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[JB1901]

I have a WD5001AALS (Western Digital 500GB Black) currently in my DNS321 and it has been running perfect for a few months but I want to add an additional drive (identical) to run in mirror to backup my data for my commercial business files.  Quickbooks, outlook, customer files, etc.

I would like to operate them in Raid1 so I don't have to worry about backing them up manually.  Can I do this without reformatting the drive currently installed?  I know I can install the 2nd drive and format, but dont' want to have to format drive 1 if I can avoid it.  Any suggestions?

[gunrunnerjohn]

RAID is NOT backup, I suggest you rethink this.  RAID-1 is to maximize data availability in case of a drive failure.  Backup is an independent copy of your data that isn't affected by anything you do to the primary data copy.

Q: What happens if someone slips and deletes the folder with all the Quickbooks file from the network drive?
A: Your data is gone to data heaven, never to be seen again.

Q: What happens if a virus or malware scrambles the data on the network drive?
A: Same answer.

[mcd0234]

No, I'm afraid that you will have to reformat the original drive too if you change to a RAID configuration. So you'll need to find a way to get the information currently on that drive onto another one before you add the second and select a RAID 1 setup - have a USB hard drive around? Not ideal, but there is no way round this if you want to do anything other than another standard disk (which would only format the new drive leaving the old drive alone) though you should still have a backup of the data on it before beginning anything as this is how accidents happen.

[gunrunnerjohn]

Actually, you should be able to add a drive and convert them to RAID-1.  The real issue here is having only one copy of important data, that's pretty reckless!

[JB1901]

RAID is NOT backup, I suggest you rethink this.  RAID-1 is to maximize data availability in case of a drive failure.  Backup is an independent copy of your data that isn't affected by anything you do to the primary data copy.

Q: What happens if someone slips and deletes the folder with all the Quickbooks file from the network drive?
A: Your data is gone to data heaven, never to be seen again.

Q: What happens if a virus or malware scrambles the data on the network drive?
A: Same answer.

I have other hardrives (also 500gb WD Blacks) in 2 of the network  I could "backup" to as well, but would prefer a "backup" system that could work when data isn't going to be being accessed (middle of the night) and also won't need a computer on (would prefer inside the DNS-321).

So, if I just install the new drive only, is there a way I can have it set to do an auto-backup of ALL the files? I currently only have ~20GB of data that would need to be backed up so it wouldn't be too bad too back up.  I would prefer to have a backup that only backs up new/modified files to go quicker though? Any ideas?

I basically have 2 networked computers that share the NAS, but at night they aren't used at all.  Any suggestions on programs? Options?

[mcd0234]

I am surprised, I double checked the manual before posting and it says that it if you change to a RAID 1 setup it would need a reformat but I'll take your word for it as I have two standard disks.

[gunrunnerjohn]

I basically have 2 networked computers that share the NAS, but at night they aren't used at all.  Any suggestions on programs? Options?

My solution to this issue is to use task scheduler to wake my computer up in the middle of the night and run a backup.  I use Beyond Compare (www.scootersoftware.com) to do a sync of the entire DNS-323 to the DNS-321.  That way I have two copies of everything.  In addition, the NAS units are strictly backup, so the data that's in active use actually resides on the machines that are using it.  They independently do their backups periodically to the DNS--323, also using task scheduler.

For boot image backups, I schedule Acronis True Image to run once a week, those images are also stored on the DNS-323 and then the DNS-321 NAS units during the scheduled backups.