Definitely a correlation if no theorem. An additional thought. Using Tapes and shipping them is cheaper but it tends to have issues tied to it. For example, tape is slower and not always reliable. Using a disk based solution is becoming realistic with newer technologies such as SATA etc.
Solutions range from EMC BCV technology to the Veritas software type solutions and everything in between. If you use a hardware vendor solution you tend to have easier implementation with the applications since it's often abstracted. There are distance limitations however if real-time data is imperative and as Rick points out, cost can be a barrier. Software solutions are known to work but you're dealing with software that is there to protect the host it's running on. Kind of opens the door for the possibility of issues. Clustering over space and time can be tricky, but almost always includes some of the other solutions to go with it. Definition of the scope and problem and expectations is the key to solving this. After that it's just your creativity in applying the solutions that counts. For example, it may be that the data for Exchange is not needed immediately. Then you could implement a solution that involves putting back functionality before data and rely on traditional backup/restore of data to put the data back. Recovery storage groups make that easy. File systems are a different breed. They tend to change many small files frequently. Plus, the data is what you're after. As Rick mentioned, buy laptops and have them store the data on the laptops and synch them with servers. If the data server goes away, then you still have access to the data. Or, you could rely on a tape restore solution or even do backups to disk as mentioned above. FWIW, I think you can design an elegant solution with backup to disk and tape (belts and braces right) and some well defined, written and practiced procedures. Practice is the key to this one. Short of it, spend your energy defining the problem to the smallest degree possible. Then go after solutions and see how they fit in your organization in terms of practicality and costs. I typically like to plan without costs as a focus and then backfill to the solution that meets problem and expectations. That way the solution works AND they get what they expect. Al -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rick Boza Sent: Friday, November 19, 2004 11:06 AM To: ActiveDir List Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hot Spare Site Dan, In all honesty, you don't build hot site capability for $25K. Using a replication service across WAN links is incredibly expensive from a bandwidth perspective. I mean, realistically, you can't even buy a server and 50 workstations to put in the remote site for that money (which you stated you expect to need to do), let alone begin the process of replicating data. For the kind of money you are talking about, realistically you are looking at a warm server or two in your remote location, and shipping backup tapes there in a regular basis, depending on how willing to lose data your company is - if all the data up to the backup is required, then you ship every day. Buy all those folks that need to be able to be onsite laptops in the next hardware refresh cycle they hit so they can bring their system with them to plug in at the alternate site. Immediate failover capabilities easily gets into the million dollar plus range. I've designed these solutions for clients in the past and have on more than one occasion been asked to do so only to have others choke when we start discussing what the costs would be. The desired SLA is almost always in direct opposition to the budget (some sort of theorem there, I think). Rick On 11/19/04 9:45 AM, "Dan DeStefano" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > There is definitely a hirearchy of importance for users. The site > would likely need to physically host like 50 or so workstations and > all the remaining 100-200 users could probably work remotely via a > terminal server farm or something to that effect. > > Yes, I am thinking of the site being able to failover immediately or > within > 24-48 hours. Replication/geographically disperse clustering sounds > like what we are looking for. I have been looking into Veritas Global > Cluster Manager - is what you are referring to? Would Exchange be > cluster-aware of this product or only for MS Cluster Service? > > _________________________ > > Daniel DeStefano > PC Support Specialist > > IAG Research > 345 Park Avenue South, 12th Floor > New York, NY 10010 > T. 212.871.5262 > F. 212.871.5300 > > www.iagr.net <http://www.iagr.net> > Measuring Ad Effectiveness on Television > > The information contained in this communication is confidential, may > be privileged and is intended for the exclusive use of the above named > addressee(s). If you are not the intended recipient(s), you are > expressly prohibited from copying, distributing, disseminating, or in > any other way using any of the information contained within this > communication. If you have received this communication in error, > please contact the sender by telephone > 212.871.5262 or by response via e-mail. > > > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Mulnick, Al > Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 4:03 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hot Spare Site > > > Additionally, what do you define as restoration of service? Do you > have to restore service and data to all users instantly or are some > users more urgent than others? > > File/print restoration of service indicates that you want to have the > data available seamlessly. That often looks like a replication and/or > geographically disperse clustering solution. > > Exchange is another animal altogether and requirements definition > needs to be tight to easily solve that one. > > al > > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Renouf, Phil > Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 3:52 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hot Spare Site > > It completely depends on the budget that youwould(could) have for a > project like this and the corporate definition of the services that > would be required to a Hot Site DR situation. You mentioned Exchange > and file sharing as the two most important so that answers one side, > what do you/your company deem as cost-effective? Would 25k be the > range, or is 250k or 2.5mil a reasonable number. > > How immediate does the transfer from production site to DR site need to be? > Does it need to be instant or is a lag of a few hours or even a day > acceptable? > > Phil > > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dan DeStefano > Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 3:44 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: [ActiveDir] Hot Spare Site > > I have been given the task of coming up with some strategies for > creating a physical hot spare site for our headquarters for disaster > recovery. Not having done this before, I am not sure where to begin. > The two major resources that need to be replicated are our file shares > and our Exchange server. All other company data, web applications, Web > sites, etc are at colocation sites. > Does anyone have any suggestions on the best and most cost-effective > way(s) to accomplish this? A good bulk of our users can perform their > jobs remotely via terminal services temporarily if need be. Could a > terminal server farm work effectively using primarily what's built > into windows (terminal services and load balancing), or would Citrix > be the only solution. > > I would greatly appreciate any help. > > _________________________ > > Daniel DeStefano > PC Support Specialist > > IAG Research > 345 Park Avenue South, 12th Floor > New York, NY 10010 > T. 212.871.5262 > F. 212.871.5300 > > www.iagr.net <http://www.iagr.net/> > Measuring Ad Effectiveness on Television > > The information contained in this communication is confidential, may > be privileged and is intended for the exclusive use of the above named > addressee(s). If you are not the intended recipient(s), you are > expressly prohibited from copying, distributing, disseminating, or in > any other way using any of the information contained within this > communication. If you have received this communication in error, > please contact the sender by telephone 212.871.5262 or by response via e-mail. > > 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/
