Disaster Recovery Planning (DRP)
Small and midsize businesses (SMBs) face unique challenges when designing a Disaster Recovery Plan. Today many SMBs now have databases, file servers, and e-mail
systems containing constantly changing data that is crucial to day-to-day business operations. If your company
loses this data, business grinds to a halt. Although data protection is as important for SMBs as it is for larger corporations, most business-class software is designed exclusively for larger corporations. Few SMBs have the extensive IT resources necessary to implement and maintain these kinds of backup solutions.TiffCo can help SMBs design a data protection strategy that is easy to maintain, and that provides all the features needed to protect critical data.
It is essential for SMBs to have a reliable backup and restore strategy to guard against data loss.
Unfortunately, SMBs are caught in a squeeze. Most backup strategies are either relatively unsophisticated
solutions designed for home users or overly complex solutions geared toward large corporations. Low-end
solutions designed for individual computer users do not provide the advanced features that SMBs need to
protect vital business data; and enterprise-level solutions often require far more IT resources than SMBs
have at their disposal.
SMBs need to find a middle ground between these extremes in order to adequately protect business data.
They need a backup strategy that can protect all their data while remaining easy to set up and run with
minimal IT resources. The following guidelines can help SMBs establish a reliable backup strategy to
safeguard the integrity of data and guarantee quick, easy, and accurate restores.
Media types
Backup media is often chosen by SMBs by what is available at their local computer retail outlet. The wrong media decision can render a backup solution useless. The days of backing up to floppy disks are long gone. In today's high capacity storage systems found in both desktop and server computers, a solution must be chosen that can handle it efficiently. We have seen many sites that deploy a replication solution where data is merely copied from one machine to another. This will work in case of hardware failure to source systems however there is no protection against catastrophic disasters like fire, theft or corruption. A solution must be deployed that allows data to be statefully archived on a periodic schedule and allow secure portability for off site storage.
Media cost also needs to be weighed into the equation as it is a common mistake for companies to invest in low end backup devices but find out the media cost is easily three times the cost of the device the first year.
Hardware
Backup hardware is the drive and controller type used by the drive. This decision impacts recovery time, scheduling and automation. A sound backup strategy utilizes as much automation as possible to remove human error from the equation. Choosing a hardware device for your backup needs goes hand in hand with what media is chosen. In addition there are decisions to be made regarding single media devices, library devices and/or library devices that have more than one head facilitating faster read/write times.
Software
This is always a challenging area when deploying a backup strategy for SMBs. A good backup application can backup database, email stores as well as both local and remote desktop data. Most "off the shelf" backup programs are designed for individual or home use and only support basic file archiving. Many network operating systems provide a basic backup application that in some cases is adequate. However these applications are commonly restricted as to the devices they support and do not provide desktop, database or email store functions.
Reporting and alerting are also very important aspects of a good backup solution. SMBs need this since their IT is outsourced and failures could otherwise go for long periods unnoticed.
Configuration deployment
The configuration of the backup system is where success or failure is determined. A good solid plan for rotation, automation, and reporting is needed to make any backup strategy a success.
