Backup Solutions?

nikhilchand · 2014-09-25T15:10:05.000Z

Curious what everyone here does for backup? I currently have an old server with an LTO-3 tape drive and BackupExec. Full backup only takes 2 tapes, which I keep offsite monthlies (12 month) and yearlies (forever). Daily and weekly I keep on onsite disk.

I am working on quoting a new backup system. Currently, I am looking SAS LTO-6, 2-tape rack mount library. This will allow me to put my dailies and weeklies back on to tape and free up my disk storage. It will also get me down to 1 tape backups with plenty of room for growth.

I am wondering from you out there, are any newer technologies I should investigate? Is LTO still the way to go hands down?

Thanks!

marc92 · 2014-09-25T15:15:54.000Z

I would HIGHLY suggest looking at disk based backups, with archiving to tape. There are a ton of options and several GreenGuys/Gals will be chiming in. My short list: Unitrends, Veeam, Quorum.

@Veeam_Software

jbrix · 2014-09-25T15:16:23.000Z

Yeah LTO is still the king imo, although high grade Blu-ray is another tech coming along, but I think it’s still not proven, maybe in another 5-10 years, right now max is about 150GB. Sony says they’ve developed 1 TB blu-rays but who knows when they’ll release those and at what price.

marc92 · 2014-09-25T15:18:57.000Z

To give you my hands on experience, we went from Symantec BE backing up to LTO-4 tapes to Unitrends with archiving to removable hard drives. Backup windows are now minutes long rather than hours long and restores are even faster.

I dropped tape completely, but only because we would have needed to buy a new tape drive, and the eSATA dock for removable hard drives where cheaper and easier.

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:24:36.000Z

LTO is still the choice for tape, but like Marc says, maybe time to get off of tape. Disk is pretty good today.

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:25:51.000Z

Or maybe a VTL, which is disk. There are a lot of those that can even run as virtual machines. I like that

Neally · 2014-09-25T15:28:45.000Z

My 3 vendors of choice:

Veeam (for VMs)
Unitrends ( for VMs / Physica backups)
Acronis

You can also look in a BDR solution (if needed)

nikhilchand · 2014-09-25T15:29:17.000Z

I have thought about the 100% disk option. I guess I am trying to wrap my head around the reliability of disk still. I still see disks fail all the time in servers, PCs, etc and worry about long term storage for our data center. I am backing up healthcare data and we need long, reliable retention.

I really like having the backup-to-disk for my daily backups as it is super fast, but are disks really that good for long term storage and archiving too?

brentjohnson5048 · 2014-09-25T15:37:20.000Z

Veeam with disk array and LTO library.

LTO is still the cheapest option for archiving

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:39:59.000Z

Cheers, Neally and Brent

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:42:11.000Z

Fair point: nchand423, all disk is a risk if none of the disk systems are are off-site.

Even today, the portability of tape can’t be beat. Acquisition cost is good also.

marc92 · 2014-09-25T15:42:16.000Z

nchand423:

I have thought about the 100% disk option. I guess I am trying to wrap my head around the reliability of disk still. I still see disks fail all the time in servers, PCs, etc and worry about long term storage for our data center. I am backing up healthcare data and we need long, reliable retention.

I really like having the backup-to-disk for my daily backups as it is super fast, but are disks really that good for long term storage and archiving too?

If you are most comfortable with Tape as a long term solution, then use tape as your archive medium. It is still a very good option for long term storage. Other options are archiving to some form of cloud storage.

My only suggestion would be to move away from daily backups to tape. First level backups to disk, then write those backups to tape. Keeps your production systems free from spending resources on backups.

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:49:16.000Z

“My only suggestion would be to move away from daily backups to tape.”

+1000 to that!!!

nikhilchand · 2014-09-25T15:49:51.000Z

Can someone provide insight on Veeam? I am pretty happy with Backup Exec. I backup Exchange, SQL, AD, file system. I do not back up entire VMs/snapshots/etc.

rick-veeam · 2014-09-25T15:52:42.000Z

Hi nchand423 - simple explanation here:

-Backup software built for VMs

-1 agentless backup gives you up to 26 restore scenarios with v7 (v8 will have 39)

-Fully storage agnostic

You can download a trial at Veeam.com or our NFR for spiecheads: FREE NFR keys for NEW Veeam Availability Suite

marc92 · 2014-09-25T16:04:14.000Z

nchand423:

Can someone provide insight on Veeam? I am pretty happy with Backup Exec. I backup Exchange, SQL, AD, file system. I do not back up entire VMs/snapshots/etc.

Then you are skipping one of the best features of using VMs, the ease of backing up snapshots. In the past 2 years I’ve had to restore an RDS host twice due to users downloading a virus. I wouldn’t know what to do if I had to restore that from a file level only backup. Restore the VM with a couple clicks and I’m done. Server came up like it had been turned off for a couple of days.

laurie-symantec · 2014-09-25T16:08:40.000Z

So not trying to give a sales pitch here, but have you looked at the Backup Exec 3600 Appliance?

The Backup Exec 3600 Appliance has an external SAS connection that allows for tape connectivity. This would fit well with the option you mention of the SAS LTO 6 tape library. It also features support for the latest Hypervisor, OS’s and Application releases, and can recover virtual machines within minutes. You can find more information at the following links:

http://www.symantec.com/backup-exec-3600-appliance

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albert-steelgate · 2014-09-25T16:28:15.000Z

if you have the tape hardware, you may as well make use of it but I wouldn’t invest any more $ into it. You should also do a backup to a NAS or USB and to the cloud as well if you can.

Steelgate can do local and offsite backup to any media (tape, disk, DVD, cloud, etc…), if you want to try new stuff, I am here to help

Albert, ametais@steelgate.com

nikhilchand · 2014-09-25T16:41:23.000Z

Laurie, sales pitches are welcome so long as they are relevant (which yours is…)!

This appliance looks very nice, but for the price I wonder why I wouldn’t just buy a really nice 4 or 8-drive Win2012 server and external SAS LTO drive, and install my current license of BackupExec on it? Granted this looks very easy to set up and configure, but I am pretty comfortable around BackupExec installs as it is.

With all that being said, you all are convincing me to continue on my path of disk backups for dailys and tape just for the archives. It is working very well now, so maybe I should look into a dedicated NAS instead of a 2-drive LTO system. I could probably just drop to an external single LTO-6 SAS drive for my archive tapes, allotting more of the budget for a new disk array instead.

courtenay-zetta · 2014-09-25T16:47:27.000Z

Hi Nikhil. Have you considered moving to or adding a cloud-based backup to save on the cost & complexity of tape-based offsite solution. Here’s a tape replacement ROI calculator tool to help you determine your potential savings.

http://www.zetta.net/offsite-backup-calculator.php