Tape backup Alternative??

dextor03

We currently run a tape backup set but our tape drive is on the blink and we're looking to either replace the drive or find an alternative. Looking for suggestions for the best backup options out there at the moment. Allowing for monthly, yearly backups to be taken and archived. Something on the lines of a NAS drive with some external backup facility. Any ideas?

unnameduser

Hi there,

It is really worth looking at online backup as it is fully automatic, secure and more affordable than ever. There are lots of online companies who can cater for your needs but try stay within Ireland for the sake of quick restoration times (for large seed restores).

Disclaimer: I am a director with www.dataprotectcloud.com. I'd be happy to discuss this more if you are interested, and set you up with a no-obligation trial.

In the interest of fairness on this forum I'll mention solid alternatives such as www.keepitsafe.ie or www.ironmountain.com

Hope this helps and all the best with it.

Mr. Fancypants

How much data, what operating system and if you want to go to cloud what is your internet connection like?

We resell KeepITSafe and it is a solid enough product if you just want a backup of data. If you are looking at being able to bring up your backup immediately in case of disaster as a virtual machine either on premise or off premise you could look at something like Datto. It's a backup appliance. It only supports Windows though.

Capt'n Midnight

how big is your dataset ?

if it could all fit on one hard drive and your backup software doesn't require addons for drives then happy days. The big disadvantage of drives is they don't like being rough handled.

But you aren't painted into the corner like you would be if your only tape drive died.



On line backup can be a legal nightmare from data protection view
at the very least go for encyryption, yours not theirs.

if you don't have the upload bandwith then do not pass Go do not collect $200.

Mr. Fancypants

Something i meant to mention above. If you want to stay local and away from the cloud most NAS appliances allow for usb backups to be taken to disk. Or you could go with something a little fancier like an Imation T5R which is a NAS that has a RDX drive built in. RDX cartridges are about the size of a tape drive but are hard drive based rather than tape. No moving parts in the rdx drive itself so much less likely to fail.
In that case you would need backup software to go to the NAS and then allow the NAS to do a backup to RDX on a scheduled basis.

richierichballs

unnameduser wrote: »

Hi there,

It is really worth looking at online backup as it is fully automatic, secure and more affordable than ever. There are lots of online companies who can cater for your needs but try stay within Ireland for the sake of quick restoration times (for large seed restores).

Disclaimer: I am a director with www.dataprotectcloud.com. I'd be happy to discuss this more if you are interested, and set you up with a no-obligation trial.

In the interest of fairness on this forum I'll mention solid alternatives such as www.keepitsafe.ie or www.ironmountain.com

Hope this helps and all the best with it.

I notice your companies website has "Ahsay" as a partner,
Is this primarily the software you are reselling? If so how do you find it?
I know keepitsafe use it also. I've haven't heard great things about it tbh.

unnameduser

richierichballs wrote: »

I notice your companies website has "Ahsay" as a partner,
Is this primarily the software you are reselling? If so how do you find it?
I know keepitsafe use it also. I've haven't heard great things about it tbh.

Hi there,

Yes Ahsay is the backup software we are implementing.
The software is excellent. However, there is a lot of back end management to it to ensure it works perfectly (from a providers point of view). We've been using it for years so we know it inside out and it works a charm.

If you'd like to outline some of the negative things you've heard about it I'm happy to give our experience with it.

Ctrl Alt Del

My first choice will be a new backup drive or get a care pack,if possible.

Second choice,another standard PC, 2/4 hard drive in RAID and with a minim version of NOS Server 200x.Use any backup software to run backup Disk2Disk.You have backup visible,in Windows Explorer for data (not Exchange or SQL). That will sort out the onsite backup.For offsite,a series of removable drives that you can see the data and / if supported encrypted ! ArcServe D2D just comes to my mind now...

-Cloud is expensive and hard to own / manage.Its going to cost you more than a new backup drive,controller,cables and tapes.
-NAS is risky as you are exposed to an unknown firmware that can run your data corrupted,The NAS supplier will replace the NAS but not the data.
-Hard drives...hmmm there are known to me only two types of drives:those that have failed and those that will fail !

Regards

dextor03

Had a look at some of the online backup options but proved far too expensive for us. We have about 600 GB of data at the moment but that is increasing.

We also are implementing some VMware and a NAS drive backup could work for us as it would keep it local and we could back up all vm's. I will look into the Imation T5R suggested above. How is it possible to archive backups. We would like to be able to access backups going back a few months. How would this be done with a NAS solution?

Mr. Fancypants

With the Imation at least you run your backups using your own backup software to the NAS unit and the NAS uses it's own OS to backup specific folders on the NAS to RDX cartridges for archiving.

lotas

mbroaders wrote: »

With the Imation at least you run your backups using your own backup software to the NAS unit and the NAS uses it's own OS to backup specific folders on the NAS to RDX cartridges for archiving.

Do you have any experience with those RDX drives? Looks interesting...

Mr. Fancypants

lotas wrote: »

Do you have any experience with those RDX drives? Looks interesting...

Yep, i work for a MSP who resells them. I should be able to answer questions you have?

lotas

mbroaders wrote: »

Yep, i work for a MSP who resells them. I should be able to answer questions you have?

Main questions I have is around price, availability and durability? I have found some on amazon, but not much else... I see they have carts up to 1.5tb... Is that the uncompressed size or is it like tape and up to that size? Have you seen any fail, and if so, is it the same rate as hard rices or as tapes?

Thanks.

Mr. Fancypants

lotas wrote: »

Main questions I have is around price, availability and durability? I have found some on amazon, but not much else... I see they have carts up to 1.5tb... Is that the uncompressed size or is it like tape and up to that size? Have you seen any fail, and if so, is it the same rate as hard rices or as tapes?

Thanks.

1.5TB is the max size at the moment. That's the size you get so it isnt showing the compressed size. There is no hardware compression that i am aware of so you would use the software compression in your backup software to get more on.
Last i heard if you buy 5 cartridges a usb RDX dock is included for free as a special. I am technical not sales though so that may of been updated without me knowing.
Haven't seen any fail yet. The cartridges we sell feel very sturdy and the docks themselves have no moving parts so are a lot less likely to fail. The cartridges and dock come with a warranty also.

These are the make we sell :

http://www.imation.com/en-US/Scalable-Storage/Scalable-Storage-Products/RDX-Removable-Hard-Disk-Storage/RDX-HDD-Media/#Resources-tab

One of the nice features with these is that you can buy encrypted versions of the rdx cartridges also.

Feel free to send me a pm and i can ask one of our sales guys to give you a quote if you like.

ressem

Having used a few RDXes for 3 years now..

The RDX are 2.5" hard drives within a plastic shell and propriety interface. They can fail at similar rates. It has also meant that size has increased and cartridge prices dropped.

A fault with the cheap older version of the docks can result in them refusing to eject the cartridge, even after repowering, or attempting the paperclip method to force an eject.
It is rare, perhaps a couple of times per year. Even with the latest firmware and registry workarounds.

They are simple devices though and this can be sorted quickly if you are OK with opening the drive.

You'll want a USB3 or SATA version for 600 GB+, not USB2. They are slower than a serial attached scsi tape drive.

And don't install the backup software that comes with the drive. Drivers sure, backup software no.

lotas

Thanks for the info lads. @ressem, you mention that the devices are a propritary interface... so does this mean you cant take the hdd out and use it in a normal machine if something goes pete thong?

ressem

The SATA interface looks the same but I half remembered that it would not work without the RDX dock.

So I opened a formatted RDX cartridge with valid but disposable data on it and connected the internal toshiba 2.5" disk to a plain old sata adapter.

The drive is detected of course,but appears as an un-initialised device which confirms the info on the Dell site. The normal data recovery tools wouldn't allow me to access the sectors of the drive.

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/storage/f/1216/p/19303472/19586330.aspx
"You cannot use RDX or RD1000 cartridges without an RDX or RD1000 dock. Using a generic SATA to USB adapter will not work. The reason for this behavior is that are areas of the disk are reserved for cartridge metadata. This explains the unrecognized file system displayed in disk management on your Server 2008 machine."

Bladeserver

Would you not consider going down the route of a NAS? Plenty of options out there including Qnap, Synology etc discs are cheap and let's be realistic about as reliable as an RDX! You could use something like Arcserve or StorageCraft for the backups (image based). Do 1 initial backup and than do incrementals after that so you avoid having to do big backs daily??

ressem

Bladeserver wrote: »

Would you not consider going down the route of a NAS? Plenty of options out there including Qnap, Synology etc discs are cheap and let's be realistic about as reliable as an RDX! You could use something like Arcserve or StorageCraft for the backups (image based). Do 1 initial backup and than do incrementals after that so you avoid having to do big backs daily??

The op mentioned having looking at a NAS but keeping an offline archive. There could be a requirement for off-site copies in his industry, and be a part of disaster recovery or audit plans.

When you get flooding or fire in your premises the NAS alone would not cut it.
And anyways a pair of QNAP Raid 1 setups is more reliable than one RDX disk, but not 20.

Bladeserver

Very true. Would you not go down the route of using a NAS for keeping monthly backups and than have a tape drive for archiving off data?