I was pulling my hair out trying to figure out the best way to do both a personal cloud the way I needed and general backups. I love my WD My Cloud and the fact that I’m hosting my own NAS/Cloud so the device is fine. The software **bleep**.
Context:
WD Smartware is functionaly challanged and SLOW.
I needed Dropbox like functionality
Like Dropbox I wanted personal clouds for my wife and I without having to pay for more than the standard free 5Gb
I needed to support ‘Offline’ files and syncing with my devices (laptops, desktops, etc.)
I needed ‘real-time’ or auto syncing
The problems:
We have 3 laptops, 3 desktops, 2 Kindles, 2 iPads, and Android phone and and iPhone between my wife and I. We both need a personal cloud with more than the standard ‘free’ 5Gb offered by everyone but McDonalds - and I bet they will eventually get in the game also.
WD Smartware supports ‘continuous’ backups however, they are not ‘mirrors’ but thier proprietary file structure/compression/etc. They cannot be viewed in file folder and see you files like a normal folder.
WD Smartware is slow, slow, slow
WD Smartware only supports one (1) backup set on a device. No way to get creatice. You pick your folders/files for a backup, the destination share and that’s it. You can’t define a different set. For instance, if you wanted and this is just a quck example, you wanted to backup all of your commonly accessed files every day at noon and backup all those old files once a week you can’t do that since it would require multiple backup sets being defined,
While Windows used to support ‘offline files’ and ‘syncing’ that functionality was removed from Windows 7 & 8. It’s still available if you buy the upgraded versions not your regular ‘Home’ version. I wasn’t going to upgrade all of my windows 7 & 8 OS’s just to get the built in ‘Sync’ center. Why Microsoft did this is a mystery to everyone.
There are a plethora of ‘sync’ tools and utilities available and trying to figure out which ones do what, how well, support real-time or scheduled syncing only, free vs. seat licensing, etc. was frying my brain. Which one do you choose SyncToy, GoodSync, SugarSync, UNC, etc. I was about to give up.
My solution:
The day after I purchased my 3TB My Cloud I realized that I didn’t have the patience to wait for my one (1) and only backup set for each machine. Smartware is pig slow and like I said, only supports one backup set per machine. I did my research and figured Acronis True Image 2014 was my best choice. There was one other program that rated a little better but it lacked some funcionality that I wanted. I downloaded the free version first to test it out. Here’s what I got:
The functioanlity available in True Image is phenomenal. Way more than just backing up files so there’s that added bonus. Check ut their feature list. It does more than any average home owner could possibly need and everything a savy techie would.
Supports multiple backup sets
Supports ‘real-time’ syncronization and ‘off-line’ files
It backs up FAST
Yes, it does have a price tag but not bad
Aggressive integration with Windows actually adding basic support rather than just a single stand alone program like Smartware.
You can see the real folder/file structures of your backups in Explorer you just need to pick the versions
So, I use a 3Tb WD Mycloud, manage it with the web interface, use Acronis for all of my backups, use Acronis for real-time sync. I now have everything I need. I have Dropbox funCtionality with no limit on my storage, I can invite others to share what I want, my backups are fast. I didn’t have to buy/use some here today/gone tomorrow third party tools - Acronis isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
The only missing piece is true and complete security in never losing my data. So, instead of paying for multiple Mozy, Carbonite, etc. accounts for each device I have one online backup account that I back my NAS up to so that in the case of fire, breakin, or device failure my files will be secure.
All in all, it cost me $156 to buy 6 licences for Acronis True Image 2014 and it was money well spent.
If I understand you correctly I think I addressed this by setting up one (1) online/offsite backup service. Right now I’m using Mozy but will probably switch because there are better services out there now. I just happened to already have a Mozy acount.
Previously, we were paying for 6 Mozy accounts, one for each computer. On four (4) of them we just did file backups but on two (2) we did disk image backups. Now that I can handle all of that with my NAS device I cancelled all but one account. Now I only do an offsite backup my for my NAS device. So, in the case of fire, flood, tornadoe and other acts of God along with thieves and the possability that the NAS device fails all of the data is backedup remotely. That way I can either fix, replace, or by a different NAS device (we know they will just get better and better for homes and small offices) and restore my data.
Also, I am considering - but this might be overkill - of getting another My Cloud and using that as secondary failsafe storage since recovering terabytes of data from an online/offsite backup service could litteraly take days if not weeks. Instead I could possibly just make the secondary NAS primary or copy everything from secondary to new primary NAS.
For backups;
Desktop →
Desktop →
Desktop → ----------> NAS Share(s) ---------> Offsite Backup Service
Laptop → |
Laptop → ------> Optional second NAS device for failsafe
Laptop →
For ‘Dropbox’ like functionality - ‘offline’ copies and real-time syncing:
Desktops & Laptops <------> NAS Share(s)/Synced ---------> Offsite Backup Service
|
------> Optional second NAS device for failsafe
We let Apple and Amazon host our backups for our mobile devices since it’s free and integrated.
Hopefully this covers us completely and securly since we can encrypt everything and know there is an offsite copy of all our data.
Oh yeah, I only do system image backups on our two (2) primary desktops. We switch out equipment - buy new laptops, etc. - so often that system images usually do us no good because if for some reason a laptop dies we buy a new one and the system images do’t handle different hardware well. I know there are some backup software programs that say they can handle that but I don’t sweat it.
I do system images when I have to buy one of our consultants a laptop so that I can refresh if I need to give it to someone else but that is a rarity. In those cases I’ve been just using an external USB connected drive but now I might start using the NAS - makes sense.
I’ve been a long time user of Acronis TIH and was looking forward to using it with my new MyCloud however I am having trouble in that TIH is constantly asking for credentials in setting up the backup. If I ignore the requests, eventually the backup fails. I spoke with WD tech support and was informed WD MyCloud is not supported (tested) by Acronis. I was successful in setting up a backup to a public share but not to a private share. A few threaded questions:
Are you backing up to a private share?
If so, are you having credential issues?
If no issues, how are you entering the share credentials in Acronis for the backup?
I cross my fingers, but the time being I have no trouble with Acronis at the credentials level. I noticed however that the backup get interrupted from time to time and I end up with 2 files instead of a single one. It seems this happens when the NAS is busy with other things. In the Acronis log, I can see a temporary access issue and ATI retrying automatically and succeeding. Worst case was during I was doing a bunch of content uplaod and simultaneously backing up. That time the full backup got split in four files.
Thanks. My solution turned out to be rather simple. I built a MyCloud user with password that I will use specificly for Acronis, changed the resulting share to private and gave the new user full access to it. In Acronis, I used the UNC address to the share and provided credentials for the new user. Acronis worked great on all my machines.
I’m curious if the changes you oulined in your last message have proven a durable solution. I’ve been struggling with Smartware. I finally got it to “see” the WD My Cloud. But it won’t stay logged in, so the backup fails unless I log in every time it runs which sort of defates the purpose of running software to automatically back up.
Elsewhere on this forum I read a post claiming that you have to make the share public in order to prevent Smartware from prompting for a login every time. But I’m not willing to compromise security that way. I tried creating a user account with full rights to the private share like you did, but Smartware can’r remember the credentials.
Does Acronis remember your credentials and run properly without your intervention?
So far so good with my solution. Acronis does remember the credentials. I imagine you will have to enter them should you need to restore an image from an acronis boot CD. I tried Smartware briefly but did not like the fact that it would not back-up an entire image as Acronis does. I will say that there is a slight delay with my wireless devices (laptop etc) in Acronis seeing the existing backup location. But this delay has not seemed to impact Acronis’ functionality.
I have the credential problem too, but only on my Windows 8.1 system. My wife’s 8.0 system works fine every week.
I have Acronis 2014, WD MyCloud 2TB and Windows 8.1. Don’t know if this is a Acronis problem or a WD problem, but I’m at my wit’s end with both, I think.
This is what I been looking for. I just got my cloud, and was looking for this dropbox feature. I don’t mind spending a few extra $ for Acronis if this works, I’ll try it tonight.
Any tips on how to configure both? Do I Sync Acronis to the Cloud (MyCloud)?
Has anyone tried it Quickbooks on this Dropbox like drive? My wife runs a small business home base business from a desktop and a loptop (and her Nokia phone), and she wants to be able to run her quickbooks from her desktop, but when she is out of the office (home) she wan’t to be able to use Quickbooks. I told her she needs to be logged out from one computer, and that is ok with her.
Comments are welcome!
Thank you all for sharing, I read all coments and this is a great comunity.
I am interested in similar solutions, in setting 3 laptops for remote connection (through internet) to mycloud. It is very important to get synchornization between these laptops and mycloud in real-time. Can this be achieved with Acronis?
So, you want your own cloud. So that you don’t have to pay dropbox.
And to achieve this “not paying” option you have purchased a WD Cloud product, spent a ton of time and effort trying to get it to work, and are now considering purchasing additional software to make it work like Dropbox does?
I bought the MY Cloud because I want My Own Cloud. It works great for letting the whole world view my files form anywhere…(if I share it) But if you want realtime backup you have to be on your LAN not WAN… WHY? Why would you not want your cloud to work? is not the point of a personal cloud? to be mobile and have continuous backup to from wherever you are? Why buy a my cloud if I am going to have to buy space on dropbox or another “cloud” service?
