Backup Tape System
Implementing a good backup tape system is definitely a good investment. While we have tried to help customers to reduce the cost of backup by using the cheaper external USB hard disk and Network Attach Storage, non has found to be reliable or robust, let alone the ease of storing the backup device out of the office (offsite storage). Backing up via USB or network connections is not ideal because of the limitation of the data transfer rates of such connectivity. Backing up 1 Terabyte worth of data via USB to an external hard disk would take almost a day, and most often, the backup hung during the backup leaving the users in dismay. Most vendors often misled customers on the backup capacity of their backup system which they produced. A DAT72 backup drive, for example, offers backup capacity of UP TO 72Gb, PROVIDED and ASSUMING your data could be compressed by 50% ( 1:2 compression ratio). This is not likely to be true these days, as the data files are pretty much optimized by their respective software programs. Thus one could only assume the native backup capacity and anything more would come as a bonus. 7-Network recommends IBM or HP LTO backup system. With the LTO Gen 4, one could backup 500Gb (native) worth of data onto a single tape. And if you need a higher capacity, there are higher range tape autoloaders or library backup systems that will definitely meet your requirements. 7-Network has the expertise to provide requirement studies and help customers implement a robust and reliable backup system.
