Tape backup advice ?

mobeen

@travisdh1 said in Tape backup advice ?:

@mobeen said in Tape backup advice ?:

Hi all,

For Offsite Backup I am thinking of Tape Backup option.

We are running Windows Server 2012 File Server with data around 5TB which needs to backed by Tape solution and rotate to offsite.

Tape is one of the option we are thinking of. I am thinking of Full Backup of data for offsite (on Tape) instead of copying Onsite Backup data.

Following are few queries comes to my mind :

We may need to consider increase of data (around 5GB difference according to Incremental Backup daily happening) before getting Tape Backup, maybe we need to consider of 8TB or 10TB to backed up ?

Sure, but only if you insist on changing a tape once a week instead of twice a week. LTO 7 does 6TB native, and claims 15TB compressed. Planning wise, somewhere between those two extremes will be more realistic depending on how compressible your data is.

Just wonder what will be the performance difference b/w Tape and External HDD ?

Years ago tape was horribly slow. That's more historic knowledge now than reality. A single, modern, tape drive is much faster than any HDD.

What are all requirements for Tape Backup solution ? a) Tape Library b) Tape Drives c) Backup software, right ?

Seems to be a good list. I'd add driver, but that should be included with the Tape Drive/Library.

So which model Tape library will suite us with what size of Tape Drives ? and rough pricing it may cost ?

For a new LTO 7 drive, looks like around $2300. Then $100 per data tape.

We use external USB drives here, but we also don't need to keep to a backup window time. If speed is important, tape can be very appealing today. Then if we assume 10TB external drives, it doesn't take long for costs of drives to be more than the initial investment of a tape drive and tapes.

In your shoes, I'd think a single LTO 7 drive and tapes to match would be the best way to get your offsite data. The costs of external hard drives of a size to match LTO 7 tapes just grows to quickly. Plus, you can use just that single drive without any library needed, keeping things much simpler to manage.

That's nice reply

mobeen

Thank you all for great responses !!

I am thinking to discuss how Cloud option would fit in our environment. Sorry by mistake I have provided you wrong info that we have Upload speed 10Mbps, while we actually have 20Mbps !!

Maybe creating separate Topic will be good to discuss about Cloud options ?