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Back-up Services

Data is the lifeblood of your company: Mail, Databases (SQL, Exchange, etc), Records, Invoices, Presentations, Contracts, etc. is all 'data'.

The amount of data created by the average user/company is increasing exponentially. According to Contingency Planning Research & Strategic Research Corporation:

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43% of companies experiencing disasters never re-open, and 29% close within 2 years.

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40% of data that has been lost or stolen is valued at over £2 million

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Most companies value 100MB of data at more than £1 million.

Back up to an on-site machine (back-up server)

Certainly an improvement! As long as you have the right software, you should be able to back-up automatically, incrementally and securely, and restore painlessly and quickly. But bear in mind that your data is still 'on-site'. In case of a natural disaster / calamity / theft / vandalism, that's of no help unless you're replicating your data to a remote server..

Back up to a remote server (online back-up)

The safest of the lot since your data is off-site and there is an online back-up service provider, focused on facilitating your back-up and restore operations.

10 Points to consider when planning your back-up policy

1. Ease of Use

We can't emphasise enough how important this is. Considering the fact that back-ups are not the most pleasant of tasks one wants to (but needs to) do, the easier it is to do it, the better. An intuitive, user friendly user interface goes a long way towards better back-up habits!

2. Flexibility

Your IT environment is unique to you. The last thing you need is a 'back-up service' that places demands for additional infrastructure or for that matter, one that only works on one OS / application. Look for something comprehensive that works with your existing resources!

3. Automation

Let's face it - no one remembers to back up. Look for a solution that, once configured, can indefinitely run by itself as per a pre-determined schedule and settings. Ideally, you should be able to back-up different sets of data differently: continuously, daily, weekly, etc.

4. Transparent

A back-up solution that's easy to use, flexible and automated doesn't help much if it 'hogs' your computer while backing up! The ideal back-up solution runs quietly in the background and periodically assures you that everything is under control.

On-Line Backup

5. Secure

That's YOUR data you're backing up - over the internet. It's very important to ensure that the data is encrypted before it leaves your computers. Make sure that the encryption algorithm is powerful and supports higher 'bit' keys for added security.

6. Incremental Back-ups

With a good incremental back-up solution, once you've completed the first (large) back-up, the ideal solution will monitor your data for changes and back up only the changed parts saving you bandwidth (time & money). A must have feature!

7. Compression

While on the subject of conserving bandwidth, it is important to compress your data optimally so that you can reduce the bandwidth/ time/money spent in sending data to the remote server. Look out for configurable compression, where you are able to choose what works best for you!

8. Restore

A back-up solution is only as good as its ability to restore data - after all that's what it is for in the first place! Besides 'ease of restore', it is important that you also have the facility to restore a single file, or to deleted files and older versions of files, if required.

9. Infrastructure

Make sure you know more about where your data is being backed up. How protected is the remote server itself, and where it is hosted? Is the server itself backed up / replicated? A good service provider should be comfortable telling you all this.

10. Pricing / Support

If you've taken care of all the items mentioned so far, you shouldn't be having many back-up issues. But it is good to know that help is available if and when needed. And of course, pricing - flexible and reasonable monthly plans based on your data requirements are key!

Datrix has been providing a range of flexible back-up solutions to its customers for over 15 years. With Sonar, that range is now expanded to include a choice of powerful Managed back-up options. Call us today to see how we can help.