Cloud Backup: Rapid Recovery Via Backup Appliances

Cloud Backup Series

This post is one of a series regarding cloud backup.  See these links for more information concerning Unitrends cloud backup along with an overview of Vault2Cloud: Unitrends enterprise level cloud backup service.  This is an example of an on-premise backup appliance mentioned below.

Cloud Backup: Enabling Rapid Recovery Through On Premise Backup Appliances

So we’ve established that pure online backup of more than a few tens of gigabytes to some type of cloud has a distinct problem with respect to recovery performance.  And yet the advantages with respect to cloud-based computing as it pertains to backup remain:

• Enabling disaster recovery by moving the data away from the premises.
• Reducing costs via eliminated capital expense and lowered operational expense.
• Ability to quickly scale.
• Well-defined service level agreements resulting from measured service.

The answer to rapid recovery while taking advantage of cloud-based computing is an on-premise backup appliance that can quickly serve to backup your information technology infrastructure and serve as a gateway point to a cloud-based disaster recovery service.

An on-premise appliance offers not only local backup but also offers dedicated in-flight deduplication.  Once the cloud is loaded with your initial set of data this in-flight deduplication not only compresses your data but also deduplicates that data before it is sent upstream to the cloud.  This is done with no impact to the clients (i.e., servers, PCs, workstations, and notebooks) that are being protected by the on-premise backup appliance.  It means that once your initial set of data has been uploaded, much more data can be protected than can physically move over the WAN in any given time.  Thus it is possible for hundreds of gigabytes and more to  be protected and kept synchronized with the cloud each day with a relatively small amount of bandwidth.