Backing up a Raid array? (1 Viewer)

[CRyan]

I am considering going Raid 5 for my next server setup but have a question regarding backing it up. If you have a Raid setup with a total of 10TB of data, how do you go about backup it up? Obviously, you would have to back it up to multiple drives and I would prefer it to be somewhat automated. I just cannot seem to find a solution for this. I am not interested in tape systems - Only hard drives. And I don't want my backup solution to be another array because if your hardware controller fails then you are kind of screwed. Any thoughts or ideas? I guess you can manually copy portions of the array to other drives but this certainly isn't automated and wouldn't be an up-to-date backup system. So I am kind of at a loss. The OS on the server will be Windows 7, XP or Home Server 2011. But I don't believe any of those have a feature built-in that would handle this scenario. Maybe there is a third party software that will do this?

 

[mattCR]

Ok. I run into this often.. I'm over 28T now, after this Christmas, and I get brought up.. the reality is that in a RAID-5 or JBOD of this size, a full backup is an absolute pain. And most of this (if you're like me) is video.

I really don't worry about most of the video I have on there.. if it all gets destroyed, I have the original blurays in a box in my closet. BUT, I do backup essential data which I could not restore if lost (pictures, music store, etc.)


You can do it two ways: (1) get a network NAS unit to match your server - I really like the Drobo and Qnap, but Iomega is also a valid choice since they were bought by EMC (2) use a simple external USB and backup only scheduled data.

 

[Al.Anderson]

Use a backup program that only backs up changed data. (Maybe that's what Matt meant in #2.) Most of the data on a 10TB system will likely not be changing. It's probably video, graphics, and music. Then just periodically copy the backup data to a writeable DVD.

 

[CRyan]

Hmmm. Thanks for the ideas. I deffinitely want a complete and total backup of everything - The idea and going back to source in case of a crash makes me want to vomit. I have the hard drives to do it already so I am not worried about that side of things. Getting a Drobo that matches the size of the array would certainly work - Not cheap, but it would work for sure. Good idea. But option 2 I am confused about. Is there something I am missing that will allow me to backup a 10TB "drive" to USB drive(s)?

 

[dmiller68]

Option 2 would be breaking up your content over 2-3TB USB drives. Not a bad option I have done it. Duping the system is the best option you can use Raid 0 for that system as you lose it you just re-backup again.

You think this is a chalenge try 300TB, my last job basically replication of storage systems was the only way.