exchange server backup setup (best practice?)

[GerryRigney]

Hi All

 

We are currently backing up or exchange server over the network (GB) onto an existing backup set on another server. We are backing up the users mailboxs everynight (just the new items) but are also doing a full backup of the storage group the users are contained. We were advised to do this so if a user looses a mail we can retrieve it from the mailbox backup and if our server goes up in smoke (touch timber) we can easily (!?) restore the whole thing as it was by restoring the storage group.

 

Our problem is the storage group is over 50GB so this is eating the hell our of our tape space, which brings me onto my question(s):

 

If we switch to diffrential or incremental what are we sacraficing in terms of data recovery should we need it? What are the bedifits of incremental over diffrential? or should we keep going with the full backup?

 

I appreciate any feedback you can provide, apologies if its a basic question and yes I know we should have had this down from the get-go

 

thanks

gerryR

[nekr0phage]

Hi Gerry,

 

If you want to reduce the amount of space required for backups, switching to differential or incremental should be fine. However, you should run a full backup on a regular basis. For example: if you rotate between two tape sets weekly, run a full once a week so that you always have a current full to restore from on one of the sets.

[GerryRigney]

hi Foster and thanks for the reply.

 

 

 

Why would one bother running an incre or diff backup if they were doing a full some time anyway? Is it possible to recover an entire servers exchange from the incre or diff or in the case of a full recovery can it only be do from a full backup? If we do do a full backup say twice a week onto our current backup set is there anyway of getting it to overwrite the previous weeks storagegroup or will it only backup the whole thing again? (bearing in mind there is other data being backuped onto the tape too so we can't overwrite the tapes completely)

 

 

 

Apologies for the 2nd quesation but I'd like to understand the thinking behind the options.

 

 

 

thanks again

 

gR

[nekr0phage]

Hi Gerry,

 

If you run a full backup once to a tape backup set then switch to differential for the rest of the week, the differentials will save you a fair bit of space versus doing a full backup every day. However, you will need a full to restore then the differentials will update the full to the most recent backup, so you need that full in there somewhere.

 

There is no way to have Retrospect backup over older versions of the storagegroups on their own, you can either recycle, or if you're running a disk backup set you can set it to groom out previous snapshots. This would allow you to keep a current backup of Exchange without losing space on multiple versions of the storagegroups.