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Backup hardware: the right strategies

From STORAGE Magazine Vol 6, Issue 7 - September 2006

With an ever-increasing variety of data protection companies, technologies and techniques coming on to the market, how can you identify the right backup hardware that suits your particular business and its specific needs? Brian Wall investigates.

It seems reasonable enough to conclude that the immediate challenge around identifying the right backup hardware for your business is to weigh up the benefits of each offering, versus the expected return on your investment and the complexity introduced into your storage environment. But where do you actually begin? And how do organisations sidestep the pitfalls and potential hazards in the hardware selection process? It is by no means an easy thing, as any of the businesses struggling to implement the most appropriate solutions will readily attest.

"With so many players in the market generating so much noise, some small companies have become awash with the complexities of data protection," confirms Sharon Munday, EMEA marketing manager at Tandberg Data. "So much so, she says, that some small organisations still delay taking important backup decisions (in fact, Gartner states that as many as 40% of all SMEs still do not perform effective regular backup).

"Our advice at Tandberg Data is to cut through the hype and take it back to basics. Essentially, there are two methods that SMEs should consider deploying - tape or disk-based backup. And, to determine which is best for you, you need to look at how you use your systems, the applications they hold for you and rate how important they are to your company's everyday business.

"Consider your backup window and how long you want backups to take, and always protect your investment by ensuring that you select a technology that has a clear upgrade path to allow for your future growth," she advises. "Don't forget that you will only have to experience average growth in your business over twelve months to experience exponential growth in your data. In tape backup, LTO [Linear Tape Open technology] is the dominant leader, so look for vendors that have a clear LTO technology commitment and range of solutions to suit your needs."

Once you have carefully ranked the importance of each application and data, and if you deem that it is highly critical to your business, then you'll need to consider very fast restores through disk technology for near-instant access and restore.

"There are a few vendors, Tandberg Data being one, that now offer portable disc-based solutions that give you speed, capacity and access, but with the comfort factor of being able to take data offsite each evening," Munday adds. "And they are designed to be affordable and suited to essential, easy, everyday application backup. And, lastly, don't neglect compliance and legal obligations to retain information. Even the smallest companies have compliancy requirements."

Munday offers a number of tips for trouble-free backups:

Take backup seriously. When you look at your data, evaluate that not all data has the same value. Rank that data value and determine how quickly you will need to restore it, and how much capacity you will need, now and in 18 months’ time!

Dedicate resources. Assign a member of staff to be responsible for backups, with a support member.

Monitor the backup window and perform regular trial restores. Back up the entire system and keep backup logs to enable fast drill-down for file restores.

Keep at least one daily off-site copy in a secure environment.

Knowing your own business needs intimately is certainly a prerequisite for successful hardware backup. "The key to success in buying backup hardware is to make sure that you understand and are directly addressing the constraints in your current infrastructure," confirms Steve Mackey, director of product marketing, ADIC. "It's easy to be seduced by the specifications on new equipment, but you need to take care that you don't upgrade without improving overall performance.

"A company might, for example, replace its existing LTO1 drive technology with newer LTO3 technology, with the intention of speeding up its backup. While it would quadruple its capacity, companies often find that the rest of their infrastructure is unable to deliver data to the new tape drive at its stated bandwidth and that the upgrade has little overall impact on performance. By fixing bottlenecks in the network, it might have been possible to improve performance of the backup and reduce the amount of hardware required."

One reason that companies sometimes make poor upgrade decisions is that the storage infrastructure has evolved in complexity to the point where problems cannot be easily traced to their source. "There are services now," says Mackey, "including ADIC Backup Health Check, which use software to gather data on the performance of the storage infrastructure to help identify where the weaknesses are. These services differentiate themselves on the consultancy they offer to help interpret the results. Companies should aim to work with consultants that have a view that encompasses software, hardware, disk and tape."

A successful purchasing strategy also needs to respect the existing infrastructure. A company might introduce plain disk to its backup, instead of a more expensive disk-based virtual tape library, for example. "That would often be a false economy," Mackey adds, "because it could require changes in backup software and business processes, and end up causing more problems than it solves."

As storage hardware is only a small part of the storage infrastructure, companies should ensure they choose hardware that is well supported. That means it is certified and conforms to standards, so that problems are resolved with the co-operation of all vendors involved in the solution. One of the biggest mistakes a company can make is to attempt to put together its own storage system using 'cheap' off-the-shelf components, says Mackey. "It might work to start with, but, when problems occur, there will be no support available and the organisation's data, disaster recovery and regulatory compliance could be at risk."

Wayne Hall, storage specialist, Microboards, recommends a step-by-step approach to assessing your company's specific needs when considering backup hardware investments. This should embrace the business requirements, the regulatory environment and the budget available. Here are some questions he puts forward that potential investors might want to consider:

Can you afford to be locked into a proprietary system or a specific supplier? Not all data-supporting media are easy to transfer from one device to another. If the backup hardware was physically damaged, could the data be moved to a different device?

How long do industry/company regulations require data to be held? Longevity is a serious issue. Systems that rely on magnetic media, such as tape or hard disks, are prone to corruption caused by electromagnetic interference, in addition to mechanical failure. This means the data they store will have to be migrated to new systems at regular intervals of two or three times per decade in order to maintain data integrity, which can add significantly to the total cost of ownership.

Where will the hardware reside? Server rooms are often in basements that may be vulnerable to flooding, or physical storage areas where they are susceptible to being knocked around. What would happen if the data storage unit was physically damaged - would the data survive?

What is the budget available? DVD storage libraries, for example, are inexpensive. A single device, offering almost two terabytes of storage, can cost less than £7k. DVD media is extremely robust and durable. Data written to a DVD cannot be altered or erased and the media will last for 50 years or more, meaning no costly data migration is required. So there is practically zero risk of accidental data corruption and original copies of documents are permanently recorded - there is simply no way for them to be altered after the fact.

How quick and easy does the retrieval process need to be? For example, the data retrieval speed of DVD storage libraries (seconds) is considerably better than that of tape-based systems Hall acknowledges that this is a quick overview and advises buyers always to "consider the scalability and flexibility of a system - if a business is likely to grow or legal requirements are likely to change".

Identifying the storage solution that best suits a company's business needs therefore requires that the organisation has a clear understanding of the nature of the data it is working with.

"The most critical data needs to be stored on fast, high-powered devices where customers, employees and partners can access it quickly," says Chris James, EMEA marketing director, Overland Storage. "However, bear in mind that as information ages and becomes less critical, it needs to be moved to lower-cost secondary storage devices and eventually to longer-term archive systems. Managing this complicated process can be difficult and failing to manage the lifecycle of data effectively can quickly send storage costs spiralling out of control.

"A tiered storage solution could be a consideration for organisations searching for effective solutions that also aid in regulatory compliance. A tiered storage solution incorporates a disk-to-disk-to-tape (D2D2T) system whereby a fast, intelligent primary storage solution is used to store current information; a cost-effective secondary storage appliance implemented for data up to 30 days old; and a data archiving tertiary appliance for data that needs to be stored for compliance reasons. This will enable a company to store data where it makes the most sense, depending on how available the information needs to be."

In addition, says James, it needs to be remembered that storage requirements inevitably grow and expand, resulting in storage infrastructures becoming more complex, difficult to manage and expensive to maintain.

"For this, storage virtualisation could be a consideration. Virtual storage makes it possible to simplify storage management, maximise capacity utilisation and lower costs. Storage virtualisation also allows the purchase of additional storage based on real, long-term needs - rather than short-term emergencies.
"An automated backup process is fundamental to a data storage process, as it reduces the risk of losing data as a result of human error. Many companies have multiple locations in a country or across the globe - and an automated process enables data to be stored in a central location without having to ensure staff take a backup tape back to the remote site or have it posted to the IT department.

“This automated backup also allows companies to reduce the costs associated with management of data,” adds James. “Data can also be made non-corruptible by using Write Once, Read Many (WORM) media to satisfy new legislation."

By understanding the information that really matters to the business when determining which hardware to use for its data backup, an organisation is in a position to assess how quickly the data that is backed up would need to be restored should the data become unavailable.

"Hard disk devices do provide fast access to data, but keeping backup copies of data quickly fills up space and increases the need to buy more disks for your server," says Will Trotman, senior product manager, Sony Europe. "Hard disk devices also still leave the potential risk of data loss and/or corruption through virus attack and accidental or intentional data deletion. "Data backup has always traditionally involved copying files to removable media," adds Trotman. "The big advantage is that copies of data can be physically removed from the IT environment and placed in a safe area. Consequently, viruses or accidental data deletion cannot affect the copied data. The most cost-effective means of storing increasing larger amounts of information is on removable magnetic tape."

His top tips for hardware decision-making are:

Leave room for growth. Ensure you have room for expansion. You should be able to add capacity either in the form of more disks, larger-capacity tapes or additional tapes. This ensures that any budget utilised can cover requirements, as your business grows, for a number of years

Location, location, location. You may need to make multiple copies of your data and keep them in different locations to safeguard against physical loss or theft. This can be more easily done with a device that can provide removable media that could then be carried to another site.

To automate or not to automate, that is the question. With manual backups, an administrator will need to be involved in changing removable media. They would also check for errors or batch problems. With an automated backup, removable media are changed automatically, removing the need for manual intervention. Tape autoloaders or libraries are popular choices with this option, providing single or multiple tape drives to read and write data with a magazine or media slot for managing multiple media.

Any business looking to invest in backup hardware, of course, is faced with a multitude of products and technologies to choose from. In many cases, there is no single ‘right’ or ‘best’ solution, which means product selection has to be based on a careful consideration of needs. "Depending on the business type, size, expected growth and external factors, such as compliance issues, backup hardware needs will vary dramatically and can only be estimated by looking at backup requirements from a top-down, company-wide perspective," says Graham Hunt, EMEA product marketing manager, Quantum.

"Before investing in a backup hardware solution, a business should have a clear mapping of future growth. To do this, future requirements for capacity and performance should be taken into account, even if the existing hardware is currently sufficient in these areas. It may be the case that compliance with future legislation means that certain businesses have to keep more data for longer - or that it becomes necessary to increase the security on certain types of data. By taking such eventualities into account when selecting backup hardware, a long-term storage solution can be identified, which solves all issues, both present and future."

In many cases, businesses will look for point solutions to current needs, instead of taking a more long-term view of requirements. This kind of decision-making process will often occur when a business has reached its storage capacity and a quick-fix solution has to be found. "This will inevitably result in the need to upgrade the storage technology more frequently than would otherwise be necessary and will cause integration difficulties when new technology is added," Hunt stresses.

"To avoid the potential pitfalls in backup hardware procurement, businesses should avoid finding point solutions to current needs. Instead, they should start by carefully classifying all data for storage. This provides the business with a fair idea of the types of storage it needs to invest in. The next step is to examine future capacity and performance needs within each classification by taking into account expected growth and future operational requirements.

“By this stage, the business should have a fairly clear idea of its storage hardware requirements and will be able to sensibly invest in backup hardware that will serve the business for years to come."