BDR Essentials: Five Features for Backup Bliss

Selecting the right solution for backup and disaster recovery (BDR) can be a complex process for managed services providers (MSP). Many solutions may seem appealing, but do they provide everything you need for reliable BDR. Cloud or on-premise? How often should you test the backup? (You do test your backups, right?) And what about virtualization?

BDR vendor Datto is no stranger to what a solid solution should look like. We asked the company’s Director Channel Relations Shannon Kohn for her thoughts on top features for BDR solutions.  Here are five big-ticket features that BDR solutions should have.

Local virtualization of any backup
With downtime being costly to any organization, a vendor should be able to provide a business with a fail-over server. “Downtime is costly and with the recent advancements in BDR technology, no client should ever be down for hours at a time,” Kohn said. “The BDR should be able to step in and act as a fail-over server in the instance that the clients local server(s) goes down. You should also be able to run virtualizations locally on the BDR until the server can be replaced.”

Off-site virtualization of any backup
Is critical data protected at an off-site location? “In the event of a local catastrophe, it’s imperative to have critical infrastructure backup up off-site. This gives a client peace of mind that if the unthinkable happens, they can be brought back online quickly in the cloud,” she said. “This means that email, web and other critical applications (like Quickbooks) can be restored in a matter of minutes.”

Daily automatic testing of backups
Being able to test the bootablilty and viability of backups before a disaster is critical. “You don’t want to get to a disaster scenario and then discover that the backups have not been working properly for the past month,” Kohn said. “Many BDR solutions have error reporting, but it’s still important to test backups on a regular basis. This can be time consuming and frustrating. There is technology in certain BDR solutions (like Datto SIRIS) that can automatically test your backup on a daily basis and report the status. This is a key feature that can provide a safeguard against failed backups for MSPs.”

Multiple and geographically diverse data centers
Data centers should not be located in the same region. Spreading data prevents a regional disaster from wiping out data from a single location. “It’s important to ensure that data is stored off-site in geographically diverse locations,” Kohn suggested. “Should a regional disaster occur, it’s important that the off-site data remains secure and unaffected. It’s also important to back up to more than one data center to ensure that the data is accessible in the event of a data center issue or failure. It’s unacceptable to tell a client that they cannot get to their data because the data center is currently experiencing problems or downtime.”

Off-site Archiving
A BDR vendor should provide off-site archiving, Kohn said. “This is important for two reasons: first, it ensures that if data is removed from the local device by accident, that there is still a secure copy off-site that can be restored. Second, it saves MSPs and their clients money because the local device capacity does not have to cover the entire backup repository. MSPs can use a smaller device to store recent snapshots and periodic backups locally, while the bulk of the repository can be stored off-site. Further, archiving capabilities are is also necessary for certain HIPAA requirements.”