OT-Seagate Mirra Personal Server

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Tue, Oct 16, 2007 at 12:07:47PM -0400, Don Coleman wrote:
> This device is not directly accessible like an NAS.  I'm also wondering if
> an NAS should be considered as a legitimate backup device (provided at least
> the most current backup is taken off-site) or as the actual host of fP data,
> as opposed to a server.

Well, opinions vary, but in my person opinion, if it's not tape, it's
not a backup.  Spinning magnetic storage is too easy to screw up to be
considered a backups -- you can accidentally delete files on it while you
have it mounted, for example -- and it's still a bit pricey to maintain
*my* personal favorite business backup tiering arrangement  (repeated
here, in case it wasn't here I enumerated it last week :-):

Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu

The Friday tapes:

Wk1, Wk2, Wk3, (Wk4)
EOM1, EOM2
EOQ1, EOQ2, EOQ3

And the End of Year tapes:

Before Close, and After Close.

15 tapes, with a cost of about $50-100 per tape, depending on your
drive type (DDS4 for smaller installations, DLT/SDLT/LTO for larger
ones; maybe AIT if you press me, but I like larger tape and hate
helical-scan).

You keep the EOY tapes "forever", and the quarter and month tapes as
long as you feel the need, rotating them down to daily as you retire
the daily tapes.  50 passes is a year on a daily tape, and one to two
years is as long as you want to run a tape, IMPO.

Friday tapes go off-site, and the older one comes back in on Monday.

Data-grade fireproof safe.

So that I'm clear: spinning magnetic storage *is* useful for nearline
"Oops, I deleted it again" recoveries.  It's just not too bright to
assume it fulfills all the requirements that "backups" have
traditionally fulfilled.

Oh: full system saves, and BackupEdge or the moral equivalent thereof.

Opinionated?  Me?

Betcher ass.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                   Baylink                      jra at baylink.com
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