Business continuity, high availability and disaster recovery are no longer optional for enterprises in today’s very competitive landscape. Thankfully, there are server backup solutions you can use to make all of these very easy.
Server backup solutions help you make sure that you can protect your server from data loss and that you can recover from it. Data protection involves backing up your data and storing it some place that you can access at a later time to restore your server in the event of untoward incidents.
These incidents include fire, flood, human failure, media failure, user errors, hacking attacks, sabotage, and other scenarios that could render your server inaccessible and that forces it to go offline. The effects are disastrous. For one, you lose productivity, as you cannot perform tasks related to the server, like accessing your customer profile. You could lose customers or your reputation might suffer.
Server backup solutions help you avoid these painful situations. Here is a list of the tools that you should be looking at:
UrBackup
UrBackup uses clever wordplay to put across their aim: “Your backup (solution)” or “You Are Back Up.” This open source server backup tool makes use of both file and image backups to help protect your data and to enable you to restore your server fast when necessary.
This software constantly watches the folder that you want replicated and does incremental backups to ensure that you have updated copies. It can even backup a file even when the system is running and processes go on without interruptions.
It makes efficient use of space so you do not have to get a lot of storage. It is also easy to use as it comes with a Web-based interface and works with several operating systems including Windows, Linux and macOS.
Best of all, it is FREE. UrBackup is licensed as an open source software under the AGPLv3+ certification.
Windows Server Backup
If you are using Windows Server for your server, you might want to check out Windows Server Backup. This feature allows you to do basic backup and recovery operations.
With the Windows Server Backup, you can perform backups and recovery using command lines and snap-in tools. You have four wizards that will help you through your backups and recovery.
You can choose to back up an entire server, chosen volumes, or even system state. If your current server crashes due to disk failure and you cannot get it back up, you can restore your entire system on another hard drive.
Windows Server Backup allows you to experience fast backups using block-level technology and the Volume Shadow Copy Service. You can just run incremental backups after the first backup, which takes less time than having to do a full backup over and again. Restoring your backups is also very easy, you can choose what items you want to restore, such as files, a folder or all contents you have backed up. You can also recover applications because the feature protects application data as well. The good news is that Windows Server Backup is very user-friendly that even non-techies are able to use it. It is best suited for small business owners as well.
Windows Server Backup comes in all editions of Windows Server 2008 and is compatible with Windows Server 2012.
Carbonite Server Backup
Carbonite offers a paid server backup solutions service that allows you to protect all files on your servers. It is very easy to set up and schedule. You can choose whether to store your backups on a local storage device, on the cloud, or both.
When it comes to restoration, you can use the service’s bare metal restore features to restore your backups to any point you choose. This means that you can restore your backups on any new hardware, without having to install an operating system or other software.
Carbonite allows for hot backups that let you to get copies of your files even when they are in use. You can protect Hyper-V virtual machines as well and create your own backup policies.
Pricing for Carbonite Server Backup starts at $600 a year for one server with 250 gigabytes of cloud storage. If you plan to back up several computers or servers, you might want to choose the Ultimate plan where you pay $1,000 per year to back up an unlimited number of servers that come with 500 gigabytes of cloud storage.
Oracle
Oracle Secure Backup
Oracle Secure Backup allows you to backup and recover data on heterogeneous servers. It has a client-server architecture that helps protect every IT environment, including support for different operating systems, file systems, Oracle Database and NAS devices. It also allows you to encrypt your backups as well as manage your backup retention easily. You can store your backup on tape or a hard disk. Licensing costs $3,500 per stream.
Oracle Recovery Manager
If you are dealing with Oracle databases, then you will appreciate Oracle Recovery Manager as a server backup solution.
Oracle Recovery Manager enables you to back up and recover your Oracle Database and detect corruption up to the block level when you are restoring or backing up. It works well with Oracle Secure Backup.
User managed backups
Apart from using these features, you can also do your own user-managed backup without using RMAN. Instead, you use OS commands and SQL*Plus recovery commands. This way, you are in full control of how the backups and retrievals are done.
However, there are some things that Oracle Recovery Manager can do that a user-managed backup cannot. For example, incremental backups, detecting corrupt blocks, automatically finding the files for backup, and platform independence for backups are all possible with RMAN, while these are not supported when you do a user managed backup. RMAN also has a backup repository where your backups are logged into a control file.
However, if you need to include networking files and passwords, you might need to do a user managed backup because this is not backed up using RMAN.
Do you need help implementing Oracle as one of your server backup solutions? Call Four Cornerstone now or contact us by filling out our online contact form here.
Photo courtesy of Matthew from Flickr.
