Hey guys,
Maybe my configuration might give some people some ideas.
I've always built my computers from scratch since forever.
Remember how happy I was when I added a math-co-processor to one of the original ones.
Anyway, here's what I did with my config.
I have one of those old military corsair tower case, which I like.
I have 8 Drives in it.
I have a HD addon card in one slot that added 4 extra drives to the 6 on motherboard, use blue cables for these connections, since the addon card is slightly slower on transfer rates.
In the upper bay slots, I have two SSD drives, and my Blu Ray/DVD drive.
Upper Bays:
1 SSD 860 (1Tb) - Primary C (Always Plugged In to MB)
2. SSD 840 (500gb) - unplugged from MB - plug in when I do a Disk Clone (usually bi-weekly, unless big changes)
3. Blu Ray/DVD Drive - Always plugged into Add-on card
Lower Bays:
1. D Drive: 8TB - always plugged into MB, created directory called Internal files to update, usually attach other drives below weekly & update
2. E Drive: 8TB - Only plug into MB when transferring files
3. F Drive: 8TB - Only plug into MB when transferring files
4. G drive: 16TB - Only plug into MB when transferring files
5. H Drive: 8TB - Only plug into Add-on card when transferring files
6. I Drive: 8TB - Only plug into Add-on card when transferring files
USB:
Another Blu Ray/writer portable plugged into one port in back.
This drive is slower than the internal one *but* it can sometime read disks without errors that the internal one sometimes can't, even after cleaning.
For some reason it's a lot more forgiving of scratches/surface defects.
Backup:
System Drive:
I have exact duplicates of all my drives offline - 3 copies of system drive thru cloning and checking bootability after cloning (SSD 840, 1TB old Drive, 1 TB old Drive)
Takes 28 minutes to backup to each using USB bootable Acronis Tru Image - what makes it really fast is prior to doing the clone, attach the drive to be cloned too, format it, then boot from USB - saves about 15-20 minutes of "thinking" if the drive is formatted prior to cloning
I also only have the source drive and the drive to be cloned actively attached when cloning, this prevents USB True Image boot from having to analyze drives I'm not going to use and saves a lot of time.
File Drives offline backups:
I use a USB 3.1 StarTech Docking bay - put in the drive & update external drives on the fly to offline backup copies
Have 1 to 1 backups of internal drives duplicated offline to just put in docking bay.
The beauty of this Is I have 2 Roku Ultras that I got on sale for about $60 each that have the USB ports in back and can take my offline backup disks and dock them to play files directly to TV's.
Use another USB 3.1 StarTech Docking bay, plugged into Roku ports to play any movies to TV's - works great with the 16TB drive too!
*****
My system isn't the greatest & currently only on Win10/64 due to Skylake and using a 2070 Super graphics card.
Convert files to H265 for less file space and always test the playability & sound synch prior to deleting originals.
Will probably upgrade next year from a clean install of Win 11, the upgrade from Win 7 pro to Win10/64 was ok, but had holdover issues that took some finagling with.
I've used USB external portable drives the past & found that they are *not* very dependable and get corrupted occasionally, especially with the plug adapters.
Anyway, my system normally only has 2 drives attached actively (SSD 860 1TB), D drive for temporary holding of drives to be copied to internal drives.
Files are backed up immediately thru docking bay & weekly to internal (unplugged drives).
I do this to save wear & tear on drives and extend their lives and for less electricity usage.