Small business backups solutions?

[Kenny Lussier]

On 2/5/08, Dan Coutu <coutu at snowy-owl.com> wrote:
> I have a small client (30 employees) using Linux servers that is
> struggling to find a robust and reliable backup solution that provides
> bare-metal recovery capability without costing over $10K. It's easy to
> find expensive solutions that work wonderfully.
>
> The primary challenge so far has been hardware. They used to use 30Gb
> tapes but now that the servers are bigger this doesn't work. Minimum
> capacity for the smallest system is 80Gb and the largest system requires
> ~200Gb to backup everything onto a single medium. I've tried to use the
> Iomega REV autoloader as  a solution and it sort of but not quite works.
> In other words it isn't reliable, you can't count on it to work every
> single time. The thing seems tempermental in that it sometimes wedges
> the SCSI bus. Not useful.
>
> The backup solution needs to be reasonably portable so that it is
> possible to carry the medium offsite each day for offsite storage.
>
> What types of solutions have worked for others?
>
> Dan


Speaking of strictly the hardware, I have had a lot of good luck with
Quantum Superloader3. It has a single LTO3 drive, and the basic model
has an 8-slot carrier. You can upgrade it to a 16-slot system with a
firmware upgrade and purchase of a 2nd tape carrier. The cost of an
8-slot autoloader is about $4500 right now.

LTO3 tapes can handle about 400GB native and (supposedly) 800GB
compressed, but I have never seen a system that could actually do 2:1
compression. I usually get about 580GB on a new tape. The tapes are
about $40 a piece now that LTO4 is up and coming.

You can carry the tapes offsite easily. But I would suggest leaving
the autoloader mounted in a rack :-)

As for software, if you are being cost concious, then look into Amanda
(http://www.amanda.org).

HTH,
Kenny