My backups need to go on a diet (or incremental forever vs periodic full strategies)

omg

I don’t want to date myself, but I remember getting an upgrade to a 20MB hard drive in my PC. I thought, “Oh boy, I’ll never fill this thing up!” It blows my mind now to think about that now. I’ve got:


• 500GB drive in my laptop
• 180GB on my iPod
• 32GB on my iPhone
• 30TB on my HyperV server
• 6TB on my backup appliance
• On and on…


IDC predicts that over the next decade, data in the digital universe will experience a 50x growth rate, while the number of “files” will experience a 75x growth rate.* So, backing up all this data, and continuing to back it up in a window of time that meets your business requirements is a huge challenge and a moving target.


Lots of IT shops are solving this problem by implementing backup solutions which offer incremental forever backup strategy. Basically, only one full or master backup is required (the first one), and from then on, you run incremental backups which only capture changes since the last backup. The frequency at which you run the incremental backups should be based on the rate of change of your data. Typically you run these incremental backups at least daily, but more often shops run them every few minutes.
If you are considering implementing a new backup solution with an incremental forever strategy, here are some things you want to research:

 

  • Does the solution allow me to meet my organization’s RPOs (recovery point objectives)?
    •  Does it allow me to run incremental backups frequently enough?
  • Does the solution allow me to meet my organization’s RTOs (recovery time objectives)?
    • Does it offer point-in-time recovery and auto-synthesis of the incremental backups such that multiple lengthy restore jobs are not required?
  •  Does the solution allow me to manage retention of my data?
    • Does it allow me to set minimum and maximum time units to keep data and purge appropriately without ever requiring a full or master “reset” job?
  • Does the solution offer incremental forever backups for all my OS’s and data types?


Unitrends offers incremental backups for almost all flavors of Windows as well as Linux. You should include them in your due diligence!

*2011 Digital Universe, “Extracting Value from Chaos”, June 2011, John Gantz and David Reinsel

MARKET-LEADING BACKUP AND RECOVERY SOLUTIONS

Discover how Unitrends can help protect your organization's sensitive data