Backup Central

Hi

I'm setting up a new backup strategy for our company using Backup Exec 12.5 and would like input on how I might be able to do it better.

First off, I'm using a Full/Differential strategy where I do a Full on Friday nights and Differential backups the rest of the nights. Then, after the backup is complete I copy off all of the .bkf files for the last 8 days onto a removable eSATA drive.

The .bkf files on the removable are there for disaster recovery purposes only. I have a rotation of these removable drives that then go off-site.

I'm wondering if anyone else is doing something like this and if so, what problems have you run into? Can someone tell me I'm crazy or an idiot?

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The only negative I can think of is that you are copying the raw BKF file, and not doing a duplicate job. So when you have to do a restore, you'll have to import and catalog those BKF's. Thus a longer restore process.

Late answer, but here's the workaround I've been using:
Multiple External eSATA drives in hot-swap enclosures
Format drive, but instead of mapping a drive letter, mount to a folder instead. Name the folder with a unique name, e.g. Nov_MonthEnd_A, and use that same name as the device name.
Create a backup-to-disk folder (not a removable one) pointing to that path, using that same name.
Point your backups to that device, probably using a device pool to simplify matters. When you're done, disable the device (right-click, disable), and physically remove it, and archive it off-site.

This avoids the multiple problems with drive letters. The main one is that the catalog references the drive letter, if you're using one, and if you backed up to K:, you'd need to not re-use K: for any other media, and when you need to restore from that archive, you'd need to make sure it re-mounted as K:. Basically, you have to tie a drive letter to a physical media permanently. There aren't enough letters to accommodate that, practically.

By mounting media to a folder path, you are not limited to 26 letters, you can have infinite unique media paths that never change, so the catalogs aren't screwed up. You do need to re-catalog if you pull back a really old archive, but that's no different than tape.

I do wish BackupExec would implement a way to do this within the product.