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0 pointswwweston6y ago0 comments

Even if data loss is entirely mitigated by backups, storage failure can also be a thing, and mitigating that issue used to be a matter of making at least one of your backups bootable and on media you could swap in, so this didn't take down the whole device. Not sure what techs do now, but I'll bet it involves more downtime and less continuity.

But data loss is an issue. Network backups are great, and I use them, but they're bandwidth bound. Local external drive backups are great, and I do them, but less frequently. And I don't test my backups (yet)... do you? Having removable storage -- or even storage that's reliably accessible in the face of other component failure -- provides an extra margin against the risk of loss that can creep in even with a set of responsible backup habits.

What's the pro of soldering storage to the board that outweighs these cons?

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l33tman6y ago

Just get a time machine, put on your wifi and you don't have to think about it anymore, it will just backup every day in the background. You can easily restore into another macbook using the builtin restore functionality. Apples solution to this is really good (still struggling to do it with the same ease with Windows without 3rd party software and Linux).

nine_k6y ago

> restore into another macbook

That's the problem. Instead of replacing a $200 SSD, you have to replace the entire $2000 machine.

birdyrooster6y ago

Just preheat the board, get your hot air station, heat and remove those bad modules, clean the pads, add your solder and remount some new ones before cleaning up all that flux you were using. Then reinstall macOS and restore your backups.

It might take a few tries before the solder balls up correctly under each pad. Use plenty of flux. Maybe give it a ultrasonic bath.

Source: YouTube

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briandear6y ago

If you have AppleCare you won’t have to pay for that replacement. After 3 years, you would, however buying a laptop with an inferior OS just in case one day a machine catastrophically fails is like riding a horse because you are afraid your car might fly off a bridge at some point in the future.

I know I am anecdote-land, but I have never in 20 years of using Macs, had one catastrophically fail. Or fail at all for that matter.

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redwall_hp6y ago

Apple discontinued Time Capsule and their entire Airport line. The Time Machine software is still in MacOS, but de-emphasized and who knows if they'll retain it going forward.

sudhirj6y ago

Doesn’t it ask you whenever you plug in an empty hard disk if you want to use it as a Time Machine backup drive?

simonh6y ago

In what way has it been de-emphasized?

Nextgrid6y ago

With how hard they're pushing their cloud and integrating it into pretty much everything I'm surprised there's still no official cloud backup solution for Mac.

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