Full Offsite Cloud Backup Solution

[Nausing]

Hi peeps,

 

We are currently using DPM 2007 to backup our file storage data to a 3TB NAS onsite, which is working lovely.. 3 backups daily, 10 day retention.

 

I now want to backup ~10 physical servers to a cloud system. This will be system states, exchange server, SQL databases. Inc. our file storage server for weekly backups with a 4 week rotation.

 

I am interested in RackSpace Cloud Files, as they offer 7p/GB storage pay as you go with 8p/GB download which should be fine due to the fact that a download would be rare.. hopefully..

 

Anyway my question is, I need a client/software to run the backup schedules and send up to RackSpace Cloud Files. I have seen some tools online that RackSpace suggest but none currently offer system state, exchange & SQL backup. Any suggests?

 

Also it would be helpful to know what you use for offsite backups and what rotation/schedule you work with.

 

Thank you!

 

P.S I estimate the entile backup to be around 2.5-3TB mark.. possibly more.

 

P.S.S I have looked at CeeJay (formerly Crash Plan) but they do not offer Exchange/SQL backup, just file.. although you can run alongside another client to create the file and then use CeeJay to backup...

Edited April 11, 2013 by Nausing

[plexer]

Take a look a Redstor?

 

Ben

[Millgate]

Hi Theo,

 

We provide offsite back up. If you drop me your details on a PM or email, I'll send you some info

 

Luke

[Meldrew]

I am interested in RackSpace Cloud Files, as they offer 7p/GB storage pay as you go with 8p/GB download which should be fine due to the fact that a download would be rare.. hopefully..

 

I'm not up with cloud storage costs at all (this may be cheap for all I know), but isn't this a very expensive way of storing backups? 7p per month per gig = £860 per terabyte per year, not taking download of restores into account (which as you say should be rare).

 

Meldrew

[Nausing]

I'm not up with cloud storage costs at all (this may be cheap for all I know), but isn't this a very expensive way of storing backups? 7p per month per gig = £860 per terabyte per year, not taking download of restores into account (which as you say should be rare).

 

Meldrew

 

We are currently paying £248 a month for 1TB backup with GigaSoft..... works out around 19p a GB.

Edited April 11, 2013 by Nausing

[Nausing]

Hi Theo,

 

We provide offsite back up. If you drop me your details on a PM or email, I'll send you some info

 

Luke

 

I emailed you...

[Gibson335]

We are currently paying £248 a month for 1TB backup with GigaSoft..... works out around 19p a GB.

 

3 grand a year per Tb??

 

* blows out cheeks *

 

Sounds like a lot of dosh.

[glennda]

I can recommend Datto's backup appliances - they are actually Hybrid cloud, so you backup locally and then it replicates itself out into the cloud nightly.

[teejay]

We looked at this and it was actually cheaper to backup to encrypted tape and store offsite. Another option is if you're friendly with another school then you could have a reciprocal agreement where you backup onto storage at each others site. We did look at this, but as soon as it was mentioned to our lawyers there was some sharp intake of breath and talk of contracts and liability so we backed off from it. You also have to be careful of data protection as you will be storing sensitive data off premises. You could try the government purchasing portal who have pre-agreed contracts for this - CloudStore | G-CloudG-Cloud

[truebluesteve]

I'm currently evaluating 2 cloud backup providers - for 1Tb of data one company has quoted us £1400 and the other £2600 so it pays to shop around. Both have unlimited server/client licenses.

 

Have to say that doing restores seems to be an awful lot easier and quicker than Backup Exec

[glennda]

The main area to consider with Cloud Backup is how easily you can get your data back and the SLA for doing so. For example you have companies such as Databarracks who will charge anything between 500 and 1000 per TB per month but will get your data back to you within 24 hours (on USB drive with an engineer) and also start a restore (anywhere in the UK). You also have companies such as Mozy pro who will quite happily take you data for a fraction of the cost say £300 (its $380 for a TB). But for that to get your data back in the event of DR its a case of getting it over the wire or waiting longer to have it shipped on a USB drive. These are both companies I work with.

 

And the datto product I also mention above, is Hybrid cloud, do you have a 500gb, 1TB, 2TB, 5TB, 10TB or 25Tb unit on site, these units run a custom version of Ubuntu 10.04 and use a product called Shadow Protect to backup within each machine (whether its physical or virtual it doesn't matter). It backs these up to VMDK format which is actually bootable from 3 clicks of a button on a Datto appliance (there is a version which doesn't support the on-site virtulisation). These are then replicated out to the cloud at a frequency which is set by you (once a day, once every half day etc). And in the event of DR you can physically boot your servers off the Datto Cloud and run them from there - so in essence you can redirect dns records to the datto DC and run your infrastructure temporarily in the Datto cloud, once a new site etc is in place you can do the reverse and backup back to the new site and start them again.

[CyberNerd]

These are the Amazon S3 prices:

Amazon S3 Pricing, Pay as you go for Cloud Computing Object Storage

 

Standard Storage Reduced Redundancy Storage Glacier Storage

First 1 TB / month $0.095 per GB $0.076 per GB $0.011 per GB

Next 49 TB / month $0.080 per GB $0.064 per GB $0.011 per GB

Next 450 TB / month $0.070 per GB $0.056 per GB $0.011 per GB

Next 500 TB / month $0.065 per GB $0.052 per GB $0.011 per GB

Next 4000 TB / month $0.060 per GB $0.048 per GB $0.011 per GB

Over 5000 TB / month $0.055 per GB $0.037 per GB $0.011 per GB

 

Data Transfer IN To Amazon S3

All data transfer in $0.000 per GB

Data Transfer OUT From Amazon S3 To

Amazon EC2 in the same region $0.000 per GB

Another AWS Region or Amazon CloudFront $0.020 per GB

Data Transfer OUT From Amazon S3 To Internet

First 1 GB / month $0.000 per GB

Up to 10 TB / month $0.120 per GB

Next 40 TB / month $0.090 per GB

Next 100 TB / month $0.070 per GB

Next 350 TB / month $0.050 per GB

Next 524 TB / month Contact Us

Next 4 PB / month Contact Us

Greater than 5 PB / month Contact Us

[chazzy2501]

I looked into this and it was way to much, I now have a 2nd backup server in a remote building (in the hopes that they're unlikley to both burn down. I also have a bimonthly encrypted backup on a 3tb drive that lives in the boot of my car! incase a biblical sinkhole swallows the entire school...

[maark]

For disaster recovery then amazon glacier looks good about $22 dollars a month for 2TB - keep meaning to get it setup here. Data retrieval is a bit more if you want it in a hurry but if the college burns to the ground then that is the least of your worries. If you have your backup server in a different part of school to your main servers then you are only going to need it in extreme circumstances. Edited April 12, 2013 by maark

[Nausing]

3 grand a year per Tb??

 

* blows out cheeks *

 

Sounds like a lot of dosh.

 

Redstor quoted me £666/mo for 3TB storage for all my servers and exchange/sql

[Nausing]

I'm currently evaluating 2 cloud backup providers - for 1Tb of data one company has quoted us £1400 and the other £2600 so it pays to shop around. Both have unlimited server/client licenses.

 

Have to say that doing restores seems to be an awful lot easier and quicker than Backup Exec

 

What providers are these?

[Vintage82]

There are a good amount of differences between backup providers - it seems everyone is focusing on the price comparison as opposed to comparing the technologies/functionality/benefits delivered.

 

I work for one of the backup vendors that have been mentioned in this thread - We always ask prospective customers to make sure they are comparing like for like and ask potential providers a range of questions which I've included a few below. In fact, I only know of one other cloud backup organisation focused on the education market who prompt customers to ask similar questions. I'd say if your prospective backup partner can't provide the info, you should be going elsewhere...

 

The Technology

• Is the service encrypted? At source?

• Deduplication/compression included?

• How long does the service retain your data for? Is this flexible or does it incur extra cost?

• Does the service provide support for application plug-ins? SIMS, Exchange, SQL etc.

• How does the pricing model work? Is the price for the data only or are their separate costs? E.g. server licencing, restore costs

• Does the service provide automated reporting options?

• Does the service provide a central console for all backup accounts?

• Does the service provide options for large backups or restores?

 

The Company

• What other schools use the service?

• Will you be billed on data selected, or data stored?

• How many copies of the data are kept?

• What type of storage is the data kept on? SAN/NAS, enterprise disk or hard drives

• Do they provide Service Level Agreements?

• Where is the data stored? If the data isn’t stored in the UK, what laws in that country exist around data protection?

• How quickly can you get your data back in an emergency?

• Do they own their own datacentres?

• Do they use their own backup technology or resell another service?

• If the company goes bust, how can you get your data back?

• If the technology provider goes bust, how can you get your data back?

• Are they ISO accredited? ISO9001 (Quality Management) and/or ISO27001 (Information Security)?

• Is it a subsidiary company of a larger business?

[TheGoodGuy]

Anyone know anything about these guys?

 

http://www.myschoolbackup.co.uk

 

Their pricing seems very reasonable...

[Vintage82]

TGG - Reading the website suggests the technology behind the service is Livedrive.

[TheGoodGuy]

Ah so they are just acting as a reseller? Doubtful the servers are UK based then.

[Vintage82]

Ah so they are just acting as a reseller? Doubtful the servers are UK based then.

 

Seems to look that way, but can't say I have ever come across the parent company (PraTech UK Ltd) in my time to comment too much.

[TheGoodGuy]

Well the livedrive for business say they are uk based..

 

https://www.livedrive.com/ForBusiness

 

(make sure you set uk pricing at the top)

 

I am contacting them for more information.

[jamesbmarshall]

I have no experience with it, but Cloud Storage | Cloud-Integrated Storage | StorSimple could be a good option?

[mbedford]

Another vote for Amazon's Glaciar solution. We use that in conjunction with a piece of software called Cloudberry, this is an agent that sits on a server and collates all of the storage you want sending to Amazon and the uploads it in jobs\batches that you control.

 

We have uploaded easily 10TB+ over the last 4-6 months, the price is ridiculously cheap but there are caveats. Its VERY!! slow to get your data back, and its costly (to retrieve the data, cheap to send it and store it), but for a final DR backup which, lets face it, none of us ever intend to use, its nice to have.

 

If you want any further info, just PM me, i'm not a reseller or vendor, just an College Admin who is happily using it :-)

 

Mike

[xenonive]

The solution I'm looking at is putting a NAS box in a school down the road with Internet connection , something like a 8Tb QNAP box and they do the same with us. As we both use LEA Internet connection they are sorting the external and internal network access for us.