High Availability Solutions
In theory, every business would like the maximum amount of system availability possible, or 99.999% uptime. In practice however, the cost to implement a system capable of delivering this would be enormous, and your business may not even require such a high level of availability across all departments, hence this theory being known as the 'myth of the five 9s'. The myth is perpetuated when some businesses exclude planned downtime from their availability calculations. This is where it is necessary for a system to be taken offline for a period of time, to allow for scheduled maintenance, an upgrade, or software patch to be installed
In real terms, high availability equates to 99.9% availability of systems, which translates into 8.8 hours of planned downtime per year. In order to achieve this a significant investment is required in terms of consultation and infrastructure design and build, which includes purchase of new equipment and failover passive technology. Systems must also be monitored, protected with up to date security and data replication technology, to ensure no critical information is lost.
d2 delivers solutions that focus on the entire application environment, including data, operating systems, servers, the network and every application. In the event of a failure the equipment will switch over to secondary systems, delivering high availability in practice, not in theory.
Data Replication
Data Replication is the process of backing up data remotely to a secure off-site location, but differs from Data Vaulting in that it only replicates changes in data. A snapshot of your system is made and any changes from the previous one will be backed up. This minimises the demand placed on systems and networks, which is a critical issue when replicating data over long distances.
The service is incredibly flexible, so that you define the parameters for how often the data is mirrored, and whether it is done on a continuous basis, at regularly scheduled periods, or out of hours to avoid disrupting users. The frequency of the replication will depend on the importance of the data and how quickly you need it restoring in the event of a network failure or a disaster. If the worst should happen, restoring data is easy and much faster than more traditional tape backup methods, as the data is readily available.
Disk-to-Tape Solutions
Disk-to-Tape backup is done several ways. One of the most common ways is to have a tape device attached to each server that needs to be backed up. Each server then backs up all critical data to the dedicated tape device during off hours. Initially, this is easier to setup and configure, but individual tape devices require additional management and manual intervention by the system administrator. Another popular method is to add a backup server to the company network with a tape device directly attached. The backup server then pulls the data from the other servers across the LAN to the attached tape backup device. This method consolidates the storage to one manageable location. Once backups are complete, tapes are rotated off-site for storage in a secure location. Sets of tapes are periodically pulled out of the rotation and archived.
Disk-to-Disk-to-Tape Solutions
The best answer for customers who require fast backups and restores is to add disk into their backup and archive strategy. Disk-to-Disk-to-Tape (D2D2T) is the combination of Disk-to-Disk and Disk-to-Tape. In essence it takes the best from both worlds. D2D2T is an approach to computer storage backup where data is first copied to a disk storage system and then copied again to a tape backup system. It provides a way to expedite backup by first copying data directly from one tier of disks to another, then enabling tape backup as a separate operation. The data will reside on the second tier disk until it is ready for long-term archive, which allows it to serve both as a staging area for the tape backup and a holding area that is available for quick restores. The idea is to back up from the production disk to a backup disk as quickly as possible. Once the Disk-to-Disk (D2D) portion has finished, files can be backed up to tape at a more comfortable pace without impacting the performance of the primary storage space. The additional disk stage will add cost, but for some customers the speed is vital.
All the disaster recovery solutions that d2 deliver focus on the entire application environment, including data, operating systems, servers, the network and every application. In the event of a failure you will have the means necessary to get back up and running in as quick a time as possible, minimising the effect on the end user / production.
