Very basic backup question...

[grumblepig]

Hi all - I wish I was more embarrassed by questions like this, as I'm supposedly a professional music maker, but I'm eternally baffled by basic tech! I probably sound like a troll, but I'm not! Bear with me.

I'm in Berlin, recording on a new laptop. The external drive I've been using for audio recorded in Logic is called Morgenmusik. I also have a second drive meant as a backup with the name Ant 2021 Backup. 

I've primarily been working on two albums while in Berlin. I need to make sure that (a) my backups to the Ant 2021 drive add new or updated material without deleting anything. And when I get back to California, I'll want to get all the newly worked-on material from the Morgenmusik drive onto my main drive at home.

I know this is totally basic stuff, but more than once I've screwed this sort of thing up. I get home, jet lagged but eager to immediately get to work, and I plug the wrong thing into the wrong thing etc... (On day two in Berlin, I plugged the wrong iPhone in to my laptop and deleted everything on it that I'd only loaded in two days prior...)

Is Merge the way to go? Pretty sure I don't want Replace when I'm moving from the Berlin drive to my main drive at home, yeah?

I'm asking this with more than a week left in Berlin. My hope is to have a clear and clean answer from someone here that I can reference and follow even in the depth of jet lag!

Thanks in advance,

Ant

[des99]

You shouldn't have to do this manually. Using a tool like Super Duper, or other folder syncronisation tools (there are loads of these, I like Get Backup 3 and Forklift for folder syncronisation), you can just say "Sync drive/folder A, with drive/folder B", and the software looks at the files in each location, and copies only the new or changed files from A (the source) to B (the destination) (or bi-directionally, if required).

You save presets for the various backups between drives/folders you need to do, and just choose one and hit "Go", and the computer figures out what it needs to do to keep the data in sync, giving you more time to get a coffee and relax!

Edited September 22, 2022 by des99

[grumblepig]

I wanted to follow up on this... I think downloading a new app or such might not be the ideal for me. I'll be no doubt jet lagged and basically need as basic a method for getting new and updated material from my travel drive to my home drive. A new app or program that requires any part of my brain will probably backfire.

So... I've I just copy from my travel drive to my home drive and use the "Merge" option, nothing on my home drive will be lost, only augmented with new material, yeah?

We fly home tomorrow and thankfully land in the evening so I won't be as tempted to risk immediate damage to my album-in-progress!

[des99]

Using an app like Get Backup 3 and clicking "Go" on a saved folder sync setup (basicaly just saving your source and destination paths) is as simple as you can get. It's really not a complicated app at all, super easy, barely an inconvenience to use.

I would never personally trust a Finder "merge" option for a whole bunch of reasons, but of course it's up to you to find the best method that best works for you.

*Alway* test first, before trusting your data to whatever method you use.

[DanRad]

Off topic, but, a suggestion. I've been flying back and forth from LA to Portugal and have found my method to not getting jet lagged.  For me, I've just accepted that I cannot sleep on a plane, so why try? If I take drugs etc, I'm just sleepy and uncomfortable instead of just uncomfortable. So I just accept I wont't sleep...  I watch movies (make sure to have GOOD closed ear headsets) and when you get to your destination, no matter what time it is, wait until your "normal" bedtime.  THEN take drugs so you can sleep (I have trouble sleeping when I'm really tired like after 20 hours of flight etc)  Then, wake up close to your normal waking time.  For me, at least for trips to Europe, this works quite well... as for back up.... I have no clue...