unattended backups

[falconindy]

Not if the correct device drivers are not installed. I've found it difficult to get Linux to work properly with my hardware even when it's properly installed.

I think you should educate yourself about Linux drivers work (and how they're vastly different from Windows drivers). If driver support wasn't as it is, liveCDs would be a horrible failure. They're clearly not. There's also a reason Windows doesn't make LiveCDs.

To make up for the missing archive bit do the following:

Create a database.
create a row with a timestamp when you archive a file and to which disk you saved it. Give them an arbitrary number or some identifier.
When backing up check the modified date on each file against the database. If it's newer then back it up again. If the fs has the modification date tracking feature turned off save a hash and size of the file. You can detect changes by rehashing the files and comparing against the database.

So every time I want to do a backup, I need to lookup, possibly hash, and compare 72000 files with a list of equal or larger (due to garbage accumulation) size? Yikes. I suspect my backup is small compared to yours as well (~3GiB uncompressed), given that you suggest the need for multiple DVDs.

Curious -- what is your aversion to using an external hdd? Your goal is unattended backups, but you want to be responsible for manually switching removable media if need be?