A nasty ataraid experience.

[Howard Goldstein]

Oliver Fromme wrote:
> Bruce M Simpson wrote:
>  > [...]
>  > I also now understand that I can't rely on RAID alone to keep the 
>  > integrity of my own data -- there is no substitute for backups,
> 
> That's 100% true.  RAID -- even true hardware RAID -- is
> *never* a substitute for backup.  Consider:
>  - Fire.
>  - Theft.
>  - Lightning strike or power surge.
>  - The cleaning woman knocks the tower over.
>  - ...
> In all of those cases, chances are that both disks in the
> RAID mirror die.  Also, as you mentioned, it doesn't
> protect agains human errors ("rm *" in the wrong directory
> and similar things).
> 
> Backups should always be made to media that can be taken
> offline and stored in a safe place:  Tape, optical disks,
> hard disks in swappable drive trays, or external drives.
> 

Messr. Fromme's point _can never_ be restated too often: Offline and 
offsite.  Pick your religion:  dump, rsync, bacula, amanda, whatever, 
just stick with it.

(To the list I would add:
   -  Fancy new well known manuf's ATX power supply received from a 
reputable reseller.  Unwrapped from factory package, installed and the 
RAID array discovered the 12v and 5v rails were swapped internally at 
the factory and there went all of the magic smoke.)