What backup methods do you use?

[altecsole]

We are considering our backup process and it would be interesting to see how some others do things.

 

At the moment our data is copied (using RoboCopy) across the network to a backup PC (Windows XP machine with a big drive). Once there it is compressed (using 7-Zip) to save space.

 

With this method we can keep about 2 weeks worth of backups, but we would like more. We do a normal backup on a Friday (starting at 6pm) and incremental backups each week night (Mon - Thur) at 6pm.

 

Typical user data for a normal backup is just over 100 GB. A normal backup with this much data takes 3 days - not good! Obviously compressing the data on the server before copying it across the network would improve things, but we would like to consider other methods too.

 

Non user data is copied to a second backup machine in a similar way.

 

Any thoughts please on the best way forward for this. We will be happy to go with a commercial product. Ease of user data restores is also an issue. At the moment we have to reset permission on user folders when data is restored to them - no big deal, but a nusiance non the less.

 

Thanks for reading and replying.

[indie]

We've got Veritas 10 with Remote Agents to backup from other servers, Advanced Open File Option to... backup open files and Intelligent Disaster Recovery which rocks.

 

We backup about 180GB in 4 hours to an SDLT320 drive with a tape for each day and we rotate the tapes each week.

 

No problems at all, doesn't take too long to restore data and the one time I had to use the IDR stuff, it worked

[alan-d]

Same here - Veritas

[Jake]

Same here, Veritas 10, funnily enough same drive too. Tape for each day, rotated bi-weekly

[RoyG]

I also use Veritas onto an HP Ultrium tape drive.

 

Full backup every Friday night, incremental Monday-Thursday. Switch to incremental for holidays.

 

Swap tape on Friday, then on Monday morning as the full backup > 200 Gb.

 

All scheduled - easy-peasy.

 

Also use Veritas OFO & IDR, haven't needed to test IDR yet, fingers crossed!!!

 

RoyG

[Quackers]

Admin Server:

 

Backup onto removable hard disks, daily, stored in fireproof safe.

 

Curriculum Servers:

 

Volume Shadow Copy everynight.

Followed by a Robocopy onto another PC other end of the school.

Once a week backup on to tape in a fireproof safe.

 

This way, kids can get there own backups back.

If the server fails, there is an indentical working copy that i can redirect the clients too, so VERY small down time.

 

If we have a fire, we lose no more than 4 days of kids work since we have weekly backups in the safe (If the school had a fire that bad it took the servers i do not think people would worry about losing 4 days work.

[indie]

If we have a fire, we lose no more than 4 days of kids work since we have weekly backups in the safe

 

Now where was it I read that fireproof data safes werent worth the money, most only handle 1-2 hours before they give up and melt.

[plexer]

Yes a fireproof safe will have a rating of how many hours it can survive this is how long it will protect the data for not melt itself though.

 

I suppose what you need as part of your DR plan is that the fire brigade are notified where the safe is so that they could rescue it?

 

Mines in my first floor office but I may change that now I've thought about it.

 

Ben

[Ric_]

I use Retrospect Multi Server version (unlimited network use) with Exchange and SQL clients and backup to a Tanberg LTO2 Autoloader (only £2500). Works OK and is quite fast.

 

I keep my tapes in a separate block to the servers which should help protect against the risk of fire - tape safes are expensive.

[plexer]

Tape safes are expensive but then how valuable is the data held within?

 

Ben

[Ric_]

hence why it is stolred in a different building... and chances are that the fire brigade aren't going to go fishing for your tape safe wilst the building is burning down.

[Norphy]

We use Legato Networker with a Certance Ultrium LTO 2 tape drive. My manager takes the backup tapes home with him every night so data is stored off site.

 

We've also enabled volume shadowing on our new Win2k3 file server and that in itself has completely eliminated the need for silly little restores.

 

Works very nicely

[_Rob_]

I'm about to roll out an LEA wide solution for remote backups, all schools will be backed up to a central location in the data centre then mirrored to a second location. The data is sent/store in an encrypted state and schools are the only ones with the encryption key.

 

Cost to schools, about £300 per annum.

 

Rob.

[MkII]

Surely there must be something wrong with that robocopy script?!?

 

I do a full backup every night of about 100Gb - and that to a terrastation with a mobile phone CPU [apparently! ]

 

Mon to thurs then 4 fridays giving me 4 weeks

[ajbritton]

My standard method is based on a command script which does the following;

 

1 - Call the EXE which makes a SIMS backup (admin servers only)

 

2 - Create a new tape name (based on date/time)

 

3 - Execute NTBackup with a predefined .BKS selection file

 

The whole thing runs as a Windows scheduled task (not via NTBackup) under the security context of a dedicated backup user account that has Administrator level access.

 

The system works fine as long as the data fits on a single tape.

 

I don't think this solution would be useful for anything but the simplest of sites but I thought I'd throw it it to show how penny pinching I am!

[kingswood]

Veritas here too and I also complete a full backup to Lacie external hard drive once a month. In addition we have a Recovery Manager Server on our network, so this helps with dynamic backups of student and staff saved data and recovery of lost files (much like volume shadow copy).

 

Paul

[john]

NTBackup here (I want Veritas as I have always used it in the past and its excellent), with muggines here swapping the tapes (Ultrium 1s) daily. We backup all pupil data, images, finance stuff and admin home areas daily in full (about a 70GB backup) Takes just over 1 1/2hrs now its on a new server. Don't backup exchange, SQL or profiles, or anything else really atm, need to look at doing something though.

[Ric_]

One of the main reasons for me choosing Retrospect over Veritas was the pricing structure.

 

* £525 for Multi-Server license - allows back up of all your servers, workstations, laptops, etc.

* £299 for an SQL agent

* £295 for an Exchange Agent

 

This is a lot cheaper than Veritas (especially if you are pulling data from 4 servers as I am).

[altecsole]

Thanks for all the replies.

 

Just out of interest; has anyone used SonaSafe? We need a better solution for backing up Exchange and this caught my eye. We currently use NTBackup to backup the infostore, but this means we can only restore the whole infostore, not individual mailboxes or email - no ideal!

 

Veritas looks good, but it also looks very expensive.

 

Our plan is to backup to a network location and then use a USB external drive for off site storage.

 

Thanks for all the input, it's appreciated.

[tarquel]

Need to update my backup plan a bit after looking at this - although I have already started.

 

Have a Buffalo Terrastation 1TB waiting in a box for the task of night backups.

 

Thinking along the lines of adding the shadow service thingy [brain gone to mush right now] also but can someone point out the overhead and cot of storage before i start using up the unpartitioned space on the new 146Gig HDD hehe

 

Also gonna daily backup [mon-fri] to tape over a 2 week period and probably do a single one during the holiday period [tho the tape drive is making some odd sounds hehe]

 

Regards

Nath

[john]

Just to update mine - just got a USB2 DAT72 drive for backing up all the other servers stuff. HPs have front mounted USBs so just plug her in and away we go, the tapes are dirt cheap, and I mean DIRT cheap. So thats all the machines done, will probably back up mailserver and SQL maybe once a week, and other machines, system statuses & OTDR maybe once a month or maybe maybe every 1/2 term.

[Richie1972]

We're currently running Retrospect 7.0, but find it to be slow and, well, a bit crap compared to Veritas 9.1 that we use on the SIMS server.

We're probably going to rip it out and install Veritas 10 later this year and implement a better DR solution that involves a PC sitting in another building with a load of hard drive space that runs NTBackup on a nightly basis - this will also mean that we can restore lost work in less than a few minutes.

 

Anyone else had problems with their Retrospect grinding to a halt or just with its general performance?

 

To be honest, as we're running Win2003 is there any need for some of these backup software apps with "open file" backups when there's volume shadow copy?

[Ric_]

@Richie: Dos_Box and I love Retrospect (we are both now running 7.5 but it's virtually the same). We also both use the Tandberg LTO2 Autoloader - I suspect that some hardware works better than others.

 

The main advtange of Retrospect over Viritas is the price. A multi-server retrospect license is the same price as 2 veritas licenses. It therefore makes sense to go for retrospect if you have more than 2 servers!

[rupturedtoad]

I use Bacula (free open source network backup system - http://www.bacula.org) to back up the servers to three ultrium drives. Daily incrementals, Set of four full weekly backups and a full monthly that goes to an offsite storage facility (a shoebox in the network manager's back bedroom).

[Richie1972]

We have a backup server, so all we'd need to buy are either clients for the other servers, or just back them up across the network for veritas.

I had thought that I could download and install retrospect 7.5 as an upgrade to our 7.0 - in case that fixed the performance issues - however it seems that you have to pay for 7.5 - it's not a free upgrade from 7.0