running), particularly the web GUI version that is designated experimental but which never gave me the least problem.

Just now, Jud said:

When I had B2, I was very happy with Rclone (free, open source, mature, capable, works with any OS we’re likely to be running), particularly the web GUI version that is designated experimental but which never gave me the least problem.

I have read good things about Rclone because I am having a real heart to heart with myself right now about switching to Linux and am investigating the software that would replace what I currently rely on on the Mac platform, like Forklift. I am tempted to stick with Mac as my user interface, so to speak, to what is essentially entirely Linux (and BSD) behind me on my network.

The need to replace my iPhone 7 that works just fine only so I can  purchase an Apple Watch opened my eyes to the fact that this will also happen to Apple Silicon computers as well. It also soured me on the watch purchase, which I haven't done yet either.

5 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

I have read good things about Rclone because I am having a real heart to heart with myself right now about switching to Linux and am investigating the software that would replace what I currently rely on on the Mac platform, like Forklift. I am tempted to stick with Mac as my user interface, so to speak, to what is essentially entirely Linux (and BSD) behind me on my network.

 

The need to replace my iPhone 7 that works just fine only so I can  purchase an Apple Watch opened my eyes to the fact that this will also happen to Apple Silicon computers as well. It also soured me on the watch purchase, which I haven't done yet either.

Apple is famous for planned obsolescence, though its moves that were controversial at the time have proved prescient (getting rid of floppies, internal disk drives, USB2). I’m a gadget geek who looks forward to buying a new phone every couple of years (snappier internal processing and network speed make me happy). I also love my Apple Watch (great sleep, health and workout data). 🙂

Regarding Rclone, you can install it and play with stuff like looking through your storage and see if you like it, while continuing to use Forklift for actual work.

When I last looked at BB it was too expensive but at $70/yr for unlimited requires another review...re-ripping or replacing my music would be a PITA (5-6 TB).  Question is: Is it truly Unlimited?

iWatch: I wanted one to monitor Blood Oxygen as I am on a CPAP.  When it detected AFIB (post a bad Covid experience) my wife is all into it and allowed the upgrade to 8 Ultra.  I like it much more than I though I ever would.  The new OS Beta just added cycling sensors (power/cadence/speed) and is a much more useful device than Garmin (which just added ECG to one device).

Apple's obsolescence plan is better than Google's...my Pixel 2 XL is just fine but updates stopped after 3 years.  New Pixels get 5 years now (I think) but my wife's old iphone 7 only recently stopped getting updates and it is older than my Pixel.  I switched to the iPhone at 12 and plan to get a 15 for the USB connector. 

3 hours ago, jcbenten said:

Question is: Is it truly Unlimited?

Yep.

12 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

That was precisely my thought process when seeing amazing, too good to be true and feasible long term storage deals.

Shush please don’t let them know they seem to have a good deal.  There is a DSM app that backs up my NAS as well as the PC /Mac stuff..

7 hours ago, jcbenten said:

When I last looked at BB it was too expensive but at $70/yr for unlimited requires another review...re-ripping or replacing my music would be a PITA (5-6 TB).  Question is: Is it truly Unlimited?

 

iWatch: I wanted one to monitor Blood Oxygen as I am on a CPAP.  When it detected AFIB (post a bad Covid experience) my wife is all into it and allowed the upgrade to 8 Ultra.  I like it much more than I though I ever would.  The new OS Beta just added cycling sensors (power/cadence/speed) and is a much more useful device than Garmin (which just added ECG to one device).

 

Apple's obsolescence plan is better than Google's...my Pixel 2 XL is just fine but updates stopped after 3 years.  New Pixels get 5 years now (I think) but my wife's old iphone 7 only recently stopped getting updates and it is older than my Pixel.  I switched to the iPhone at 12 and plan to get a 15 for the USB connector. 

I had 5 TB of stuff backed up to my personal account before I switched to B2.

I’ve been in the IT/storage (hdd, NAS, SAN, raid, solid state storage ssd/nvme) environment for over 4 decades, and have used every RAID configuration available on EMC/Netapp/LSI/other storage arrays. 
I have to ask why any personal/small business/even large businesses storage setup would require a NAS or SAN? I wrote a paper that’s still on websites describing why DAS is a much better way to go over a NAS or SAN.

You have many options for setting up storage for your environment and if you want that storage replicated offsite. Word of caution, anytime you go outside of your network, you have to worry about security; who actually has access to your data, and is your data being backed up. 
 

Many people think that just because you are using a RAID setup on a NAS/SAN or replicating data to a remote site your data is protected, you would be wrong. I worked at a large company that the DBA’s replicated the databases to 5 different servers and they told management they would never lose data. I told them that was false, because if any piece of data gets corrupted/deleted/inadvertently modified, that data is replicated to all your sites/replicated storage servers in seconds. This is why backups are so critical. Taking snapshots throughout the day is a good way of recovering your data to a later point in time than just using your last backup.

I use a DAS environment for my storage, using hdd and a mix of ssd/nvme m.2 storage. If you need more storage than the computer has available, consider getting a jbod unit from owc and use their soft raid to make it a RAID 1 configuration. Then get a good reliable backup process going that takes daily backups with hourly snapshots if possible. 
 

If you need to replicate your data offsite, setup an sftp/rsync process to do this syncing. I rotate my backup drives and store my last 2 in an offsite vault/safe in case of a robbery or fire

38 minutes ago, Rsmaximasr said:

I’ve been in the IT/storage (hdd, NAS, SAN, raid, solid state storage ssd/nvme) environment for over 4 decades, and have used every RAID configuration available on EMC/Netapp/LSI/other storage arrays. 
I have to ask why any personal/small business/even large businesses storage setup would require a NAS or SAN? I wrote a paper that’s still on websites describing why DAS is a much better way to go over a NAS or SAN.

You have many options for setting up storage for your environment and if you want that storage replicated offsite. Word of caution, anytime you go outside of your network, you have to worry about security; who actually has access to your data, and is your data being backed up. 
 

Many people think that just because you are using a RAID setup on a NAS/SAN or replicating data to a remote site your data is protected, you would be wrong. I worked at a large company that the DBA’s replicated the databases to 5 different servers and they told management they would never lose data. I told them that was false, because if any piece of data gets corrupted/deleted/inadvertently modified, that data is replicated to all your sites/replicated storage servers in seconds. This is why backups are so critical. Taking snapshots throughout the day is a good way of recovering your data to a later point in time than just using your last backup.

 

I use a DAS environment for my storage, using hdd and a mix of ssd/nvme m.2 storage. If you need more storage than the computer has available, consider getting a jbod unit from owc and use their soft raid to make it a RAID 1 configuration. Then get a good reliable backup process going that takes daily backups with hourly snapshots if possible. 
 

If you need to replicate your data offsite, setup an sftp/rsync process to do this syncing. I rotate my backup drives and store my last 2 in an offsite vault/safe in case of a robbery or fire

 

NAS is by far the easiest way to provide several music servers access to 14TB of music, schedule automatic backups to locally attached USB drives, schedule automatic encrypted offsite backups to iDrive, and keep the local disks in my basement (far from my listening room).

47 minutes ago, Rsmaximasr said:

I’ve been in the IT/storage (hdd, NAS, SAN, raid, solid state storage ssd/nvme) environment for over 4 decades, and have used every RAID configuration available on EMC/Netapp/LSI/other storage arrays. 
I have to ask why any personal/small business/even large businesses storage setup would require a NAS or SAN? I wrote a paper that’s still on websites describing why DAS is a much better way to go over a NAS or SAN.

You have many options for setting up storage for your environment and if you want that storage replicated offsite. Word of caution, anytime you go outside of your network, you have to worry about security; who actually has access to your data, and is your data being backed up. 
 

Many people think that just because you are using a RAID setup on a NAS/SAN or replicating data to a remote site your data is protected, you would be wrong. I worked at a large company that the DBA’s replicated the databases to 5 different servers and they told management they would never lose data. I told them that was false, because if any piece of data gets corrupted/deleted/inadvertently modified, that data is replicated to all your sites/replicated storage servers in seconds. This is why backups are so critical. Taking snapshots throughout the day is a good way of recovering your data to a later point in time than just using your last backup.

 

I use a DAS environment for my storage, using hdd and a mix of ssd/nvme m.2 storage. If you need more storage than the computer has available, consider getting a jbod unit from owc and use their soft raid to make it a RAID 1 configuration. Then get a good reliable backup process going that takes daily backups with hourly snapshots if possible. 
 

If you need to replicate your data offsite, setup an sftp/rsync process to do this syncing. I rotate my backup drives and store my last 2 in an offsite vault/safe in case of a robbery or fire

 

If you did in fact work in the field you say you did then surely you are aware of ZFS and the fact that it is not supported on Mac so my only option is to offload that storage to a NAS, in my case a TrueNAS, which runs on ZFS and Debian. You would also be aware that ZFS is the most robust file system for storage there is against data corruption and disks going bad etc...  Additionally, you would be aware that before my NAS sends a bit of data to Backblaze B2 it checks the checksums and ensures it matches with the parity. If it doesn't, it fixes it, and then sends it.

There is no directly attached storage apparatus on the planet that protects against any of that unless you also run Debian based linux as a desktop OS.

Backblaze B2 also has an option for encryption in which only I hold the decryption keys. So unless my Data is deemed important enough for them to go through the effort to crack that key, I am positive I am safe.

And finally, my data is in 3 separate locations geographically. My house, my brothers house in an identical NAS, and backblaze B2 servers.

A Mac Studio Ultra M3 with ECC RAM and a Thunderbolt connected Thunderbay 8 on which I can use ZFS is my dream storage array but that's not possible. SoftRAID doesn't protect against bit rot or corrupted data.

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Plus, if you want to give access to other apps, music servers, or even via SFTP, a desktop OS is far from ideal. A Linux appliance NAS is literally built to do all of this. 

Like Minimserver, for example!

These days I feel the line between NAS and DAS is getting rather blurry. I've got my computers (and directly attached storage) in the office, and my audio system in the living room, so playback is over the network in any case. If I decided to switch to NAS (and I believe I will in perhaps the mid-term future), then I'd simply be running optical fiber from the NAS to a switch in the office, rather than USB cables from external HDDs to my computers. And just as I do now, I'd be syncing to offsite commercial backup. It doesn't really seem like that profound a difference to me.

10 minutes ago, Jud said:

These days I feel the line between NAS and DAS is getting rather blurry. I've got my computers (and directly attached storage) in the office, and my audio system in the living room, so playback is over the network in any case. If I decided to switch to NAS (and I believe I will in perhaps the mid-term future), then I'd simply be running optical fiber from the NAS to a switch in the office, rather than USB cables from external HDDs to my computers. And just as I do now, I'd be syncing to offsite commercial backup. It doesn't really seem like that profound a difference to me.

I see what you're saying, and I think you're using Linux, right? and if so I can see even more where the line would be blurred even more. In my case however, ZFS is something I just can't trust to directly attached USB or Thunderbolt drives on a Mac. I tried, it kept me up at night wondering which of the bugs was going to get me. If it was Oracle that convinced Apple not to pursue ZFS it really makes me dislike them. If I were using Kubuntu, for example, then I could plug drives in and use ZFS on a supported system and sleep soundly at night. So I think it really depends on which OS you're using.

7 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

I see what you're saying, and I think you're using Linux, right? and if so I can see even more where the line would be blurred even more. In my case however, ZFS is something I just can't trust to directly attached USB or Thunderbolt drives on a Mac. I tried, it kept me up at night wondering which of the bugs was going to get me. If it was Oracle that convinced Apple not to pursue ZFS it really makes me dislike them. If I were using Kubuntu, for example, then I could plug drives in and use ZFS on a supported system and sleep soundly at night. So I think it really depends on which OS you're using.

I actually use 4 OSs - 2 Linux distros, MacOS, and Windows (MacOS on laptop, the other 3 at various times on desktop). I’d probably use a 5th OS on a NAS; as now, storage would be accessible from any of the OSs.

What would motivate me to use a NAS? I have the desktop set up to serve my music to the Internet, and can control it remotely from my phone or the laptop. As a rule I don’t leave the desktop on 24/7; I didn’t build it with that in mind. So I need to remember to leave it on if I want to listen to my locally stored music remotely. I’d buy or build the NAS to be on 24/7. It would be one less detail to remember, and I’m enough of a geek that I might enjoy building one.