Backup strategy exchange 2010

[johnnybrian]

Hi!

I have a request from a customer who would like to run BE2012.

To keep it simple, i will only mention his exchange setup: 2 X Exchange 2010 servers in DAG. Database size is about 400 GB.

Customer wants only to run B2D, he has no tape setup, neither does he want it. He wants to move the backup off-site after the local B2D has finished. So far so good. I have this covered.

But i am in doubt which strategy of retention i should use: Customer wants to be able to restore a single email which has been deleted maybe 1 year ago.
So it seems like I have to keep my weekly full backups forever or at least for 1 year. The size of the database however makes that a serious amount of data!!

So which backup strategy should I choose for this customer do you think? His demand is simple, he always wants to be able to restore a single email from 1 year ago, that someone maybe has deleted. Is there somehow I can take a full backup and the append to the mailbox, so that this email will always be there, but newer emails are added?

Any help appreciated.

[Backup_Exec1]

Hi

Fist of all from your statement , can take a full backup and the append to the mailbox, so that this email will always be there, but newer emails are added?

We backup the Information store as whole with backupexec which in turn in restore view gives single email or mailbox view, so as per your above comment we dont backup mailbox so we cannot backup newer email

But yes if you perform incremental GRT backup of information store on disk it would only backup transcation log & flush them end of backup job as like in full it backup database & transaction log both

So now comes about restore of email or mailbox you will have to choose that from full & consequent incremental to do a restore

Thanks

[johnnybrian]

Im follow you on your first correction; Of course it backs up the information store and not the single mailboxes.

But im not sure I follow the latter: Should i run Differential and keep for 1 year in order to always be able to restore a mailbox, even if it has been deleted within that year? or should I run full backups and save for 1 year in order to achieve this?

thanks

[Backup_Exec1 · Accepted solution]

Hi

I will not suggest differential as they will not flush the transaction log at end of backup job so you can do full may be once on a weekend & continue doing incremental , so I will suggest doing full & incremental GRT backup so that in terms of data backed everyday you should not have issue

Only you will have to take care about while restoring single email or mailbox you will need last full & incremental after that

Or you can always do the simplest which is full everyday but then ensure you have enough of disk space to retain that backup on disk for 1 year as you dont have tape to duplicate it too for longer retaintion

Thanks

[CraigV]

Hi,

Keeping INCR backups for a year is a bit much...how often do you want to do your full backup?

Why not look at whether or not a synthetic backup is an option?

Otherwise, to keep those mails, you'd need 52 weeks of FULL backups, and at 400GB (assuming Exchange doesn't grow), you're looking at storage of at least 21TB!

Another option is to use deduplication to backup Exchange...

Thanks!

[CraigV]

...a FULL every day is 140+TB of disk space...

[johnnybrian]

I went with a Full montly kept for 6 months, and enabling journaling in the exchange server.

Thanks

[johnnybrian]

I wnet with a full monthly kept for 6 months and enabling journaling for legal requirements.