I am implementing a tape backup for three servers we have on a WIn2K domain with AD. I have Veritas Backup Exec. The servers are all configured with the OS on seperate drives from the data drives (which are configured RAID 5). My concern is where to install Veritas. If I install it locally on the servers, and the OS drives crash, then how would I run the software to do the restore function? It seems to me that I need to run the backup software from a seperate stand alone server. Am I right on this? I'm a newbie in the network admin world, so any help and suggestions from the veterans would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a bunch.

"Logically/ideally" it would be on its own - separate server...; one kept safe from various predations etc...? A true back-up server? If you do a trawl in google etc. using: where to install backup tape drive on multi-server system? as the string/search term, you'll get a range of useful how to do it hits; many of which will doubtless be useful to read too...? This is one the better forums to come for network know-how...; there are others too. Incidentally, if you don't know about this magazine... http://www.windowsitpro.com/ then it's worth your while to get a subscription... Level of i/p in the past was excellent - and generally remains so today. Deals with NT upwards - all areas/aspects; excellent archive and assorted how to's etc...

Thank you very much for the pointers!

Question is are you running three tape backups [one per server] or are you running one tape unit but backing up three servers? Here is what I do at one of our smaller sites. I have one tape drive in a server [with a backup tape drive on the shelf]. BE is installed on that server. BE remote agents are installed on the other servers so they can be backed up. If I lose the backup server it is just a matter of rebuilding, reinstalling the OS, reinstalling BE and then doing a full system restore. This works as I have had to do it. Any of the other servers would be the same way except instead of reinstalling BE it would just be the remote agent. There is an addition BE program for bare metal restores but last I checked into it [years back] it was out of line for my budget. Give a person a fish, they eat for a day. Suggest they internet search and they learn a skill for a lifetime.

Thanks for your suggestion. Yes, I will have three individual tape drives. Each server has a 100G Array for data, and an ULTRA3 SCSI interface. The OS drives are 18G, but only the OS is loaded on them. My thought was to use LTO tape drives that can handle the 100G (the arrays aren't completely full, so data drive plus OS drive should still be below 100G.)