Should I split a big (8TB) backup disk into more than one partition, or not?

[Liam Proven]

On Thu, 24 Sep 2020 at 15:02, David Fletcher <dave at thefletchers.net> wrote:
>
> Yes, I know what the 'R' stands for. My point is, that the more drives
> you're running, the higher the probability of one of them failing.

This is in fact the opposite of the point.

If you have 1 drive, then the MTBF of your storage is the MTBF of the
one drive. If the drive goes, you lose everything.

If you have 2 in a mirror, and you lose 1, you still have everything.
The MTBF has in effect doubled but at the price of doubling the
storage needed.

If you have 3 in a RAID, and you lose 1, you still have everything.
Your MTBF has gone up by 2/3 but you have 2/3 of the storage space.

My home server has 4 x 2TB drives. It is nearly 50% full.

> On the other hand if you're just running a very small setup at home for
> yourself, is it worth it? I think not.

Your choice. My choice is the exact reverse. I do not wish to entrust
my backups to a single drive.

I have 2 backups of my backup, as well (excluding films, TV and
downloads.) But they are not current.


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