Backuping up a server

[Midget]

i use a tape style backup regieme with HDDs and a hotswap eSATA caddy. hdds for mon-thur and 4 for fridays

[dhicks]

Originally Posted by rocknrollstar

I thought that if I did the system state backup, that was effectively backing up the domain controller?

Yes, should be. I was just saying in that other thread that I'd find it easier to run the domain controller as a virtual machine and use the VM system's method of backing up, but it was pointed out that there's some potential pitfalls when running DCs as VMs, generally when you have multiple DCs around the place. You have one DC and no VM system, therefore a system state backup would seem to be just the ticket.

I see you a lot on the TES ICT threads- very helpful! There are some real idiots on there, so nice to have some genuinely helpful people

Well, it must be annoying for ICT teaching staff to be expected to be the ones with the technical knowledge to sort every other teacher's problem out. Most times I'm tempted to say "Ah, technical question - ask on EduGeek instead!"

--
David Hicks

[srochford]

Originally Posted by kmount

It's all very well and good doing the back up to file, just make sure the file is backed up to tape as the hard disk may fail

and then copy the tape to something else because the tape might fail :-)

Toucing lots of wood, I've never been unable to restore from disc backups (always discs in "other" machines, of course,) but I've had lots of tape failures - I now won't use them because they are inconvenient, unreliable and expensive!)

[torledo]

Originally Posted by srochford

and then copy the tape to something else because the tape might fail :-)

Toucing lots of wood, I've never been unable to restore from disc backups (always discs in "other" machines, of course,) but I've had lots of tape failures - I now won't use them because they are inconvenient, unreliable and expensive!)

I'd second that, and it goes back to what i was saying about a D2D solution for backup and restore reducing the reliance on tape as the first port of call for backup. In terms of offsite backup i think tape is still favoured but the eSATA caddies and usb hard disk methods as described by others seems a perfectly good way of eliminating tape from the offsite backup regimen.

But this trend of disk for taking offsite is definitely at the lower end for the moment...for middle and large IT depts manufacturers will still sell a lot of tape, and those that are looking at building some sort of disk based removable media backup devices to replace tape tend to try and mimic tape libraries with their products. So disk based libraries that look like and smell like tape except they don't use tapes. Go figure. It's a bit like the VTL trend, VTL's are based on the premise that orgs want to backup to tape but they want to use something that they're familiar with, so a VTL will emulate traditional tape operations. Again, it's a somewhat bizarre idea that uses modern disk based technology but looks back to traditional tape operations, all because it's what depts. are used to, even though most admins don't like traditional backup software and backup operatrions.

I just might get one of thoese eSATA caddies (preferably rack mount) and try using them instead of out tape autoloaders. I'm sure they'd work just as fine. Does anyone have any recommendations, preferably something that uses disks that can be read standalone via usb if required. Sorry not familar with what's available.

[SYNACK]

Originally Posted by torledo

I just might get one of thoese eSATA caddies (preferably rack mount) and try using them instead of out tape autoloaders. I'm sure they'd work just as fine. Does anyone have any recommendations, preferably something that uses disks that can be read standalone via usb if required. Sorry not familar with what's available.

We just got a whole bunch of Digitus eSATA/USB enclosures and equiped them with 1TB drives, they are pretty quick when it comes to eSATA operation and alright at USB. eSATA cables are not the most secure things though as they don't lock into place on any of the hardware that I have used them on. The cables are also more suseptable to interfearence than USB is so you want to keep them well clear of power cords.

For something a bit more robust you are probably looking at something like this in a server drive bay:
DIGITUS: Accessories

[rocknrollstar]

Thanks for your help. I've now setup NTBackup to do a system state backup to the shared hard drives. Nice to know that it's safer than it was

Thanks.

[Joedetic]

@dhicks I never got round to playing with DRBD...I keep meaning to get a small test setup between two machines. It's just a case of getting round to it...maybe I'll get the time now it's summer hols (hah!)

I had a quick play with Linux-HA though. Simple Heartbeat setup with Apache. Apache ran on one IP with one machine as the master...that machine failed and the slave machine picked up using the IP the master was running on.

[ChrisP]

Mine is a little unconventional.. no raid for OS drive

bfs1=backup-fileserver1
bfs2=backup-fileserver2
bfs3=backup-fileserver3

LEVEL1

For ghost type recovery I try not to have the main OS on a raid array, just a simple sata will do.
every term I ghost all servers OS HDs
everynight I have every server automate a System state backup to bfs1
everynight most servers have a local dat72 that back up sys state and cherrypicked files
everynight fileservers etc. backup non OS HD's (raid array) to bfs1
all servers shadow copy set to twice a day.

LEVEL2
shadow copy on bfs1 set to everyday
so now bfs1 has a local copy of everythig. SYSstates, apps, profiles etc.
bfs1 has a 800gig LTO3 that backs up everything everynight. ( GF,F,S )


LEVEL3
bfs2 is old PC's with a few 500gig drives in it running basic raid 0 to give prenty of storage.
bfs2 backs up bfs1 everynight and shadowcopy is set to 2days

LEVEL4
bfs3 is old PC's with a few 500gig drives in it running basic raid 0 to give prenty of storage.
bfs3 backs up bfs2 everynight and shadowcopy is set to 1 week


LEVEL5
VMs and select files from bfs3 are backed up every term to a couple of external 500gig drives

[dhicks]

Originally Posted by ChrisP

Mine is a little unconventional.. no raid for OS drive

We don't, either - we're aiming for a Google-style distributed computing platform on commodity hardware (which translates as "You didn't think the bursar would actually give you money for a real RAID card, did you?"). But that's the nice thing about running everything as virtual machines - all you have to have installed on each machine is your standard VM system, so if a boot drive does fail all I have to do is replace it and re-install our standard (documented, ish) CentOs setup.

--
David Hicks