Hi guys! Let me ask you something. I have a Windows 2003 Server with 4x500GB all full with users's data. (2 TB data) No tape, no nothing. Bulk hard disks. Which is the best solution to take'em backup ? Hardware? Software ? Thank you ! Digital Family.

A NAS or removable drive would be a good idea. A tape would work if you could find one big enough to hold all your data. If not, you could look for 500 GB tapes and have 4 separate backups (1 per HDD). Regardless of what you decide to backup onto, you still need software to do the backup. Whether it's a drag and drop copy operation or you use the builtin ntbackup or a third party solution. Personally, I would use backup software that utilizes compression.

Thank you so much Curt R ! Can you recommend me one ? I heard that Symantec Backup Exec is one of the best right now on the market. Is it true ? Thank you again ! Digital Family.

At this level you really need two solutions. Both will cost you serious money. You need a disk to disk backup solution. How this works is a nas unit is setup with backup software [BE is just fine]. Other software shadow copies/mirrors the live data to the backup disks. Then you backup from those disks. This way your backup to tape doesn't impact the live servers performance since 2 TB will take some time to backup. Google disk to disk backups for more info Imagine the power if you knew how to internet search

To be honest, I've yet to use BE myself but have heard from many others it's a good product. What I have used that I liked a lot was CA ARCServ by Computer Associates. There are probably quite a few different backup progams available, some better than others so I would do some serious research prior to deciding on which one will best suit your needs and still be most cost effective.

Thank you so much guys! I appreciate it! I will build another one Server (as a backup server) and I will take there 4 backup tapes. I'll try to inform you what BOSS said.. hehehe... Thanks again! Digital Family.