VO Studio Workflow Essentials: Backing Up Basics

We seldom think about backing up data until it’s too late.

I’ve spoken about Iterative Saves, File Organization, backup power supplies…those kinda boring things that we put in place to keep our home voiceover studios up and running. However, one key thing I never actually covered in detail was making sure that we were backing up data… which no one really ever wants to think about, because everything is working fine. Which is good.
Until it doesn’t. Then it isn’t.

Backing up data remains one of those things we often talk about but usually stop short of actually doing. In the past couple of decades drives have gotten incredibly reliable, which is a blessing. However, they’ve also grown enormously and are now capable of holding terabytes of information. Thus, we’ve gotten a bit lazy. My studio computer and my laptop both have 1TB drives on them. That lets me record gobs of audio without paying attention to the capacity. It’s easy to keep piling more and more into one very deep hole. 

(Cue ominous music) So, if anything happens to that drive, everything is gone.

Backup Step One: Duplicate Data to a Dedicated Backup Drive

For a proper creative studio, the best practice is to have a data drive separate from the system drive. However, a completely separate data drive is something best set up at the beginning. For the purposes of a home VO setup, it’s probably not as essential as it once was. Let’s start by just automating a copy from our computer to another drive.

MacOS has Time Machine, and Windows has a native backup app as well. They just need somewhere else to put stuff. Storage in the form of a separate drive is relatively cheap – in this case, cheap insurance. Think about how many hours it would take to redo even a medium sized project, and compare your hourly rate to the cost of a simple external USB drive.

A few models which are consistently reliable include OWC’s Envoy, Samsung’s T7, (also available in colors), Seagate’s One Touch or Portable , La Cie, and the simple Western Digital Passport which I’ve always found to be a good value. (Note – a couple weeks ago, I cited issues with SanDisk SSD’s as reported on Petapixel).

Connecting these to your computer, then scheduling an automated, consistent, once-a-day backup will duplicate your data to a separate piece of hardware. I schedule mine to work at 1 AM, when I’m (hopefully) away from the studio. That way any drive noise or system load won’t impact my recording or editing activity. Since these will be simple backup drives working at off hours, the drive speed is less important.

The “automatic” aspect is key. The weakest link in the backup system is, regrettably, us. In my experience, it’s one of the things on everyone’s list which too frequently gets kicked to the “later” list.

Backup Step Two: Save a Copy Off-Site

Once we have things duplicated on site, it’s time to think about a copy elsewhere. Between fires, hurricanes and other impacts of late, there are too many stories of home studios getting impacted. An off-site copy means that you won’t lose work if the physical drives disappear. Many of us work with Dropbox , which now has a backup system even for the free levels. MacOS provides iCloud , and Microsoft OneDrive or Google Drive can be used to store copies. Automating these methods will provide another layer of backup, should something happen.

While that may cover you for a few key items, one thing to consider is how long it can take to retrieve larger files across the internet. Investing in a true off-site backup service such as Backblaze can be beneficial. They will actually send you a hard drive with your data on it, should you have a catastrophic loss. Carbonite is another reliable provider, and Carbon Copy Cloner has some deep coverage tools as well. These companies provide peace of mind while facilitating an efficient return to productivity.

These two steps – automating a daily backup to a local drive, and having a comprehensive off-site backup – create data in three places. This is solid and viable approach to not losing any of your hard work.

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