Backup System For 5 PC SMB
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@scottalanmiller said:
That only works if they have another desktop to work from, though. And if they do, theoretically you are ready to restore.
I'd take them a laptop while I commandeered a new system for them. Or fixed the old one.
Or also this would be great if their place burned down or all machines got stolen
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Say Monday morning hits and they were robbed over the weekend. All 5 employees could be up and running at 9:15.
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Here is my understanding of how the BMR licensing works...
- Your old machine has an OEM license
- Your new machine has an OEM license
- You have purchased imaging rights so that imaging systems can be used via VL
- Old machine dies, you can use the image on the new machine. No licenses transfer, only the system image. You will need to re-authenticate.
I still don't like this idea at all, stick to a gold master image and data backup. But BMR is doable using all of the tools mentioned.
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@BRRABill said:
@scottalanmiller said:
That only works if they have another desktop to work from, though. And if they do, theoretically you are ready to restore.
I'd take them a laptop while I commandeered a new system for them. Or fixed the old one.
Or also this would be great if their place burned down or all machines got stolen
So they have backup hardware ready to go at all times that is or isn't owned by the business? The company only has five PCs, right? They would need to buy all new?
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@BRRABill said:
Say Monday morning hits and they were robbed over the weekend. All 5 employees could be up and running at 9:15.
Somehow I don't think you need that quick of a RTO.. Considering how little you are willing to spend, down time must not cost you that much.
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@BRRABill said:
Say Monday morning hits and they were robbed over the weekend. All 5 employees could be up and running at 9:15.
Using what hardware, though. I get that it is remote, but if someone steals your desktop, you still need a desktop to keep working. Providing loaner Windows licenses isn't valid either
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From what you are describing, it sounds like what you really want is actually VDI. Is there any reason not to actually do VDI? Other than costs. Amazon has a nice VDI product.
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I can see where you are going, but it's not going to be an option. It's layers upon layers of licensing problems. It is a "failover to VDI" project which isn't licensenable. If you wanted to do that concept you could with separate VDI instances and only the data being backed up so that you can failover in that way. No problem there. But the cost would be huge. But because you are not dealing with SA licensing you would need to them license all of the equipment that would access the VDI which would be another nightmare.
It's lots of issues that come together here. A little bit on the technology side and a ton on multiple licensing fronts.
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This seems extreme for a five person office that isn't running a server or other infrastructure. Just a weird mismatch of wanting low downtime but not having an infrastructure to enable it. But going for really high end backup and recovery systems. A lot less money could get you something really good, I think. Obviously lots of companies tackle this every day. It's not that your needs are weird or uncommon.
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Most companies approach this with a combination of local backups, local storage and the ability to replace machines quickly.
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Something that needs to be addressed, I think....
You mentioned a fear of them having their desktops stolen en masse. This can happen, I've seen it happen. If that is the kind of thing that we are working to protect against and the kind of data that we are talking about is seven year retention.... I believe that we just said that we are looking at desktops holding seven years of customer tax data that could reasonable all walk out just on desktops? That seems like a big risk. Is there some special security being considered for just how much and how valuable the data stored on the desktops seems to be?
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I think we've broken away from my original 5 person company question.
I am defending the theory of why image backups with real-time spinup of a VM is a viable backup strategy for a small business.
You asked about computers. Everyone has a computer at home, the library, whatever. It could work until I rebuilt their systems.
To be honest, I'm not sure what direction to go in this thread any more, LOL. Too many smart people on here!
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Even the 1 person company thinks they need to be up 24/7.
They don't. it's ridiculous. But that's how they think.
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@BRRABill said:
Even the 1 person company thinks they need to be up 24/7.
They don't. it's ridiculous. But that's how they think.
Actually especially a one person company. The Fortune 100 don't make those kinds of business mistakes. Only really tiny companies have that kind of hubris.
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@BRRABill said:
I think we've broken away from my original 5 person company question.
Ah. Might be worth a new thread then
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@BRRABill said:
I am defending the theory of why image backups with real-time spinup of a VM is a viable backup strategy for a small business.
Even if you wanted to fail over to VDI, I can do that even more efficiently without an image based backup. I'm not confident that it is as valuable as you are imagining. I see why it sounds good, but all of the resulting features that you have I can achieve without needing to have heavy image backups being shipped over a WAN.
It would be viable, sure. And sometimes it might be ideal, but it doesn't feel like it should be. It's starting from the fundamental concept that the desktops are their own servers. Which even in a one person business, I would not do today.
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@BRRABill said:
You asked about computers. Everyone has a computer at home, the library, whatever. It could work until I rebuilt their systems.
Okay, so you meant going to "bring your own device" as a failover - going to somthing outside of the IT's dominion.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Okay, so you meant going to "bring your own device" as a failover - going to somthing outside of the IT's dominion.
It's how small companies roll for the most part. At least the ones I deal with. Not saying it is right. Just saying it is.
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Let me reverse it. Let's start from your goal and drive with that rather than driving from the solution. The thread is driven by the desire to do all of this using imaging. I can see why that would happen.
But let's say that what you want is the ability to take a backup, retain it for seven years, have it be cost effective and if a desktop dies that you want to be able to restore quickly and/or work from a remote VDI instance via a BYOD method until the desktop is restore. And you want the restore to be quick and painless.
Cool, i can do all of that today without an image-based backup system
So you don't lose any functionality, I don't think, you just can't do it using the technology that you are thinking. -
@BRRABill said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Okay, so you meant going to "bring your own device" as a failover - going to somthing outside of the IT's dominion.
It's how small companies roll for the most part. At least the ones I deal with. Not saying it is right. Just saying it is.
It's critical from a licensing standpoint, though. With the kind of VDI that you were looking at, every device at home that they want to use would need its own license as they don't have enterprise, VL or SA licenses attached to them. Using consumer gear with straight VDI is a problem.
