Re: HA Server Backup Tool/Process recommendations needed (XP Pro only)

["David Gumbrell" <david.gumbrell@xxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks Rob,

Yes - my focus is more on hardware failure than file deletion and you make
a
very good point about hardware failure being more than just hard disks. I
am
considering cold/warm/standby computer options for exactly this reason. But
was also considering hard drive mirroring due to consequences of
heterogenous redundancy - ie only one PC can have the CCTV card in it so
there is then a decision between MTTR and functionality depending on the
scheme chosen.

As for motherboard RAID - I am wondering how effective these BIOS things
really are - many people set them up and they create no problems, but how
many people experience them in a failure scenario and especially a
hard-to-test scenario like a dying drive ? I don't have facilities to test
anything other than nice clean unpowered removal, although I guess SATA/hot
plug might allow for some more exciting tests :-)

My experience of Soft RAID on Linux a few years ago was not a happy one. I
lost some important data due to combination of circumstances but learnt a
hard lesson.

But there are more questions arising in my mind :-

- assuming a disaster recovery backup was in place to rebuild a clone
machine onto new hardware, how would one handle lack of driver support for
a
new (different model of) motherboard in the disaster recovery backup ? I
have successfully transplanted hard drives between motherboards/pcs by
pre-loading new drivers, but in this circumstance one might not know the
new
motherboard in advance. Are default drivers in XP going to be good enough
in
the disaster image ?

No doubt I am going to end up with a multi-level solution.

Thanks for the enlightening discussion - keep 'em coming ...

Cheers

David


On 10/31/07, Rob Iles <rob.iles@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>   IMHO, software raid is next to worthless - especially on
system/boot/os
> disks.
>
> I have no experience of motherboard based hardware RAID - though I'd
be
> cautious / nervous that if the mobo fails, you'd need to get an
identical
> replacement in order to recover data..
>



for online backups (internet backups, not the traditional definition of
> online backups) - I've found Carbonite to be rather handy. (
> www.carbonite.com ) - - $50 USD/year for unlimited storage! runs as a
> background process, and performs differential backups of selected
> files/folders. Restore time is obviously an issue if you need to
recover a
> lot of data - - limited by your internet connection - - but it's handy
to
> have some easy off-site backup of important files! (I'm told they're
> encrypted and mirrored to several data-centres). no affiliation - just
a
> happy customer.
>
> Regards,
>
> Rob
>
>


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