Backups don't just protect you from disk failure, and RAID isn't a replacement for backups. It is always possible the data on the disk could get deleted or corrupted in which case RAID won't help. Backups can also be taken off-site.
That said, I have used disk mirroring under NT4 and it works *reasonably* well with two main caveats: 1. You will not be able to boot from the mirror disk should the primary disk fail unless certain steps are taken. Only the data partition is mirrored - the MBR is not mirrored. There are steps you can take to get an MBR on the mirror disk, but even then, you still may not be able to boot from it. The NT4 resource kit books have an excellent discussion of what all can trip you up. 2. You get absolutely no warning that a disk has failed. There is only an eventlog entry. I've not looked at 2000 or 2k3 software raid to know if these problems have been rectified. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of GRILLENMEIER,GUIDO (HP-Germany,ex1) Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 4:25 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Backups I wondered that in this whole discussion about how to protect yourself from a harddrive-failure the cheapest way - why don't you just use the built-in SW-Raid features of your Windows Server? Naturally, I'm not really a big fan of this SW-Raid and have truly never used them myself (now why would that be?), but with such a low budged you can't really be too choosy... This would give you all the benefits of an automated failover, obviously at the cost of some CPU of the server - which could well be unnoticible for you. It's at least something to look into. However, I'd be interested to hear, if others have already used the Windows SW-Raid features and how their experience is with these...?? Is it ok for the really small companies with NO budged (but a second disk), or would you keep your fingers off? /Guido -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jake Connor Sent: Mittwoch, 14. Januar 2004 20:23 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Backups No they are too cheap to buy a few hard drives and a raid card :-\ I'll look into Ghost and pcInspector. Do you know if Drive Image by Symantec will work on Win2k server or just workstations? On Jan 14, 2004, at 11:09 AM, Mark Nold wrote: > They would spring for Ghost or pcInspector or the like, but not 80 > bucks > for a 120G IDE drive that you could slap in there to mirror? > > Do you have any "dead" pc's lying around that you can grab the IDE > drive > from? Not the best I know, but seems like it would be better than > re-imaging your drive after every change you made in AD to keep your > "backup" fresh. > > My 2cents anyway.... > > -----Original Message----- > From: Jake Connor [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 11:03 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Backups > > Because it's a small company and I have recommended it a hundred times > but in a nutshell, they are too cheap even though we have experienced > a server crash which took about almost a week to restore everything > (which costs more for paying me) and they don't realize a RAID will > solve about almost everything and cheaper. > > > On Jan 14, 2004, at 10:25 AM, Coleman, Hunter wrote: > >> If you're concerned about the hard drive failing, why not just set up > a >> RAID1 (mirror) configuration? Cost would be low, and you won't have >> to > >> worry >> about creating disk images and swapping hard drives around. >> >> Hunter >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Jake Connor [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 11:00 AM >> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Backups >> >> First of all, thank you for the information :-) >> >> I would like to make a complete hard drive backup onto the firewire >> drive (like a complete image) so that if the one on my system crashed >> then I > >> can >> just get the hard drive on the fire wire cable and put it into the >> IDE ribbons. >> >> I probably should have mentioned that what I am using is just a fire >> wire cable that lets you connect any type of IDE drive to it. >> >> So with pcinspector, would it be able to make a complete copy of the >> hard drive (with all the partitions, bootup stuff, etc) to another >> hard drive and >> have that hard drive be exactly the same as the hard drive in the >> system so >> in the event of a crash I can just swap the hard drive, start up the >> system, >> and everything is back to normal with all my Active Directory users, >> etc? >> >> Thanks once again in advanced. >> >> Jake >> >> >> >> On Jan 14, 2004, at 4:25 AM, GRILLENMEIER,GUIDO (HP-Germany,ex1) > wrote: >> >>> using a FW drive, you may run into issues with available drivers to >>> allow you to copy the data without first re-installing an OS on the >>> box. There >>> are some cool free-utilities (such as a disk-cloner) that you may > want >>> to look at - but I have no idea if they support drives connected via >>> FW: >>> http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/uk/welcome.htm >>> >>> so in worst case, you'd have to restore the OS onto the new >>> harddrive (default install - incl. the FW driver, if this is not in >>> the > default) >>> and then restore your backup afterwards onto this new drive. >>> >>> Otherwise you may preferr using a backup on tape afterall, for which >>> you can get routines to completely restore a server from bare-metal >>> fully automated. >>> >>> /Guido >>> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jake Connor >>> Sent: Mittwoch, 14. Januar 2004 00:04 >>> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>> Subject: [ActiveDir] Backups >>> >>> I have a schedule backup that just copies everything on my hard >>> drive to a drive on my firewire drive. >>> >>> If my active hard drive crashes, how do I restore it with the data >>> on my firewire drive so I can just boot up the new hard drive and it > will >>> have all the active directory users and all that stuff? >>> >>> Thanks >>> >>> List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm >>> List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm >>> List archive: >>> http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ >>> List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm >>> List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm >>> List archive: >>> http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ >>> >> >> List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm >> List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm >> List archive: >> http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ >> List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm >> List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm >> List archive: >> http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ >> > > List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm > List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm > List archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ > List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm > List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm > List archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ > List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/mail_list.htm List FAQ : http://www.activedir.org/list_faq.htm List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
