How do you back up your QTS install?

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paradoxgrowth
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How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by paradoxgrowth »

Everything important (I.e. my personal files) is backed up to a cloud. However I don’t really have a back up of qts. I’m thinking about getting an external to back up to do the job. I mean a 1:1 back up with the system files, including .qpkg file folder and all of the app settings etc. I have a few questions before I decide. Maybe I just copy everything to a directory, zip it and send it to the cloud.
  • How do you back up QTS and have you verified your method works (ie restored and everything was intact)?
  • How much space should it take up?
  • If you manually back up (ssh) where are the major directories I should hit?
  • Do anything special to restore?
Last edited by paradoxgrowth on Sat Jun 12, 2021 8:18 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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dolbyman
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by dolbyman »

there is no backup for QTS .. if your NAS dies you must reinstall the NAS and apps from scratch

The system settings backup includes just some settings and user accounts
paradoxgrowth
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by paradoxgrowth »

Not entirely true. I have upgraded my main hdd and while I did reinstall the apps, I kept my app settings. I did a restore of the app settings by using ssh and restoring from my manual back of the .qpkg file. I didn’t have to re-setup Kodi or hybrid back up.
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Moogle Stiltzkin
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

i mostly backup my data (pictures, videos, music, those kinds of things) which is of outmost importance. the only qnap app settings i backup is the ubiquiti unifi controller qpkg which i can backup from it's webserver admin page. other than that, i usually don't bother.

when i am forced to reinit (which is very rarely), i'll just do it from scratch. i run a very basic setup to begin with. i usually take an 1 hour or less to configure (raid sync that takes 7-13 or so hours for a 4x 4tb raid5)

for myself this is acceptable, but for others maybe they rather be able to restore the basic qts config as they can't afford the hassle or downtime.
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dolbyman
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by dolbyman »

the system is mirrored across all member drives, so as long as not all drives are swapped/bust, the system stays intact

so my notice stll stands
paradoxgrowth
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by paradoxgrowth »

Ha not exactly your original point but okay (you said a back up cannot be done, wrong!). :mrgreen:

I only have one hdd, and even if you have more than one hdd, each app has its settings on one drive at a time. Lastly, I wanted an external (or zipped cloud backup) for a back up that I could keep safe from power surges (unplug and keep in a closet).

Now we have rearrived at my original question, I would love to hear from others!
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OneCD
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by OneCD »

paradoxgrowth wrote: Sat Jun 12, 2021 8:00 pm Now we have rearrived at my original question, I would love to hear from others!
@dolbyman is correct: it's not possible to make a complete backup of QTS. :geek:

At-best, QTS offers a system-settings backup only. This backup does not include any application-generated data (by QPKGs). The user must create their own backups of QPKG data. If your applications support this - great! If not, you'll need to go snooping to find how-and-where each application stores its data.

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frostbit
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Re: How do you back up your QTS install?

Post by frostbit »

I don't. Because it's not possible, as already said. Even those undocumented "system settings" (nobody knows what they contain ... ) cannot be backed up in a scheduled automated fashion and have to be downloaded through QTS manually. Other vendors offer this option. This was one of my first support tickets to QNAP some years ago. I was shocked, when I figured this out. I mean those NAS devices have 2 purposes: network storage and backups. Well, they fulfill 50% of these purposes, which is still better than nothing... like...better than a brick, though...

This is also the reason, I do not use any of the QNAP apps anymore. I felt the pain twice, when QNAP broke my app data through app updates. I used their multimedia apps. One can spend a lot of time managing photo albums or rating songs. And I spent a lot. Very very lot of time. And it just takes a couple of seconds and everything was lost.

I'd really like to use those new apps, which have a couple of nice features. But this situation is a no go.
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