The COMPLETE BTRFS Snapshot Guide

BTRFS Snapshots are a feature that every single Synology user should be using. They protect you form ransomware, file corruption, and even dumb deletes, all at an incredibly low cost. This tutorial goes over the complete BTRFS Snapshot setup guide on Synology NAS.

#Synology #BTRFS #Snapshot

Synology Recommendations*:

Drives*:

Going 10GbE*:

TOC
0:00 Intro
6:02 What are BTRFS Snapshots
7:55 Simplified Snapshot space usage
9:40 overview in DSM
12:33 What folders and how often should you snapshot?
19:05 Snapshots in action
24:08 Restore from ransomware
26:48 Conclusion

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[mattiesmusic]

Now this is quality content, another reason why I like SpaceRex so much.
Straight to the point, very clear and complete explenation, and also says why.
In the mids of all of those "pretend" youtubers that pretend to know something, it's good to know there's at least one channel with true quality content.
Even if I already know what you're saying, it's still ever so fascinating to watch your videos, never know when I might something new.

So in short: A very big thanks for your awesome videos

[Supermanohman]

My man. Everybody has been telling me to make snapshots but I always thought it was some technical thing I would never need like so many things I've come across with my Synology. Your first 2 minutes talking about it made me realize I need to have them so I just set them up the same way you did. I still don't 100% understand them but at least I have them if something bad happens and someone asks me "Do you have snapshots?" I can say yes. Thanks my man!

[heckyes]

Best description on Youtube of what BTRFS, why it's useful, it's downsides, and how it works at a high level.

[DavidDWalton]

Hi Spacerex! I’m a new subscriber and fan. I’ve only had my DS920+ for a few days, but it’s already up and running perfectly, largely thanks to your content. There’s so few people on YouTube making Synology content on this level. Thank you for what you do!

[jsully]

you are like a breath of fresh air on youtube. great information communicated clearly without fluff or endless begging and "reminders" to like/subscribe/click bells/blah blah blah. I VERY rarely do any of those things for anyone, I did here though. I'm currently switching from a Drobo to a Synology and your videos have been extremely useful explaining all the new things at my disposal. thank you.

[mrthaus]

Great presentation. For clarification, when you have to "go to IT to restore a backup of a file", if that file is anything older than a week or two, they are typically going to an offsite backup - usually a data tape - and restoring from that. So when they sigh and say that the restore will take 12 hours or 1 day, its not laziness or disorganization. They literally have to determine which tape they need from the backup set, call or email the tape warehouse company and arrange return of the tape, wait for delivery, insert tape, sometimes perform a read command which indexes the tape data before they can check what they can restore from it, then restore the data to a temp folder which can take an hour or so depending on where the data is on the tape physically, then put it somewhere the user can access. All the while they also have to update the ticket and manage update queries from the user who may be anxious for their file(s).

Also, this is not unusual at all - almost all medium to large businesses have offsite backups on a specific retention period, and many of them still use tape as it is very high capacity and quite quick to backup a lot of data (LTO tapes are up to 18TB each currently).

TL;DR: don't get too frustrated at the IT team when they're restoring a lost file and it takes longer than you expect, it is often a laborious process for them, and often not possible for them to speed up significantly as much of the time is waiting for the delivery or waiting for the restore process.

[wimsijstermans]

I own Synology gear for many years with BTRFS enabled and actually never thought about this. Thank you so much for your great video! Not to mention your other great contributions. Gives me a lot more value out of the NAS. Thank you so much!

[pietschreuder]

Your previous video's made me migrate to BTRFS and set the Synology up as You suggested. I know now that I am fully covered: Snapshots for most files, daily incremental backup of the whole system and a cloud storage for my most important files. When from home, I can remotely log in to the Synology, but I have also access to the cloud system. No sweat!
BTW, snapshot reminds me of the old Salvage command on Novell Netware. That function saved the day for me many times in the old days! Thanks for your great video's!

[linochacon]

Thanks spacerex for this great video. I found this video to be one of the best I have ever seen in your channel. Great content, proper pauses within, practical examples, the ins and out of the content etc. thanks again I really appreciate your time for putting this video together.

[ademkollari]

I think I finally may have started to understand snapshots. I'll give em a try. Running 920+ I acquired recently. Thank you!

[kb]

Great tutorials for Synology. I've been a Synology Partner for many years and I don't know why I haven't found your videos before. Great information!

[mikereadinguk]

Excellent. So informative, easy to understand and useful. Keep up the good work.

[SgtSOB]

Thanks SpaceRex!!! If I use Snapshots can I turn off file versioning in Synology Drive? Thanks!

[ashnaura]

You are a lifesaver... Watched all your other videos on Synology. Subscribed and recommending to others as well. Please keep up the good work. Thank you so much.

[rapacious_rapscallion]

Thank you for this! You clarified a few things I've always wondered about when it comes to BTRFS snapshots.

[karlfoley]

Many thanks for the useful content, I now have this setup on my shares. :)
I already was using HyperBackup to backup to BackBlaze, but this lets me do local recovery without having to pull stuff back from my online backup.

[PlanetLinuxChannel]

Incredibly helpful video!How does this relate / compare to the file versioning in Synology Drive?

[Jeff_Seely]

Oh yes BTRFS snaps have really saved my butt. Great demo and explanation!

[childhoodbusiness]

Hi SpaceRex, I just found your videos on Synology and I am stunned! You provide so much valuable information and do it in such a humble way. Thanks for your work!

Regrading snapshots: I would have loved to hear a word about "recycle bin" on a Synology vs. Snapshots ... Shall I get rid of the bins? Or are they useful as an hourly snapshot might miss a new file on the NAS that got deleted before a snapshot is taken? And will the bin also get snapshooted?

[drheili]

Thank you for all your excellent Synology vids. I'm new to NAS on my home network and need it primarily for photo storage. I just installed a NS920+. Your videos have gotten me up to speed quickly with which apps to install and how to configure them. Thanks again and keep up the great work.
Quick question, any suggestions for a good duplicate file finder. I know I have many duplicate images and would like to clean them up.