Mon, 2008-08-04 10:02.
iTunes' iPhone backup is absolutely horrid. i've just about decided to completely replace it with rsync, so i figured i'd give it one last go. it's been 2 hours since i plugged my phone in and iTunes auto-synced. it's been over a week since my last rsync backup. how do they compare?
time
iTunes backup—crashed after 1.5 hours. resulted in corrupted backup, will not be able to restore from it.
rsync—5 minutes, 32 seconds.
connection
iTunes backup—plug in via dock connector/usb.
rsync—wi-fi.
speed
iTunes backup—USB 2.0 theoretical maximum: 480 Mbits/second. actual speed: approx 2.3 Mbits/sec.
rsync—actual transfer speed: 440 Mbits/sec.
data transferred
iTunes backup— ~16 Gb
rsync— ~155 Mb
data availability
iTunes backup—stored in a single compressed image. not available.
rsync—stored in a standard folder on my data drive. very available.
revision availability
iTunes backup—last backup. available only as a complete reimage, assuming the last backup didn't crash. if last backup crashed (about 66% probability, in my experience), not available at all. ever.
rsync—thanks to the magic of Time Machine, every single sync is backed up. every change. every revision. these backups can be restored piecemeal, as needed.
ease of restoration
iTunes backup—plug in phone. hope iTunes has a valid backup image. curse.
rsync—run the reverse rsync command, go about your merry way. can restore a single app or folder, or the entire iPhone.
triggers
iTunes backup—plug phone into computer, manual sync.
rsync—cron jobs, folder actions, bluetooth proximity, IP address availability, manual sync.
approx wait after plugging phone into computer before i can do anything with my phone other than looking a pretty "syncing" screen
iTunes backup—1.5 hours
rsync—0 seconds
final score

verdict?
wow.
Have you seen the Spore reviews on Amazon.com? Nobody wants to "rent" their game from EA. And it's not like DRM works. Cracked copies of Spore were available days before the game was officially released. So the pirates are the only ones who don't have to deal with the inconvenience…
At what point will software companies learn that preventing piracy should never come at the cost of inconvenience to their legitimate (paying) customers?
(original quote)