Small business backups solutions?

[Brian Chabot]

Lots of good info...

But here's one suggestion for REALLY small businesses....

How convenient that I, too, am looking for just such a thing...

In my case I have a small shop I'm putting together.  I can't see my 
total data that I need to back up exceeding a couple huhundred gigs 
...for a VERY long time. (Not much more than a handful of gigs unless I 
grow exceptionally fast...)

So I've decided on the hard drive back up routine.  My server (I'm 
ordering it in parts now in another window...) will have a 500GB SATA 
hard drive.  I'll be adding a removable SATA enclosure from 
http://www.cru-dataport.com and getting carriers for a total of 3 more 
500GB hard drives.  In total, I have the live one (with I may or may not 
set up as a RAID array) with 500GB, and three backup drives of 500GB 
each in removable SATA carriers.  Using any system I please to 
sync/mirror the removable to the live drive and then I'll have it able 
to have a recent on-site backup, an off-site backup, and one in the 
server at any given time.  At the end of the day, I take the drive out 
and either replace it with the local or off-site backup.

Total cost not counting the initial server:
Software: Free.
CRU DataPort 3 Complete package: $23.41
CRU Dataport 3 Carrier (2): (2 @ $23.45) $46.90
500GB HDD (3): (3 @ 99.99 on sale @ Tiger Direct) $299.97
__________________________________________________________
Total Cost:                                 $370.28 plus shipping.

When your data grows beyond the example 500GB your upgrade costs are the 
costs of 3 more HDDs as long as you're still using SATA at that point.

I REALLY don't see any reason to spend the time, money, and hassle on a 
tape drive system for anything smaller than the biggest HDD on the 
market right now.

Brian