Hello all,
I wasn't really exactly sure where to post this, so if it's the wrong forum, please let me know.
Anyway, on to what I'd like to find out:
I'd like to know more about the Archiving and Compression Tools available on FreeBSD.
Information about my set up :
My Wife and I have a pretty large number of Computers in our Home, and we run a multitude of OSs here, which includes this:
FreeBSD (Mostly 9.0-RELEASE, and for this question, it's all that matters)
Linux - Slackware, Debian, OpenSUSE, Mandriva, LinuxConsole, NetSec L, a few others here and there, but they don't matter.
Windows - I have a single Windows Partition on ONE Computer, which is mainly for games, since, really, what other use would I have?
My Wife also has a Windows Partition. Both are Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit Edition.
Solaris.
Anyway, I'm interested in learning more about the tools available for Archiving and Compression, and, of course, anyone who would like to share their thoughts and experience and opinions, is very much welcome to do so.
I know there are a LOT of tools out there for this, and I've been trying to test out as many as I can, but I'd like some help if possible.
Now, the most important thing to ME, is the Compression Rates; I have a Server set up running Slackware Linux 12.0, and it's served me well over the last couple years. For the most part, and for the sake of Cross Platform ease of use, I've been using Bzip2 on that.
On Windows 7, I've installed TUGZip, PeaZip, and 7-Zip, which I actually like a lot. I also have WinRAR installed but I don't really use it, as I prefer the way the others work. But again, I'm going to use whatever works best after I learn more.
For Archiving, I've been keeping it oldschool and just using Tar. So with that particular aspect, I'm open to ANY Suggestions.
What I'd like to know, is the following if possible:
what is the absolute BEST Compression? I've had a lot of people tell me different things, and when I use my Server to take the load of Compressing multiple huge files, I generally just do this; bzip2 -v9 File;bzip2 -v9 OtherFile;bzip2 -v9 AnotherFile And so on.
I know I'm probably NOT getting the best possible space saving doing this, and so one thing I'd like to hear more from all of you about, is what I could do to get better Compression.
One of the main reasons I'm trying to do this, is that we have a limited budget, and even with Disk Space being so cheap, I still can't just go buy myself some huge multi Terabyte drive array, though I'd LOVE to.
The next thing I guess, is what Compression tools do all of you use? What have you had the best luck with?
My Server is Slackware 12.0, and it's very stripped down, and I don't have X installed, or anything like that, as I don't need that on a machine that rarely has a monitor turned on anyway, and I also don't understand why someone would actually want a GUI on a Server anyway, as that's RAM and CPU wasted on something that isn't required.
The types of files I'm compressing, are of all types. The reason I set this Server up was because I wanted a central machine I could upload Back Ups to. Basically, I took the very first Computer I ever bought, and because it was my main desktop for years, but the video card was starting to have issues in it, I thought "Why not just set it up as a Server since the GUI is the only area you notice the Video Card is having issues?" And so I did that.
The HD it came with, is a little odd because it's 43 GB. I took that HD out, and installed a brand new 120 GB HD, and then, installed the old HD it came with, and then did this:
I made the new HD the main Master, and put my Swap Partition on it, and then of course, my Root File System and all that. The old HD, the one it came with, which is 43 GBs, I decided to just simply make it one big Partition, and mounted it as "/storage" and then I made it so that all logged in users could read and write to and from it. This totally solved my problems with back ups.
Having so many machines made back ups a nightmare, and so, I decided to set it up with VSFTPd, and SSHd, and then, I made a user account to be used for logging in and uploading my back ups to. This actually has worked very well for me, and I wanted to make sure to have a valid user account, as I didn't want anonymous, and so anyway, before I go to far off topic, the facts are that I'm starting to run really low on disk space.
I have my Music Collection, which, a lot of them are MP3s, and then I also have Ogg Vorbis as well, and then a bunch of videos ranging from WMVs, AVIs, and MP4s, and then pictures as well in a variety of formats, and A LOT of PDFs, text, and so on. Basically, all the Data I think is Important, from every machine we have heh.
So basically, I'm just wondering if anyone would like to share some information or experience or opinions on the way they Archive and Compress their Data, and the Tools they use to do it. I do like 7zip and stuff, but I'm just wondering what all I should try.
The only thing that's really important, is the best Compression possible. If it happens to work on other things and is Cross Platform, that'd be a plus
Thanks all,
-gore
I wasn't really exactly sure where to post this, so if it's the wrong forum, please let me know.
Anyway, on to what I'd like to find out:
I'd like to know more about the Archiving and Compression Tools available on FreeBSD.
Information about my set up :
My Wife and I have a pretty large number of Computers in our Home, and we run a multitude of OSs here, which includes this:
FreeBSD (Mostly 9.0-RELEASE, and for this question, it's all that matters)
Linux - Slackware, Debian, OpenSUSE, Mandriva, LinuxConsole, NetSec L, a few others here and there, but they don't matter.
Windows - I have a single Windows Partition on ONE Computer, which is mainly for games, since, really, what other use would I have?
My Wife also has a Windows Partition. Both are Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit Edition.Solaris.
Anyway, I'm interested in learning more about the tools available for Archiving and Compression, and, of course, anyone who would like to share their thoughts and experience and opinions, is very much welcome to do so.
I know there are a LOT of tools out there for this, and I've been trying to test out as many as I can, but I'd like some help if possible.
Now, the most important thing to ME, is the Compression Rates; I have a Server set up running Slackware Linux 12.0, and it's served me well over the last couple years. For the most part, and for the sake of Cross Platform ease of use, I've been using Bzip2 on that.
On Windows 7, I've installed TUGZip, PeaZip, and 7-Zip, which I actually like a lot. I also have WinRAR installed but I don't really use it, as I prefer the way the others work. But again, I'm going to use whatever works best after I learn more.
For Archiving, I've been keeping it oldschool and just using Tar. So with that particular aspect, I'm open to ANY Suggestions.
What I'd like to know, is the following if possible:
what is the absolute BEST Compression? I've had a lot of people tell me different things, and when I use my Server to take the load of Compressing multiple huge files, I generally just do this; bzip2 -v9 File;bzip2 -v9 OtherFile;bzip2 -v9 AnotherFile And so on.
I know I'm probably NOT getting the best possible space saving doing this, and so one thing I'd like to hear more from all of you about, is what I could do to get better Compression.
One of the main reasons I'm trying to do this, is that we have a limited budget, and even with Disk Space being so cheap, I still can't just go buy myself some huge multi Terabyte drive array, though I'd LOVE to.
The next thing I guess, is what Compression tools do all of you use? What have you had the best luck with?
My Server is Slackware 12.0, and it's very stripped down, and I don't have X installed, or anything like that, as I don't need that on a machine that rarely has a monitor turned on anyway, and I also don't understand why someone would actually want a GUI on a Server anyway, as that's RAM and CPU wasted on something that isn't required.
The types of files I'm compressing, are of all types. The reason I set this Server up was because I wanted a central machine I could upload Back Ups to. Basically, I took the very first Computer I ever bought, and because it was my main desktop for years, but the video card was starting to have issues in it, I thought "Why not just set it up as a Server since the GUI is the only area you notice the Video Card is having issues?" And so I did that.
The HD it came with, is a little odd because it's 43 GB. I took that HD out, and installed a brand new 120 GB HD, and then, installed the old HD it came with, and then did this:
I made the new HD the main Master, and put my Swap Partition on it, and then of course, my Root File System and all that. The old HD, the one it came with, which is 43 GBs, I decided to just simply make it one big Partition, and mounted it as "/storage" and then I made it so that all logged in users could read and write to and from it. This totally solved my problems with back ups.
Having so many machines made back ups a nightmare, and so, I decided to set it up with VSFTPd, and SSHd, and then, I made a user account to be used for logging in and uploading my back ups to. This actually has worked very well for me, and I wanted to make sure to have a valid user account, as I didn't want anonymous, and so anyway, before I go to far off topic, the facts are that I'm starting to run really low on disk space.
I have my Music Collection, which, a lot of them are MP3s, and then I also have Ogg Vorbis as well, and then a bunch of videos ranging from WMVs, AVIs, and MP4s, and then pictures as well in a variety of formats, and A LOT of PDFs, text, and so on. Basically, all the Data I think is Important, from every machine we have heh.
So basically, I'm just wondering if anyone would like to share some information or experience or opinions on the way they Archive and Compress their Data, and the Tools they use to do it. I do like 7zip and stuff, but I'm just wondering what all I should try.
The only thing that's really important, is the best Compression possible. If it happens to work on other things and is Cross Platform, that'd be a plus
Thanks all,
-gore
