Re: Best way to duplicate HDs
> > Except that I've pointed out already that we're specifically NOT
looking
> > at a live RAID solution. This is a backup drive that is suppose to be
> > synced every 12 hours or 24 hours.
>
> Sorry, but I don't see any benefit to having maximum 12 hour old data
when
> you could have 0. The hardware solution you mentioned was RAID 1 anyway.
> Easiest thing to do is use it, and have both spare drives and spare
machines
> ready to roll should you need to swap either.
> > The idea being that if there is a virus, a cracker, or hardware
> > malfunction, then the backup drives can be immediately pulled out and
> > inserted into a backup computer, and switch on to provide immediate
> > restoration of services (with data up to 12 hours old, but better than
> > having up-to-date information that may be corrupted or "cracked"
versions
> > of programs).
>
> Well, there's your benefit to having old data. Who's to say you're going
to
> know within 12 hours? This is not a particularly interesting problem,
mostly
> because you're not curing the disease, you're trying to clean up after
> infection.
Not really... i think of it as helping to cure the disease and helping to
clean up the problem, not eliminating both because it is impossible to
cure the disease completely. Unfortuantely if you work with a medium to
large number of various equipment (or even a small number if you're
unlucky) you're bounded to be cracked sooner or later. Even the strictest
security policy and such won't guarentee 100% protection. Another way to
do this would be to go Russell's way (the ideal way) and run a RAID array
with 3 drives, 2 live and 1 spare, and the sync the spare up every 24
hours. However, this would require 3 drives instead of 2... $$$ and space.
For the average server between 2-4 drives, this would mean a minimum of
6-12 drives compared to 4-8. The server cases wouldn't even hold 12
drives. They could hold up to 8 or so. So money isn't the only
consideration. Then you have to consider that even if we could somehow
place that many drives in the average rackmount case, overheating... power
supply issues...etc. come into play.
You might say "tape backup"... but keep in mind that it doesn't offer a
"plug n play" solution if a server goes down. With the above method, a
dead server could be brought to life in a minute or so (literally) rather
than half an hour... an hour... or more.
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