Advice on creating a backup server

[dannymozzer]

Hi,

 

I know these kinds of questions are always asked and I've read a lot of them, but I've never found an answer to my specific use case (so I thought I'd ask for some advice)

 

I have a HP Prolient Server (Something I bought on eBay for pretty cheap, and I know a standard PC would've done the job but I also kind of wanted to learn server hardware, anyway...) basically I want to know the best storage options for my use case which is, a place to backup and access my files, and that's it, however, I don't want the server running 24/7, I want to start it up at the beginning of the day and have it running so I can access files whenever I need them, and then towards the end of the day (or really anytime/on command), have any changes I made backup onto another drive (so instead of using RAID, just have a backup of a backup, etc.) and then once I'm finished, be able to turn the server off at night and then repeat.

 

Sorry if my idea either doesn't make sense or is a bit risky, but I just want to know what drives would be best for this use case, and really, how I could go about doing something like this, any advice would be great, I should also mention that cost is a bit of a concern, so please note that I'm not willing to spend hundreds of £££ on storage. (Just a simple backup storage server)

 

Thanks.

[Electronics Wizardy]

What model of HP server do you have?

 

How many TB do you have?

 

You can do all of what you want with some simple scripts or a backup program and a network share.

[dannymozzer]

35 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

What model of HP server do you have?

 

How many TB do you have?

 

You can do all of what you want with some simple scripts or a backup program and a network share.

@Electronics Wizardy

It's a HP Prolient ML310e Gen8, and well the number of TB isn't a huge matter, anywhere from 2 - 4 TB (so not a lot, it's mostly backups of files from PC's and some video files)

 

As I said, I mostly just want to know what drives would basically be OK with being started up in the morning, and shutdown at night, as I've heard a debate about that, that being turning drives on and off (especially NAS drives) can cause them to ware out quicker, which is why I was wondering if something like a WD Blue, Seagate IronWolf or something similar would be more suitable. (If I'm completely mistaken that's fair )

[Electronics Wizardy]

2 minutes ago, dannymozzer said:

As I said, I mostly just want to know what drives would basically be OK with being started up in the morning, and shutdown at night, as I've heard a debate about that, that being turning drives on and off (especially NAS drives) can cause them to ware out quicker, which is why I was wondering if something like a WD Blue, Seagate IronWolf or something similar would be more suitable. (If I'm completely mistaken that's fair )

Basically any hdd can do this, Id get a cheaper one, since you can just restore backups. All of those drives should last years in that workload.

[dannymozzer]

14 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Basically any hdd can do this, Id get a cheaper one, since you can just restore backups. All of those drives should last years in that workload.

@Electronics Wizardy

 

Ah OK, so is it mostly a case of, make sure they're not being written to and they should be OK to be, "shutdown safely"? And really any drive is OK? Huh that's good to know, as I said, I mostly just wanted to make sure I wasn't going to run the server like this (so about 6 - 8 hours a day, shut it down, start it up again, repeat, and find I was slowly killing the drives)

[Electronics Wizardy]

59 minutes ago, dannymozzer said:

@Electronics Wizardy

 

Ah OK, so is it mostly a case of, make sure they're not being written to and they should be OK to be, "shutdown safely"? And really any drive is OK? Huh that's good to know, as I said, I mostly just wanted to make sure I wasn't going to run the server like this (so about 6 - 8 hours a day, shut it down, start it up again, repeat, and find I was slowly killing the drives)

Since you only need a single hdd, id probably not use the hp server, and just use something like a raspberry pi, then just leave it on all day.

 

That cycle shouldn't hurt drives in a major way.

[dannymozzer]

1 hour ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Since you only need a single hdd, id probably not use the hp server, and just use something like a raspberry pi, then just leave it on all day.

 

That cycle shouldn't hurt drives in a major way.

I was planning on using more than one, the idea was to have one as the main drive, then another to be a backup of that one

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, dannymozzer said:

I was planning on using more than one, the idea was to have one as the main drive, then another to be a backup of that one

Having the backup on the same system kinda gets rid of some of the point. Id try having the backup seperate so if something happens to the system you still have the backup.

[dannymozzer]

51 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Having the backup on the same system kinda gets rid of some of the point. Id try having the backup seperate so if something happens to the system you still have the backup.

Ah right fair enough, thanks for the advice!