Backup solutions

[Metic]

I need a backup solution for my box (rehdat 9). I am currently using the standard backup facility from cpanel to an extra drive in the box, but I need to make a full backup of my main drive. I have heard that you can use dd to copy the drive bit for bit to another drive, but does this copy the entire drive with all partitions intact and the master boot record etc.

I need to be able to make a live "ghost or mirror" of the main drive once a week just encase the main drive dies or corrupts itself. ( basically allowing me to pull out the main drive if it was damaged and replacing it with the mirrored drive ) . I cannot have down time to initiate this backup solution.

Does anyone know of a solution that could help me.

 

[SarcNBit]

I need to be able to make a live "ghost or mirror" of the main drive once a week

I cannot have down time to initiate this backup solution.

There is a big difference between 'once a week' and 'live'.

You cannot implement the backup solution you are proposing without 'down time'.

What are you trying to protect against? If you are trying to protect against hardware failure, then a RAID or server mirror is the way to go.

If you want to protect against file corruption / hacking, then you need point-in-time backups. There is going to be downtime involved with any point-in-time solution.

What kind of access do you have to the hosting hardware?

 

[Metic]

What access i got

I only have sshd connection to the box.(no physical contact)

I don't need a point in time backup solution, only once a week a full backup.

What i meant by live was that the operating system that needs to be backed up is live, does linux allow this ? .I know that Microsoft's operating system does a shadow copy backup, but this is not perfect in the sense that you will still have to get another drive with a full OS ready to restore the backup to.

BTW Thanks for replying.

I need all the help I can get

 

[asmithjr]

The dd command should work.

something like this

But you need to replace the c0t1d0s2 and c0t2d0, to use the HDs on your system.

maybe something like sda1 and sdb1

dd if=/dev/rdsk/c0t1d0s2 of=/dev/rdsk/c0t2d0s2 bs=32k

remember to boot from this drive you need to fsck the drive
fsck -y /dev/dsk/c0t2d0s2

home this helps.

Oh also the ftsab on the second drive needs to ba modified to boot if you are using this as an alernate boot device.

change the drive in the fstab.

hope this helps.

 

[hostmedic]

r1soft

I would suggest in investing in r1soft's backup system
We did this recently - and Wow is all I can say.

It is absolutely awesome.
What I like best about it - is the simple fact it takes virtually no cpu power to run...

We have it set to take 10 daily snapshots...

cPanel introduced R1soft last year @ their conference...
awesome application!

 

[opt2bout]

I would suggest in investing in r1soft's backup system
We did this recently - and Wow is all I can say.

It is absolutely awesome.
What I like best about it - is the simple fact it takes virtually no cpu power to run...

We have it set to take 10 daily snapshots...

cPanel introduced R1soft last year @ their conference...
awesome application!

Are you using the cPanel integration of CDP? Can you give a summary of your configuration? e.g. is the backup server in the same hosting facility as your cPanel servers? How long did it take you to do the initial backup to the CDP server?

We've been looking at this as a possible add-on for cPanel hosting customers and was curious at how well it worked for that.

Thanks for any details you can offer.

 

[hostmedic]

our setup

We manage our own facility - so having the backup server @ our facility works great.

In short here is the setup:


clients network ----
|
Gigabit Layer Switch
| |
| |---->Backup Server-----> Storage Array
| |
| ------------------
| SAN Array NAS Array
|
|
|---->Firewall
|
|----->routing / external network


We found by utilizing a NAS/SAN (we use both depending on what the servers are doing - ie block level access (SAN) for database servers etc... and NAS (file oriented) we were able to increase the efficiency of the network a ton.

For the simple backup - a NAS or SAN however will work.


When we tested this setup - it was pretty simple.
You can actually load the software on virtually anything - it will run on vanilla centos (and other flavors)

I have heard of people running it on the cPanel box - but seems kinda silly to do so if thats the box your backing up.


There is only 1 issue that I do not like about R1soft as of yet when it comes to cPanel.

The clients cannot restore their own databases...
The reasons for this are being worked out I hope... but in short they have to do w/ the location and way that cPanel stores the clients database files /var/lib/mysql (generally)

Having given our clients the ability to restore files from minutes ago - is awesome.
the cPanel integration is flawless - and our customers have been praising this backup system ever since we put it in place.

R1Soft is focused on clients as well... They care about the clients - their needs, desires, and understand your business requires a backup solution that works.


I did a quick hunt around - depending on your datacenter you may get buy with R1soft pretty cheap...

My suggestion however is go direct to Chris @ R1Soft - and purchase directly.
The software is only $500 for 5 servers and 1MySQL license (i can help you cluster mySQL if ever needed to get around needing more... and more licenses )

If you were say - at the Planet - or GNax - or even in our DC - and you purchased your own cheapy server - you could buy the software outright - and then just ask for a vlan between the boxes -

this would save you a ton of cash in the long run - in under 2 months in fact you would have split even... !

For storage - if needed - you could also take a peek into

NetApps StoreVault S300 - its less than $3K for 1TB and has 4 10/100/1000 Ethernet ports - as well as being expandable up to 4TB

You could also build your own cheaper if you know how...

The Buffalo TeraStation Pro II is decent (slower i believe) but still decent.
Runs from $700 and allows up to 3TB Its simple SATA II - so an inexpensive method would be to buy the SATA drives (say those fancy 1TB drives from Seagate) and let the system go to town with them.

The system comes with USB / Ethernet and a few windows solutions in the box as well - (doubt you would need those yet for cPanel... but in the future. . . . )

Iomega has there StorageCenter Pro solutions however I have not tested these personally -


If your stuck let me know via PM and I will try to set some time aside to discuss your needs

Kind Regards,

 

[hostmedic]

time frame

The original Seed took some time - especially when we were doing this over a public lan and a 10/100 network.

When I added simple cards and moved the backup to its own network and allowed the system to run there - there was no issue...

That being said I am not a patient person sometimes ( just ask my wife and 4 kids all under the age of 7)

The original seed backup took roughly 1 1/2 hours to run - however the additional backup past this are just minutes...

The baremetal restores are not that bad either... we have done 750gb restores in under 3 hours

Hope that helps