Tape Backups

[Crusty]

Does anyone know where I can get some good information on setting up a system to use tape backups?

It's got 74gb of space and I'm pretty sure I want to do nightly images, or perhaps a system where there is a weekly image and just a nightly backup of data.. which would only run in 30-40gb range. Currently an elaborate network/external hdd system is used which has too many fail points.

The OS is Windows XP, and there is a U320 SCSI Raid card on board that can be used as well as SATA/PATA, or USB/firewire.

I'm a total noob when comes to tapes.

Any recommendations for hardware as well?

 

[Agamar]

I would recommend SDLT for hardware. The tapes are durable and I have used them over the last 3 years without problems. If you want cheap, then the IOMEGA Rev drive does very well, and is really quick on the seek times.

 

[Crusty]

Can you give me some links?

The only REV Drives I can find handle up to 35GB....

 

[GrammatonJP]

I'm pretty sure you can not hook a scsi tape drive into a raid adapter. You might need a seperate scsi card.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: GrammatonJP
I'm pretty sure you can not hook a scsi tape drive into a raid adapter. You might need a seperate scsi card.

Why couldn't you? The card would just treat it as a normal device AFAIK.

 

[cubby1223]

Also check out Sony's AIT drives link

And regards to an extra scsi card, the cost of the card & cable is miniscule to the cost of the tape drives, so I would just get an extra card.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Crusty

Originally posted by: GrammatonJP
I'm pretty sure you can not hook a scsi tape drive into a raid adapter. You might need a seperate scsi card.

Why couldn't you? The card would just treat it as a normal device AFAIK.

You can only hook a tape drive to a RAID card if you have a second data channel AND if the RAID BIOS allows you to attach non-RAID devices. Some Dell PERC4's, for instance, simply won't let you attach a tape drive to the RAID card under any circumstances. Well....it will....but it will crash your computer at some point.

Tape drives are almost always attached to servers with separate SCSI cards, NOT via RAID adapters.

Many of my consulting friends are VERY afraid of the Iomega REV drives, because of poor driver support and because they are sold by Iomega.

You are right at the limit of the common (and fairly inexpensive) DAT72 tape drives. So I wouldn't recommend those, either.

For clients with a lot of data and not much money, I recommend multiple USB hard drives or multiple SATA hard drives (in external housing). The drives cost about as much as a single 100GB tape. Our clients swap them out as appropriate and keep some drives off-site. You'd be able to hold hold multiple copies of your data on a single 200-250GB drive.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger

Originally posted by: Crusty

Originally posted by: GrammatonJP
I'm pretty sure you can not hook a scsi tape drive into a raid adapter. You might need a seperate scsi card.

Why couldn't you? The card would just treat it as a normal device AFAIK.

You can only hook a tape drive to a RAID card if you have a second data channel AND if the RAID BIOS allows you to attach non-RAID devices. Some Dell PERC4's, for instance, simply won't let you attach a tape drive to the RAID card under any circumstances. Well....it will....but it will crash your computer at some point.

Tape drives are almost always attached to servers with separate SCSI cards, NOT via RAID adapters.

Many of my consulting friends are VERY afraid of the Iomega REV drives.

You are right at the limit of the common (and fairly inexpensive) DAT72 tape drives. So I wouldn't recommend those, either.

For clients with a lot of data and not much money, I recommend multiple USB hard drives or multiple SATA hard drives (in external housing). The drives cost about as much as a single 100GB tape. Our clients swap them out as appropriate and keep some drives off-site. You'd be able to hold hold multiple copies of your data on a single 200-250GB drive.

Well that is currently what is happening, but I want to get away from HDD's as backups. I considered DVD-RW's.. but with teh volume of data it seems tapes are the way to go.

After some reading, I think that the DAT72 drives are teh way to go. We will never have 73gb of data to backup, so it will be nice to have that extra space in case we do need it, not to mention that they are fairly inexpensive, as you said.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Crusty
After some reading, I think that the DAT72 drives are teh way to go. We will never have 73gb of data to backup, so it will be nice to have that extra space in case we do need it, not to mention that they are fairly inexpensive, as you said.

DAT72 tapes won't hold ANYWHERE near 72GB of "typical" data, even with hardware compression enabled. My SBS 2003 clients get about 50 GB (maybe less) of storage before they fill up.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger

Originally posted by: Crusty
After some reading, I think that the DAT72 drives are teh way to go. We will never have 73gb of data to backup, so it will be nice to have that extra space in case we do need it, not to mention that they are fairly inexpensive, as you said.

DAT72 tapes won't hold ANYWHERE near 72GB of "typical" data, even with hardware compression enabled. My SBS 2003 clients get about 50 GB (maybe less) of storage before they fill up.

Well, other then external hdd's what do you recommend?

 

[RebateMonger]

Well, DLT, LTO, and AIT all have solutions that will fit you. I don't know of any real problems with any of them. As long as you have less than 80GB of data, you can get a DLT VS160 drive for or an LTO drive for $1000-$1500, plus $200 for an Adaptec 39160 SCSI card. Tapes are probably $40-$80 apiece in that capacity range.

I'd still recommend making an occasional full system backup to an external hard drive (that you keep offsite). If your computer gets stolen, you can't use the backup tapes until you buy a new tape drive. That happened to one of my clients.

 

[stardrek]

LTO all the way. I work at a data recovery company and we have everything from old reel-to-reels to Adic I2000's to IBM Silos. LTO absolutly gives you the most reliable backup with the least amount of media errors and great performance. We had a Sun customer come in with 350 tapes, that were LTO and only had 5 media errors. There HP-UX recovery team was using SuperDLTs and out of 150 tapes they had 11 media errors. Same company, same people brought the tapes, all kept under the same conditions. This kind of thing happens ALL THE TIME. LTO is always in better shape then pretty much any other system.

 

[Zepper]

With the cost of HDs being so low, I'd definitely use some sort of HD based backup system. Tape just isn't cost-effective any more.

.bh.

 

[ShellGuy]

I can't see the reason with the cost of tapes today to not use HDD for a backup option. It isn't like these drives are in the system at all times and running an OS that is always being used. I have OS drives that are used daily for 3-4 yrs now with no issues. I just don't see the issues with HDD as i do with tape. What software are you using for your backups?



Will G.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: ShellGuy
I can't see the reason with the cost of tapes today to not use HDD for a backup option.

The arguments against using external hard drives for backups include:

1) Size and cost. They are much bigger than a single tape cassette, so transport is more difficult. But HD price is getting so low that it's starting to compete with the cost of a single high-capapcity tape.
2) Fragility. There's no question that dropping a hard drive is more likely to damage it than dropping a tape cassette. However, tapes can also be damaged: by leaving them in a car in the sun or by dropping them. And tapes do fail occasionally/eventually. You have to expect that External hard drives being transported daily will fail at times.
3) USB reliability issues. There are reported problems with USB drive communication at times. I've had problems with a set of four LaCie drives. Two of them seem to have occasional errors during verification of backups. That said, four LaCie 250GB USB drives only cost $600, versus about $3000 for a comparably-sized LTO tape system with a set of five tapes and an Adaptec SCSI card.

 

[RebateMonger]

n.m.

 

[ShellGuy]

There is no reason that you have to use USB. You could use removeable drive bays for inserver storage. I know how careful i am when handleing hdds and i would think whoever is doing your backups would be as well if they are in the tech field or have any clue about what can happen to your job if you lose the companys data...


Will g.