Ask Slashdot: Open Source Back-Up Tool For Business?

New submitter xerkot writes: I am looking for a tool to make backups of PCs in a big company. We want to replace the one that we are using at this moment for this new one. The tool will be used to do backups of PCs (mainly Windows, and a few Linux), and we want to manage these backups centrally from a console, being able to automatize the backup process. The servers of the company are backed up with another tool, so they are out of scope. In the company we are being encouraged more and more to use open source software, so I would like to ask you, what are best open source tools to do backups of PCs? Are they mature enough for a big company?

Comments

What exactly are you backing up?

[i.r.id10t]

What exactly are you backing up? Entire disk images? Or just user files?

If disk images, then something like clonezilla, perhaps set up to boot from a TFTP server. Boot the machine via WOL, kick off the TFTP, automatically dump the image out to a server using the machine name or MAC address or something as a unique identifier

For user files only (ie, My Documents or whatever) can you set up network based home directories ? And then just back up the server they live on.