Question

Using a NAS instead of a server - how to back up?

Asked by: JackHodson

Dear all,

A friend of mine has asked me to upgrade his systems - it is a small company - only 4 users - POP email and a server which just shares files - currently there is no back up!

The server is 10 years old and seems extremely slow to do anything. They only have about 5Gb of files and there is not a budget for a new SBS.

What I am planning to do is get rid of the server, clean up all of the PCs and connect up a NAS drive like this to serve their files: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/158613

I has never used a NAS before so, my question is..how do you run a backup of the contents of a NAS? I would want to do this to mobile HDDs that can be moved off site etc.

Many thanks
Jack

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Asked On
2009-09-23 at 15:54:40ID24756852
Topics

Backup & Restore Software

,

Computer Hard Drives

,

Storage Technology

Participating Experts
2
Points
250
Comments
3

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Answers

 

by: LexmarPosted on 2009-09-23 at 17:09:33ID: 25409195

Short answer is that regardless of the product, if you can see it, then it can be backed up.  Anything on a mapped drive, mounted shares should not bother any commercially available product.  Watch out  for how you have your permissions set on the NAS.

For what it is worth, a 10 year old server is probably slower on the file sharing than a budget NAS even on a 100Mbps Ethernet LAN.  On a system the size you are talking about an incremental backup would typically take les than a minute.

At their size, they are an ideal candidate for remote backup.  Our smallest remote backup package is 10GB which runs about $10/mo.  Backing up to portable USB device is not as reliable as all the vendors with the one touch backup buttons would have you believe (check out the disaster recovery and hard drive forums here and on other places).  The backup can be run from any workstation or server.

Disclosure Note: This link is my site and business and has info about online backup.

http://lexmarsolutions.com/services/obs

-Mark

 

by: noxchoPosted on 2009-09-24 at 00:35:42ID: 25410783

I am doing backups of my NAS located data with File Backup features from Paragon made Drive Backup 9.0 Server Edition: www.drive-backup.com
If you have access to NAS shares from XP workstation then Pro version of the same product will work for you.
First of all share the folder on NAS where you store the data. Then run File Backup wizard from installed copy of Drive Backup 9.0 and select as source of data the NAS shared folder. Then point to your mobile drive and go on.

 

by: JackHodsonPosted on 2009-09-29 at 06:55:05ID: 25449008

Many thanks for your help.
Jack

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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