[stomachmonkey]

These days most external drives come with some sort of automated back up solution built in.

As a first line of defense I prefer a physical hard drive to DVD's or online solutions.

I'd look for a mirrored solution, it will have 2 hard drives that will contain the same data. Redundancy in case one drive fails. $200-300. Quick, unattended back ups.

That does not help if your place burns down so determine what you absolutely can not afford to lose and back that up to an online solution.

DVD's take a while to burn and the shelf life is suspect so I don't bother with them anymore.