Hello, I have a bunch of personal data - videos, pictures, documents, PDFs etc. that I want to backup.

I am wondering what is the best way to do this?

Requirements -

• I want to backup multiple different folders from my Linux computer - it is not a full disk backup.
• Encryption would be great to have.
• This needs to be a long term backup - like few years or more.
• Data - small videos, pictures, PDFs, text files, documents, etc. Total size - less than 50-60 GB (for now - but it can increase over time).
• I want to be able to incrementally add more data to backup of respective folders (e.g. new photos, documents etc.), or even add new folders.
• After backup, I want to be able to cleanup my hard disk, reinstall OS or restore data from backup onto a completely new system in a new directory.
• I do not care about stuff like file metadata like owner user, permissions etc.

Questions -

1. Is one or more flash drives good for such kind of backup? Or would it get corrupt within few years?
2. I found Borg backup, but it suggests that backup should be restored on the same machine - which does not seem to fit my use case.

• It also suggests to keep Borg config directory - which again conflicts with restoring or adding new items from a different system.
• Not sure how well this would work if restoring on a new system?
• Are there any better alternatives?

1. If I do use Borg, should using one repository per folder be the way to go about it? Or is there a better way?
2. In Borg itself, I am thinking of using the repokey method (key stored with the repository) - and store the passphrase in a KeePass database on a different flash drive. Any different suggestions?

Please feel free to suggest any alternatives or improvements to my plan.

I use restic. It works well. I’m not sure it meets all your requirements, but I’m going to sleep so I’ll have to respond more in the morning.

I’m a fan of kopia-ui

On Linux, Borg backup is often recommended, but I like kopia-ui as it works on all the desktop os and when I need to help others with backing up I can just use this single tool.

Luckily, I’ve never needed to recover from a backup, but it seems to work well and when I test that data is retrievable, it has been.