Need a free backup solution

[aidenbran2000]

Ok one of the schools which i will be taking over in a couple of weeks has got no backups of any files whatsoever!!!!

 

There is a spare physical server laying around which may work just to use as storage but wondering what you would recommend to get backups working and any free software i can use? I use Veeam at my current place but the school at the moment will not pay for it so need a free solution just so i can get home drives backed up.

[HBPS]

veeam endpoint is free and works a treat

[elsiegee40]

Ok one of the schools which i will be taking over in a couple of weeks has got no backups of any files whatsoever!!!!

 

There is a spare physical server laying around which may work just to use as storage but wondering what you would recommend to get backups working and any free software i can use? I use Veeam at my current place but the school at the moment will not pay for it so need a free solution just so i can get home drives backed up.

 

I would challenge the "can't afford" with Senior Management.

 

The school and the MAT cannot afford to lose everything. The one thing demonstrated by recent crypto outbreaks and by @DSapseid 's fire is that full and proper backups are not a luxury; they're essential

 

Backup talk from our conference

Edited July 3, 2017 by elsiegee40

[mikkydoos]

+1 for Veeam endpoint. I does work well as long as you can boot with the correct NIC driver - which is a pain.

[3s-gtech]

Primarily we use Robocopy and scripts to back up actual files - we do also use WSB to back up individual servers to iSCSI mounted drives in another building. Both are free and have saved us from data loss before.

[dry]

Whack on something like Iperius Backup to get at least some backups going. Also use Windows Server Backup to get some system state/VM backups.

 

This should hopefully buy you enough time to make a case to SLT about why money should be spent on a proper backup solution.

[Oaktech]

You can go a lot further wrong that a mahoosive drive array, windows baremetal backups and a robocopy script to ensure you keep as many days as you have space for.

 

But yeah, Veeam...

[themightymrp]

Veeam Backup and Replication 9.5 Free edition for any virtual machines. Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows Free edition for any physical servers. Works no problem here.

[djm968]

Windows Server Backup?

[colly72]

+1 for Veeam. It will help you sleep soundly at night.......

[TwistedHelixis]

The newer versions of windows backup does loads. Can do host vm backups etc to another server etc. Its free and you can also set schedules etc

[Sylv3r]

We use Veeam endpoint here for the primary schools we look after too.

[Roberto]

I would challenge the "can't afford" with Senior Management.

 

So very much this. If Senior Leadership think that backups are expensive, they should see the cost of losing all their data.

 

Veeam endpoint rightly gets a lot of love. I think if they have MS campus then Azure backup can do backup to disks on a local server for free, too. Open source backup programs such as Amanda are also a thing. But backups will still have a cost unless the technician managing them agrees to work for free.

Edited July 5, 2017 by Roberto

[theeggmaster]

We've just implemented Vembu BDR Free edition. Scheduled Hyper-V / VMWare and file-level backups for free. I think it's excellent and saved us purchasing Veeam.

[browolf]

Synctoy 2.1 is good for backing up user files. https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=15155

[aidenbran2000]

Just looking at the free version of Veeam. Does it do full VM backups? All the servers have been added but just need to know where to go next.

 

EDIT: I have also got a qnap storage box which may be helpful for the backups got about 8tb free

Edited July 10, 2017 by aidenbran2000