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Online Backup vs. Tape Backup?

Posted by Cliff on from the which-would-you-use-today? dept.

hashbox asks: "I work for a small non-profit (about 100 staff members) and management has decided that they want to use an online data backup system instead of our existing tape backup system. After a meeting with one of the many vendors providing this service, I must admit that I am impressed with the promise of the technology (ease of use etc). However the sysadmin side of me has a few reservations. Has anyone here on Slashdot used an online backup service, and what were your experiences?"

2 of 62 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Keep the tapes. by mjpaci · · Score: 3, Informative

    Good point there. Use the offsite for disaster recovery and local backup for risk mitigation. What I never understood with the offsite solution is the time. Most smaller companies only have a 1.5Mbps connection. That first backup's going to be massive as will the daily e-mail incrementals. Is there enough time off-hours to backup all of the data?

  2. Tapes are expensive by Circuit+Breaker · · Score: 4, Informative

    Use disks. See : Mike Rubel's rsync backup system. You can't beat IDE disks on price/gb - Tapes are MORE expensive; They're fast, available on-line, and you'll probably be able to mount them on any machine in the next 10 years (which is not true for many tape drives).