Re: sbs 2003 disaster recovery best software

I have one customer using Drive Snapshot. A friend of theirs recommended it. It does live imaging as well. I have tested restoring an image in a test situation for them but so far haven't had to use it in a real life situation.

http://www.drivesnapshot.de/en/index.htm

My problem with live imaging is mostly to do with Exchange and SQL etc. In my limited testing I have run into corrupted databases. I decided to only do cold imaging. My testing was pretty limited and several years ago. I'm sure programs have improved since then.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


"Les Connor [SBS MVP]" <les.connor@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:OD7hCq8cHHA.2068@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I'm not sure Cristian was expecting the restore to be done remotely, that would be more of a challenge - but doable with the LiLO or DRAC cards I think.

He does however want the imaging application to be kicked off remotely, and that's certainly possible. I agree that cold imaging is a safer way, but StorageCraft ServerProtect works very well with hot (live) images. I've also had success hot imaging with Paragon's Drive-Backup, and haven't tried Acronis.

Interestingly, Windows Home Server (now in beta) has shown it can successfully back up and restore SBS to bare metal (same hardware). Totally not supported (but either is any kind of imaging) but a cool experiment. That's a completely automated live daily backup, and it'll be exciting to see how this technology might fit into the next vesion of SBS :-).

Othe experimental emerging approaches are physical to virtual, virtual to physical, and virtualizing the SBS entirely. The latter makes the SBS hardware independent.

--
Les Connor [SBS MVP]


"Kerry Brown" <kerry@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx*a*m> wrote in message news:%23fr7iC8cHHA.3484@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<wedor> wrote in message news:uVIaTW6cHHA.4632@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I do not believe this can be done remotely.


I don't know of a way to restore a server from bare metal remotely. I'm sure it exists but it is not common place and likely expensive.

In my experience imaging is best done when the server is down. For backups when the server is up a backup program is best. I combine both. Whenever a server is down for maintenance I create a current image. If there are significant changes to the server then it is scheduled for maintenance and an image is done. It is also backed up daily (usually with ntbackup or with SBS the backup wizard). If a server crashes irretrievably then it can be restored from the last image and data recovered from the last backup. Even to different hardware this is usually the fastest method to get up and running as quick as possible. With different hardware some programs like TI have options to help with this. I usually just try to get hardware as close as possible to the original, restore the image, don't boot the image but immediately do a repair install (in Microsoft speak an in place upgrade), boot the server and fix up things like phantom NICs, then restore the data. With a typical SBS server this takes about 1/2 a day tops. If the customer needs faster recovery than that it gets expensive and involves standby servers.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca




.

Relevant Pages

  • RE: Disaster Recovery
    ... Windows OS not only SBS. ... SBS 2003 server backup, the system state will be archived. ... If you restore the system state to a different hardware, ... Use Outlook to export the contents in the public folders to .pst files ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: SBS two adapter setup with Netopia Router. Help Save my weeked
    ... > posting to the SBS Newsgroup. ... > When you click OK on this message, the server restarts. ... > are not able to start the server or restore the system state from backup. ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: Thoughts - bare metal disaster recovery
    ... getting corruption on restore. ... Les Connor [SBS Community Member - SBS MVP] ... Backup is essential, image is nice. ... The server is still up, ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: Disaster Recovery with NTBackup
    ... Windows Update may ... Win2K3 SP1 only (if not integrated into your SBS CD) ... Restore the backup using the document from the link I mentioned ... size equal to greater than the original server). ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • RE: Restore Active Directory from Backup
    ... Thank you for posting in the SBS newsgroup. ... As you mentioned, if you need restore to a new SBS Server from backup, ... Another way is to create a local profile, ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)