Creating an offsite Backup server

Jiggy

Jiggy

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i want to make a backup server at my office.

at the moment i have two sites and everyone backups to the server at that allocated site. i would now like to have a central backup solution and have that back up the servers/ users, how can i get them to do an internet backup?

will i need specific software?
 
Not sure exactly what your asking? If what you want is just having a server backed up to the internet. That fairly simple with something like rsync.

If you want things on the users pc's doing the backups you could also look at dropbox.
 
Please elaborate but from what I understand you should be able to "sync" your backup server data to a central location like Dropbox or Google drive for both sites without much effort using a automated task or cronjob.
 
I like the free Comodo backup, which can be set to create remote or network backups (or both)

It can also backup to the cloud (if you have an account with them or a variety of others)
 
i want to backup important stuff, like email, and documents to a dedicated backup server over the internet.

this is the layout:

the server hosts all the files, it is mapped to the users.
i need to run a back up of each users .pst file to the server.
i would like to do a daily back up of the server to my offsite dedicated backup server
the back up will do incremental backups and sync the modified files

Restore Dc does all of that but how do i send it over the internet to my dedicated backup server.

i understand i need to assign a static ip and use dyndns to have it available at all times

dropbox and the likes wont work as it has to be done manually and they don't have enough space.

i will look at rsync and comodo.
 
This could turn into quite an expensive implementation, especially on bandwidth. It would also mean exposing a server sharing user’s data to the internet, so you'd have to make sure your security is tight, I wouldn't recommend hosting it on Windows. Additionally, think about speed of the connection, copying several gigs of .pst files over a 4meg might take longer than you'd expect it to, especially if the target server is hosted on a 4meg somewhere else.

That said, rsync is awesome, I use it every day and it is rock solid.

Do you have Linux experience?
 
SirMCDeats said:
This could turn into quite an expensive implementation, especially on bandwidth. It would also mean exposing a server sharing user’s data to the internet, so you'd have to make sure your security is tight, I wouldn't recommend hosting it on Windows. Additionally, think about speed of the connection, copying several gigs of .pst files over a 4meg might take longer than you'd expect it to, especially if the target server is hosted on a 4meg somewhere else.

That said, rsync is awesome, I use it every day and it is rock solid.

Do you have Linux experience?
Click to expand...

rsync makes me want a Windows version as well. Do you have any experience with the Cygwin port of this, and if so does it work just as well?
 
garyc said:
rsync makes me want a Windows version as well. Do you have any experience with the Cygwin port of this, and if so does it work just as well?
Click to expand...

I have used it once or twice for small transfers and it works fine. The thing about rsync is that it works really well when bundled with cron and I'm unsure about whether the windows task scheduler is as powerful?
 
I use "insert back software of choice here" to backup to a local server, then I rsync to backup the local server to an offsite backup server.
 
SirMCDeats said:
I have used it once or twice for small transfers and it works fine. The thing about rsync is that it works really well when bundled with cron and I'm unsure about whether the windows task scheduler is as powerful?
Click to expand...

I use the Delta Copy version. I set the schedule in the client (I assume it just uses the Win 7 scheduler) very successfully to both windows rsync server (Delta Server) and to Linux / and HP-UX rsync servers.
 
Bernie said:
I use the Delta Copy version. I set the schedule in the client (I assume it just uses the Win 7 scheduler) very successfully to both windows rsync server (Delta Server) and to Linux / and HP-UX rsync servers.
Click to expand...

That looks good! Side-note, it does seem to use the windows task scheduler :)
 
SirMCDeats said:
This could turn into quite an expensive implementation, especially on bandwidth. It would also mean exposing a server sharing user’s data to the internet, so you'd have to make sure your security is tight, I wouldn't recommend hosting it on Windows. Additionally, think about speed of the connection, copying several gigs of .pst files over a 4meg might take longer than you'd expect it to, especially if the target server is hosted on a 4meg somewhere else.

That said, rsync is awesome, I use it every day and it is rock solid.

Do you have Linux experience?
Click to expand...
Are you using DSL? Remember the A stands for Asynchronous,ie upload speeds from your server into the cloud/net are much slower than downloads. Work on 150 kbits/s upload speed max in the real world. You know your dataset size, so it's an easy calc, allowing for acks and parity checks. Maybe you need a good dedup package to cut down data size when pushing to the cloud.
 
Install Filezilla Server on remote site generate SSL/TLS Certificate for security
Install "Cobian Backup" on machines needing backups
Utilise Cobian Built-in remote backup facilities to push to remote server.

Alternatively -- Paid for solution(s)
Acronis Backup
Attix 5
 
It all depends on how much data you have.
PST files average between 500MB and 2GB for 1 user, if you are going to upload that then you will need to use something that will only send changes ,and not changes on a file level but on a byte level.

Look at Deltacopy its making use of a ported to windows version of Rsync.
It can send changes on a byte level over a network or internet and its free. I have used this allot, on their website it states that you have to install cygwin but the installer sorts everything in one go, it also runs as a windows Service so you dont have to have it open all the time and you can be logged off.
Its a client to server tool that will push data to the server, but for this you will either need a remote location of your own or rent rackspace.

But why dont you just look at hosting your mail online ? and you will never have to backup mail again.
Or at least get an exchange server

Backing up PST files over a network is a hideous task, Outlook has to be closed because it locks the PST file when its open
and then you have backup failures
 
Last edited:
Jiggy said:
i want to make a backup server at my office.

at the moment i have two sites and everyone backups to the server at that allocated site. i would now like to have a central backup solution and have that back up the servers/ users, how can i get them to do an internet backup?

will i need specific software?
Click to expand...

Try Handy Backup Server, it's a reliable central backup software solution.
 
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