Backup is nothing... without recovery
The primarily objective of any backup test is to optimize data recovery.
HexiSTOR offers a free trial that can be easily initiated. The trial will demonstrate disk image data backup to local disks and backup of your data over the Internet, helping you understand how our process uses a modest amount of data to accomplish a full backup. The trial period is typically 30 days. We anticipate that the first three to 10 days will be used to perform initial backups. The following two weeks can be used to gain experience on how the backup window is reduced and how easy it is to restore files from any given day.
At any point during the trial or during the ongoing operation of the service customers have the ability to modify what is being backed up. In addition, the trial can be performed in parallel with existing tape backup systems. If the customer decides not to continue with the service all data backed up to Hexistor will be deleted.
Implementation Plan
We recommend you start a trial basis to gain familiarity with the software, gain operational experience with the backup window, and to determine the total quantity of data that needs to be copied offsite. The trial requires that a backup agent be installed on each server that is participating in the trial. We will create test accounts, and authentication information for the trial.
Our suggested implementation is utilize a single sever or small set of servers to be the backup test hosts. This way none of your active servers are impacted by the test. Data repositories on the test hosts can then be used to emulate your active servers for the duration of the testing.
- The existing exchange backup software can be used to dump backup images to the repositories.
- Database servers, like SQL and Oracle, should use their native tools to create images on the repositories.
- The repositories can mount files systems of critical data, like SANs, to allow them to be backed up off site.
- The test host will then run the EMC backup agent and perform data de-duplication and off site copying. They will also have the ability to restore data from the offsite archive. At any time any other computer at PHOFS can restore data from HexiSTOR, if need be.
- Restore will be primarily conducted from on-premise disks by you or via the Internet; however, you can also request HexiSTOR restore large amounts of data on removable media such as UBS drives.
We require that trial customers provide us with the external gateway IP address (es) – it is incorporated into our access control. This address is typically the external IP address of a firewall and it is used as a security check that only the customer has access to their information archive. Once a server is “activated” with HexiSTOR, the user’s administrator has the ability, via the java console tool, to modify what directories get backed up for each server (i.e., only backup d:\CAD_Archive\data).
Methodology
Once the client is installed on the customer’s test servers, the first backup takes the longest to perform because it is copying a large amount of data to HexiSTOR. Subsequent iterations will run dramatically faster. The customer testing the service has full access to all capabilities and can demonstrate sample restorations and determine that the service has the ability to successfully backup and restore user files.
Resources
The only resources required to implement our offsite data storage services are technical assistance to install the backup clients and ongoing help in creating the policies that restrict what data is actually backed up off site. HexiSTOR monitors day to day operation. Each client installation takes about five minutes. The backup policy that gets applied to each computer also takes about five minutes to establish. Once the installation and policy creation steps have been completed the system can run without modification or intervention. The computing resources required on the server are modest. The backup application, which usually runs in the middle of the night, is set to a low priority and will not impact other applications. Network congestion is mitigated because backups run during the night and the agent only needs to copy a small amount of data off site to complete a full backup.
Recovery time objectives (RTO) & Recovery point objective (RPO) Metrics
Hexistor is technical staff will work with you to develop corporate RTO/RPO metrics base on the recovery time and recovery point objectives statistics obtained during the backup/restore tests
- Recovery time objectives (RTO) the maximum amount of time to recover from a disaster and be up and running again. “How long before we are operational again?”
- Recovery point objective (RPO) the maximum amount of data loss (measured in time) acceptable in the event of a disaster. “How much data can we lose?”
Backup
EMC/Avamar’s data deduplication technology reduces your backup window from hours to minutes. The first full backup is a pain point and will take time for the system to identify the common data elements. The initial backup of Microsoft Office file data stored to disk is typically reduced by 70%. As new daily backups occur, the amount of common data across backup data sets increases, ultimately reducing the required network bandwidth and backup storage required by up to 500X compared to traditional daily full backup methods.
Recovery
Since it’s all about data recovery, not backup, it's beneficial to compare Acronis restores over the LAN and EMC/Avamar restores over the Internet to develop appropriate RTO/RPOs. Acronis restores will run at wire-speed over the LAN and EMC/Avamar restores will run at the speed of the Internet connection. We estimate that 95% of EMC/Avamar file-level restores over the Internet will meet your data recovery objectives. However, with loss of an individual or all your servers; recovery over the Internet is problematic due bandwidth limitations. Acronis bare metal restore is the best recovery solution from a downed server. Acronis disk-image software performs a sector by sector copy of the entire disk including the operating system, databases, and files. With the Acronis bare metal restore you can recover to similar or dissimilar hardware and be up and operational in a matter of minutes.
Based on the test results of the file-level and bare metal restore, you can establish corporate recovery time and recovery point objectives based upon the statistics obtained during the backup tests. The base point of your RTO and RPO will be derived from actual test data in your operational backup environment rather than an estimated RTO/RPO. Based on the statistics obtained from Internet and LAN file level restores, you can develop operational (recovery from accidental deletion of a file, corrupted database, virus, etc.) RTO and RPO metrics. The test results from bare metal restores will be the base point for developing RPO and RTO for disaster recovery from catastrophic event.
Archive and Regulatory Requirements
To meet long term archive regulatory requirements, Hexistor’s stores data on disk for one year or longer. Hexistor uses EMC/Avamar global data de-duplication to provide the greatest value of capacity savings. With global data de-duplication, the actual capacity required to protect and store user data is significantly less than the virtual capacity it is protecting This storage efficiency allows us to store the data on disk for long term archiving with on-demand fast restore. Hexistor provides daily detailed backup Activity Reports The reports provides greater operational efficiency through a series of monitoring reports. Hexistor Reports can display storage capacity details, including number of active backup and amount of data backed up.
The daily backup Activity Report is valuable tool to provide auditors a report of daily backups for all servers for financial reports and regulatory requirements. To address possible litigation exposure, you can design a Record Retention policy for ediscovery protection. A corporate record retention policy should be developed by senior managers and legal counsel. A written record retention policy that defines how long documents and e-mails will be retained will protect the corporation in the ediscovery litigation process.
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