> -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ken Long > Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2006 10:20 AM > To: backuppc list > Subject: [BackupPC-users] Best software to backup BackupPC Server to tape > {clip} > > I have BackupPC working great on a nice, large 2.4TB system > and it's now backing up almost everything in the company with > a nice rotation set up. > That's great as long as we just need to restore a file or an > individual system, but I need to also protect against > catastrophic failure. > > So, what I want to do is to be able to make a backup of the > BackupPC system to tape once a week to send off-site. The > idea being that if the whole computer room goes up in smoke, > I can bring in the tape, reconstruct my backup machine first > and then spawn all the other systems off of that. > > So, what software would anyone recommend to backup a BackupPC > server that will properly handle restoring hard links and > will also use an LTO3 tape library to span multiple tapes? > (the server already has about 700GB on it) I would assume > someone else out there is already doing this, so what works the best? > {clip}
Bacula (http://www.bacula.org/) will support the robotics in libraries and efficiently handles hardlinks. However, unless you're already fully committed tape may not be the optimal soloution. A better approach may be to locally attach another stack of cheap 500Gb SATA drives, mirror the entire machine at the OS level and migrate the stacks of drives on and off site. That way your bare metal recovery scenario will simply involve attaching the drive stack to another box and booting from it. Of course, this means ensuring support for SATA hot plug and so on. In the ultimate scenario perhaps run iSCSI (eg. http://iscsitarget.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/FrequentlyAskedQuestio ns) to another box, preferably at a different location, and mirror the BackupPC volume (hell, the entire host) to storage on the other machine in near real time... Tape has its uses but you're not trying to leverage its implicity value do single file restores back on to the backuppc machine itself so, without having a bare metal bootable recovery tape strategy such as with HP-UX, is there really any significant value in using tape? Put another way, lets say you buy a stand alone single tape LTO-3 drive such as an HP Ultrium-960 that can handle your volumes of data in a reasonable timeframe. Throw in an Ultra320 controller and 18x 400Gb tapes (2.4Tb onsite, 2.4Tb offsite, 2.4Tb in transit) and you're looking at, say, us$4,199 + us$250 + us$2000 = $6,500 plus the salary overhead to have someone feed the tapes to the drive... increase costs accordingly for using robotics and/or parallel drives to speed things up. How much raw drive space can you get setup for us$6,500 or more, assuming it's principally involved in committing sequential writes and doesn't need SCSI-level online reliability by virtue of it itself being the higher order backup entity? Heck, perhaps visualise a couple of suitcases with 10Gbe plugs that you mate to your backuppc server at the start of the day with a crossover cable and unplug and ship out to your vault at the end - should be able to squeeze a few hundred terrabytes out of that... Just my .0002 cents. :-) Kris Boutilier Information Services Coordinator Sunshine Coast Regional District ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid0944&bid$1720&dat1642 _______________________________________________ BackupPC-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/
