Hi all,

I run a small business from my home office and am looking for a backup
solution. I have approximately 300GB of *available* space (about 150GB
remaining). I'd like whatever backup solution I choose to be able to handle
the full 300GB. I've looked at tape drives but they're too expensive. What
I'd like to do is run a scheduled (nightly) backup of the entire system that
can be restored to any computer relatively quickly. I'd also like to be able
to restore selected files at any time.

I know little to nothing about backup solutions, so any assistance would be
helpful. I'd like to keep total cost for hardware under $500.

Thanks!

Scott

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

On Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:08:02 -0700, "Scott Schluer"
<usenet@SPAM_BLOCKwebservicesinc.biz> wrote:

>I run a small business from my home office and am looking for a backup
>solution. I have approximately 300GB of *available* space (about 150GB
>remaining). I'd like whatever backup solution I choose to be able to handle
>the full 300GB. I've looked at tape drives but they're too expensive. What
>I'd like to do is run a scheduled (nightly) backup of the entire system tha
t
>can be restored to any computer relatively quickly.

That cannot be done. It's as simple as that.

Any 'full system backup' implies that the backup contains loads
of files and settings which are tailored to your specific
hardware and are suitable for that hardware only.
(You will find that some businesses buy redundant hardware, just
for the purpose of being able to swap installations!)

You need to separate
1) your OS files
2) your applications
3) your data.

If you want to restore to another system, you will need that
system to run a compatible OS (tailored to your new hardware),
then install your applications onto that new system (if your
licences allow you to :-)  and then restore your data.

--
Kind regards,
Gerard Bok

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

Get external USB/Firewire drives. Each drive should be large enough to hold
all your files. This is much more cost effective than using tapes.

Use software such as Dantz Retrospect which more intelligently handles
incremental backups.
If you have a CD , Retrospect will enable the creation of a bootable
disaster recovery CD.
--
http://www.standards.com/; See Howard Kaikow's web site.
"Scott Schluer" <usenet@SPAM_BLOCKwebservicesinc.biz> wrote in message
news:l8uSc.31372$Uh.16965@fed1read02...
> Hi all,
>
> I run a small business from my home office and am looking for a backup
> solution. I have approximately 300GB of *available* space (about 150GB
> remaining). I'd like whatever backup solution I choose to be able to
handle
> the full 300GB. I've looked at tape drives but they're too expensive. What
> I'd like to do is run a scheduled (nightly) backup of the entire system
that
> can be restored to any computer relatively quickly. I'd also like to be
able
> to restore selected files at any time.
>
> I know little to nothing about backup solutions, so any assistance would
be
> helpful. I'd like to keep total cost for hardware under $500.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Scott
>
>

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

In article <411b4af2.3946954@News.Individual.NET>,
bok118@zonnet.nl says...
> On Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:08:02 -0700, "Scott Schluer"
> <usenet@SPAM_BLOCKwebservicesinc.biz> wrote:
> 
>
> That cannot be done. It's as simple as that.
>
> Any 'full system backup' implies that the backup contains loads
> of files and settings which are tailored to your specific
> hardware and are suitable for that hardware only.
> (You will find that some businesses buy redundant hardware, just
> for the purpose of being able to swap installations!)

Yep, the original poster would need to own (2) identical
machines (at least at the motherboard level).  Although,
it can be surprising what Windows will let you get away
with if you restore the image to a different system.
Different video cards, using a different sized hard
drive, different ethernet or sound card are all probably
things that you can get away with.  Changing to a
different motherboard may or may not work.

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

On Thu, 12 Aug 2004 15:16:10 -0400, Toshi1873
<toshi1873@nowhere.com> wrote:

>In article <411b4af2.3946954@News.Individual.NET>,
>bok118@zonnet.nl says... 
>
>Yep, the original poster would need to own (2) identical
>machines (at least at the motherboard level).  Although,
>it can be surprising what Windows will let you get away
>with if you restore the image to a different system.
>Different video cards, using a different sized hard
>drive, different ethernet or sound card are all probably
>things that you can get away with.  Changing to a
>different motherboard may or may not work.

Install an image with the wrong IDE-type and you may even ruin
the new hardware.
How many different HALs does Windows come with ? (If Scott is
even running Windows at all :-)

I read that the original poster wants to make sure he can
continue his business on new hardware.
That simply requires other measures than just a backup.
--
Kind regards,
Gerard Bok

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

Ok then, lets say I just want to back up a lot of data. I just need to sleep
better at night, I don't care if I have to reinstall applications. What's
the best route? External USB hard drive?


"Howard Kaikow" <kaikow@standards.com> wrote in message
news:cfg4ui$eqa$1@pyrite.mv.net...
> Get external USB/Firewire drives. Each drive should be large enough to
hold
> all your files. This is much more cost effective than using tapes.
>
> Use software such as Dantz Retrospect which more intelligently handles
> incremental backups.
> If you have a CD , Retrospect will enable the creation of a bootable
> disaster recovery CD.
> --
> http://www.standards.com/; See Howard Kaikow's web site.
> "Scott Schluer" <usenet@SPAM_BLOCKwebservicesinc.biz> wrote in message
> news:l8uSc.31372$Uh.16965@fed1read02... 
> handle 
What[vbcol=seagreen] 
> that 
> able 
> be 
>
>

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

A bit over a year ago, I added the following to a system that has about 64GB
of internal hard drives:

1. Two 80GB USB external hard rives. I only keep 1 connected at a time.
2. A CD-RW drive.
3. A USB 2 adapter because the mobo is USB 1.1.
4. Dantz Retrospect. USB drives came with OEM version, but full product is
much better.
5. Nero/InCD (I regretted this decision) and later replaced with Roxio's
Easy Media Creator 7. CD-RW drive had come with Roxio's EZCD 5.*, but I
didn't like that.

A nice thing about using a hard drive for backup that is large enough to
hold all internal drives is that you can quickly start an incremental backup
without messing around with tapes. And hard drives are more reliable than
tape.

Tape is useful to take stuff off-site, but then you could also rotate USB
drives off site and/or use tapes to backup critical files.

On my system, it would take 24+ hours to do a full backup and compare with
tape and I'd have to hang around to swap the umpteen tapes in and out.

With the hard drive, you just start a Retrospect job and go out shopping or
whatever.
I merely defined a Retrospect script for each USB drive and swap the drives
as the mood strikes me.

--
http://www.standards.com/; See Howard Kaikow's web site.
"Scott Schluer" <usenet@SPAM_BLOCKwebservicesinc.biz> wrote in message
news:sZTSc.34415$Uh.3240@fed1read02...
> Ok then, lets say I just want to back up a lot of data. I just need to
sleep
> better at night, I don't care if I have to reinstall applications. What's
> the best route? External USB hard drive?
>
>
> "Howard Kaikow" <kaikow@standards.com> wrote in message
> news:cfg4ui$eqa$1@pyrite.mv.net... 
> hold 
> What 
system[vbcol=seagreen] 
be[vbcol=seagreen] 
would[vbcol=seagreen] 
>
>

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]