How to do backups for a large client?

[InTheCube]

Hi.

I'm just trying to gather advice, suggestions, comments, opinions, etc on how to do backups for a large client (40 PCs)

The client is running Windows Server 2008 R2 x64, Pastel Partner, and they have a huge shared network folder (30GB) which contains subfolders for each department.

All these need to be backed up daily. We also need to take backups off-site, at least once a week.

What do you guys recommend?
- Full backups daily?
- incremental backups daily + full backup once a week?
- network attached storage for daily backups (we have one, about 300m to an offsite location, but it is painfully slow, accross a wireless link).
- hard copy (burnt to disc) backups once a week?
- what software would you use?
- What about backing up important user data (like Outlook PST files) for people in management?

I'm really looking for a comprehensive solution, but don't want to fork out for some lardy-daa enterprise product that costs a packet.

Just looking for something simple, but effective. Also looking to find out about best practices, what to do, what not to do, etc....

 

[S8n]

Is this a domain environment?
Is there Exchange? How is mail handled.
Does everything run off the one server?
Any SQL databases to take into consideration?

 

[ponder]

- network attached storage for daily backups (we have one, about 300m to an offsite location, but it is painfully slow, accross a wireless link).

Seeing it's so slow let it do the incremental backups as it will be less load on the wireless link.
Do full backups locally with something that has multiple hotpluggable drive bays/caddies so you can just yank a drive out and move it offsite. This way you can add a new drive or two and keep rotating.

 

[InTheCube]

Is this a domain environment?

Nope. A simple Windows Network (Windows Workgroup).

Is there Exchange? How is mail handled.

No Exchange. Email is via POP3 accounts sitting at a local ISP. Will need to backup individual Outlook PST files.

Does everything run off the one server?

Yes.

Any SQL databases to take into consideration?

Nope. Just Pastel Partner, but thats just a shared folder on the network.

Seeing it's so slow let it do the incremental backups as it will be less load on the wireless link.

Good idea. Can you recommend software to do incremental backups?

Do full backups locally with something that has multiple hotpluggable drive bays/caddies so you can just yank a drive out and move it offsite. This way you can add a new drive or two and keep rotating.

Also a good idea, but what sort of device are you talkin about? Can you recommend something?

 

[PsyWulf]

Good idea. Can you recommend software to do incremental backups?

Syncback SE - free and works a charm for simple setups like this

Also a good idea, but what sort of device are you talkin about? Can you recommend something?

Literally 4x 1TB external harddrives,each configured to the same Drive letter,Syncback files to it daily,unplug and swap once backup is done

 

[InTheCube]

Thanks everyone for the responses.

Syncback SE - free and works a charm for simple setups like this

According to this, Syncback SE is not free, but Syncback Freeware is. Is SyncBack Freeware good enough? Well $50 for the Pro version is not alot, I guess I could convince them to pay for it.

Literally 4x 1TB external harddrives,each configured to the same Drive letter,Syncback files to it daily,unplug and swap once backup is done

Keep all the drives in the server cabinet, and just swap the cables each day? That would require me to be at the client everyday. I need something automated. I only go to the client 1-2 times a week.

 

[PsyWulf]

According to this, Syncback SE is not free, but Syncback Freeware is. Is SyncBack Freeware good enough? Well $50 for the Pro version is not alot, I guess I could convince them to pay for it.

Hmm must have changed the name since my download. But yes the freeware does suffice

 

[Park@82]

I also use SyncBack.

 

[McGuywer]

Keep all the drives in the server cabinet, and just swap the cables each day? That would require me to be at the client everyday. I need something automated. I only go to the client 1-2 times a week.

Let the client swap out the drives each day.

They can take the data offsite.

 

[evilsee]

Cant you upgrade the wireless link, what sort of through put are you getting at the moment with it.

You could also setup a second domain controller at the offsite location and use something like DFS to keep the two machines in sync or if its a linux box then rsync.

Also, and dont knock it, but tape drives are rather handy, our 200 gig backup takes about 1h30. We also backup the same data to a 2nd pair of raided drives in the machine for fast recovery.

 

[ponder]

Cant you upgrade the wireless link, what sort of through put are you getting at the moment with it.

I was just about to ask him if the other site crosses municipal boundaries & roads. If it does not then laying fibre would be a good idea.
Another solution would be to use free space optics and keep the wireless as backup or alternatively to replace the wireless with some NanoStations or Rockets from Scoop distribution, http://www.scoopdistribution.co.za/index.php?cPath=101

 

[RVQ]

Windows Backup? Backup machines to a share and depending on the size use couple of 1-3TB removable drives to backup the server? The initial backup will be massive on every external drive but windows backup is smart enough to do incremental backups after the initial backup and also manages the backups, deletes older ones as drives become full. Train a PA to swap out the drives daily and you can swap out the weekly backup drive (involves plugging in a USB drive). You can even get fancy and use Bit Locker to encrypt the drives for added security.

Not exactly a great backup solution but free doesn't buy anything except what you've already got....

 

[Arthur]

I'm a big fan of Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 for the server and workstations. Disk imaging. Local disti here.

 

[Hemps]

Batch files that run a zip command to retrieve date and time and store the file on an internal backup drive.

When the batch file is run it first determines the day of the month, then according to the day of the month the backup will either make a full backup (this will only take place on the 1st and the 15th of the month unless a full backup is forced to run), or an incremental backup will occur (this will happen on every other day), and will only backup up the changes made since the last backup.
This daily Zip backup is created on the Main Server’s internal 1TB backup drive, then copied over to the Freenas mirror drives for permanent storage, the file is then copied over to the backup server and extracted onto the backup server’s data drive to keep the main server and backup as up to date as possible.

Batch files - cheap and effective and you can keep years worth of data and recover anywhere with any zip program.
Of course for the above batch script, you'll need to todo some research bud.

www.todo-backup.com
works well
I have tested the above program for about 4 months and it works just as well if not better than Acronis.
They will be getting our business.

 

[Hemps]

Also buy 2x external eSata drives with daily full images from todobackup and swop them around every day, one goes offsite.

 

[AstroTurf]

7 removable drives.
Mark them
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Month End
Mid month

Keep 5 of them on site
you keep one of the monthly drives
Manager/owner of the place keeps the other.

If you do it this way you end up with daily backups, weekly backups, fortnightly backups and monthly backups.

 

[InTheCube]

7 removable drives.
Mark them
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Month End
Mid month

Keep 5 of them on site
you keep one of the monthly drives
Manager/owner of the place keeps the other.

If you do it this way you end up with daily backups, weekly backups, fortnightly backups and monthly backups.

This sounds like a great idea. Do you any specific software to help achieve this? Or is it mostly a manual process?

 

[Anthro]

We currently have a 5 drive system, two harddrive bags, 2x people take these home and they swap them around - daily rotating backup and a weekly restore of the entire drive onto a identical off site server for redundancy.
App wise ? use Backup Assist - best 700$ ever spent

 

[AstroTurf]

Use the backup program that comes with 2008 R2.
Everyone's desktops and documents are synchronized/redirected with/to the server anyway so all you need to do is a full daily backup.

We use 7 1TB drives here.

I named them as follows:
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Offsite1
Offsite2

With these 7 drives we have in effect got a daily, weekly, fortnightly and monthly backup.
Offsite1 = Mid month Offsite2= Month end.

I keep 1 drive at my house, 1 at my bosses house so we have 2 off-site backups kept far away from the factory.

You could easily get away with 6 drives and just do offsite 1 and offsite 2 instead of say the Thursday or Monday drive.

I manually swap the drives on a daily basis, take screenshots of restore's and email these to my gmail account as well as the boss and 2 other people.

One side note, I test the Pastel backup daily by restoring it with a different name (e.g. Companyname-Test-2011-04-28) then adding it to pastel as a company and doing a data verification test.
Make sure everyone closes there pastel before they leave the office each night or the pastel backup may fail.
You could also use pastel iron tree (about R100 per GB per month) as another level of reliability on the backup.

 

[Elimentals]

What I did for a similar environment:

Linux pc with rsync + tape drive
At night sync network data to removable storage (2 drives that was swapped out every week 1 set kept off site)
After the sync I used a simple tape drive to back up the removable data to tapes. Incremental for every day, on month ends I used one fresh full backup that was stored in a safe, safe could be off site if needed. I could use slow tape drives as speed was not needed.
Monthly tapes was kept for 5 years (as per legal req)

The pro's about the system was that it was easy/quick to recover data during the day for example if someone deleted a document and wanted it back quickly.
Had a full back-up off site at most a week old.
Could do incremental restores if needed from last weeks data.
Had a full data set if the auditors needed something from say 5 months ago.
I could always test backups without affecting downtime.