Forum Discussion

Kremlar's avatar
Kremlar
Level 4
14 years ago

nightly backups to local server (differential), how to duplicate daily for off-site copy?

Trying to come up with a backup strategy and looking for some input.

We're trying to move away from individual tape drives on each server.  Our current plan is as follows:

 - dedicated backup server running Backup Exec 2010 R2

 - full backup of all servers (~1.3TB) to local RAID 6 array on backup server over gigabit every Friday night (I figure I may need the weekend to complete a full backup of all servers)

 - starting Monday night we do differentials every day, until the next Friday when another full backup is performed.

 

However, I need to duplicate this to a removable drive so we can take a copy off-site every day.  How can we come up with a simple method to duplicate a full backup + current differential every night?  I need to make it simple so that the person in charge of swappping the removable drive does not get confused. 

My initial thought was 5 USB hard drives that are rotated through every night.  Each nightly backup job to the local disk duplicates to the USB drive.  Problem is with only 5 drives on a Friday there is no off-site copy because the full backup from the previous week is being overwritten that night.


Would appreciate any feedback...

Thanks!

2010
Backup and Recovery
Backup Exec
  • Ken_Putnam's avatar
    Ken_Putnam
    14 years ago

    Is there a way to duplicate the last full + latest differential EVERY night to external drive? 

    Duplicating the just finished job is a simple matter.  Duplicting the just finished job and one that completed on another day would require some serious scripting using BEMCMD

    Or am I better off somehow rotating between 2 Friday night drives?

    That would be the easiest to implement, and would require only 6 drives.  

  • pkh's avatar
    pkh
    Moderator
    14 years ago

    You need to set up the USB drives that you are going to duplicate to according to the procedure given by my solution for your other discussion

    https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/backup-exec-2010-backup-disk-then-duplicate-swappable-hard-disk

    I presume that you are going to do a full backup during the weekend, in which case, you don't need to do a differential backup on Friday since you are going to do a full backup.  You scheme should be full backup during the weekend and differential backups on Mon - Thu.  Your 5 disk should be sufficient.

  • Kremlar's avatar
    Kremlar
    Level 4
    14 years ago

    My problem would be Friday night.  On that day my last full off-site backup would be plugged into the server, getting overwritten.  If something happened over the weekend my data would be lost.

    Is there a way to duplicate the last full + latest differential EVERY night to external drive?

    Or am I better off somehow rotating between 2 Friday night drives?

    Trying to cover every circumstance...

  • Ken_Putnam's avatar
    Ken_Putnam
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    Is there a way to duplicate the last full + latest differential EVERY night to external drive? 

    Duplicating the just finished job is a simple matter.  Duplicting the just finished job and one that completed on another day would require some serious scripting using BEMCMD

    Or am I better off somehow rotating between 2 Friday night drives?

    That would be the easiest to implement, and would require only 6 drives.