Backup workstations with central management console and agents
Hello,
Windows Home Server comes with cool feature to backup your home computers very easily using an agent.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/windowshomeserver/protect.mspx
Here are my questions:
Is there a similar feature or application for Windows 2008 R2 server?
I would like to centralize by backups of workstations (Windows XP, Vista and 7) I would like to use an application that will remotely install agents on workstations so I can control what files to backup and utilize VSS feature. A centralized management console would be great to have as well.
What are your recommendations?
Windows Home Server comes with cool feature to backup your home computers very easily using an agent.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/windowshomeserver/protect.mspx
Here are my questions:
Is there a similar feature or application for Windows 2008 R2 server?
I would like to centralize by backups of workstations (Windows XP, Vista and 7) I would like to use an application that will remotely install agents on workstations so I can control what files to backup and utilize VSS feature. A centralized management console would be great to have as well.
What are your recommendations?
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indi001: - thank you for your reply, however not doing backups is not an option, and our backbone is composed of 1GB switching gear so no need to worry about network being paralyzed, this is not a hub era anymore. I understand that the bottleneck will be the receiving server, so backups schedule would have to serialized and delta backups should come in place.
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yo_bee: - We use DPM to protect some of our servers, it looks like additional license for agents costs $32 compared to Acronis Advanced Workstation $130, do you know any other alternatives? I am OK with giving up on hard drive image backup, I care the most about files on those workstations I would like to backup. I looked at community edition of Zmanda, but the interface and configuration was a bit goofy, but that was like a year ago, need to recheck.
I recommend Folder Redirection if you are using AD infratructure.
This will give the clients a central repository and give administrators of the network the ability to backup this data using your current DPM as well has managment .
You would only need one additional client license for the server if the server does not have one already.
We are using Folder Redirection he for our 200 users and it is working well.
This will give the clients a central repository and give administrators of the network the ability to backup this data using your current DPM as well has managment .
You would only need one additional client license for the server if the server does not have one already.
We are using Folder Redirection he for our 200 users and it is working well.
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Thanks, could you give me more details about this folder redirection? Is this simple redirection of Desktop and My Documents folder to a file server?
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Thank you both for your input, I am looking into Avamar from EMC, have you seen it in action? Any feedback?
thanks
thanks
I have not.
I use Symantec and we do not use it for client backups.
I use Symantec and we do not use it for client backups.
As far as I know there's no such solution in 2008 R2, because of this reason (and of course because software vendors want to sell their software). Symantec BackupExec has such a feature, but as I said, workstation backup as a regular backup is a really bad idea...