atm i have a sff hp thin client running linux, set up as a samba file server. got all my data on a 1 tb toshiba usb hdd. about 700 gb of photos and documents, music and movies....
i bought a 2 tb seagate usb hdd for a great price this week because i want to back up the data on the toshiba hdd, i dont trust all my data being on a single drive jic it fails.....
my plan was to copy all the data from the toshiba to the seagate, set up the seagate as the new file server drive, and then i was going to set up the file server to do a weekly incremental backup on the toshiba drive. basically set the file server to back up the seagate drive to the toshiba drive weekly...
i have done backups before, backing up my laptop's 256 gb ssd to the toshiba drive, no issues there.
part of me wonders if its possible to compress down a backup of a drive and fit it into a smaller drive, say theoretically i had 1.2 tb worth on the seagate drive and compress it and store the backup on the 1 tb toshiba drive.
if i could back up a larger drive into a smaller drive using compression, id be able to take advantage of that 2 tb instead of the opposite way around, where i only have 1 tb to play with and im backing up to a 2 tb drive.
what am i missing, is this possible to do?