No backup project would be complete without considering redundancy. As I mentioned in my first article (Workstation Backup Solutions Pt. 1: Having One), there are situations you have to consider such as hardware failure, natural disasters, theft, and a few others.

Redundancy What?:

When we think of redundancy, we care most about having multiple  replication points in backups (discussed in my second article Workstation Backup Solutions Pt. 2: Methods & Retention), and then about replicating that data to other hardware or even geographically different locations. Let me elaborate in the next section.

Redundancy Where?:

With local redundancy (Raid arrays, replicating to multiple physical hard drives/hardware, etc.) you ensure that the information is copied across multiple pieces of equipment, which should minimize data loss in case of hardware failure. The issue with this is that even if you have 10x replication of a single piece of data, unless you live in a bomb shelter with the ultimate fire/flood suppression setup, you can’t really be sure a natural disaster won’t destroy the hardware.

Geographical redundancy is a little bit harder to implement on a budget because of expense involved in keeping multiple sets of hardware in other locations. If you have a friend who can keep a machine elsewhere in the state/province/country/continent/world, it’s good to be you, and the redundancy world is your oyster. For uncool people like us however, buying/renting or collocating a server elsewhere is the best bet. Of course, there are companies that offer remote backups that you can use instead of hosting your own hardware, but with these services come some amount of risk, and you will need to choose wisely in order to avoid a headache.

Redundancy How?:

Firstly, you will have to determine whether you want to simply use raid arrays or local replication, or go with a remote backup option.

With raid arrays, you have the option of software or hardware raid. Software raid, though somewhat reliable, will crash and burn if anything happens to your OS, whereas hardware raid uses a raid controller and is less prone to operational failures. Using raid brings up the problem of whether an additional point of failure such as software glitch, or a hardware controller is worth it. If you buy a good raid controller, you should be better off when considering both raid options. But keep in mind that raid cards fail too. Ultimately, if choosing to use raid, I’d go with the hardware raid option always.

Local replication is as simple as moving already backed up data to another hard drive or piece of hardware. This can be done using either a drag-drop method, or setting up a script to move it for you. In Windows, simply creating a network share folder and setting up a routine to move the files over works pretty well. In Linux, a cron that runs an rsync or sFTP script works well too. For Mac, a similar procedure can be ran as in Linux environments to move data.

Some backup software may have remote options available for backing things up. It is totally dependent on the awesomeness of the software developers, but this feature is also very often associated with a larger dollar amount for the software. So beware.

For true remote backups, you will need a server or hardware of some sort in a different geographical location to your system. In all honesty, maybe having it at a friend’s house a few lots over isn’t going to be enough space. Think broader. If a natural disaster has the likelihood of hitting both locations around the same time, maybe it’s wise to keep it elsewhere.

A few things to consider when retaining hardware elsewhere is:

1. Uptime/Relative Network Speed
2. Remote hands capabilities
3. Hardware guarantees on rented machines

All three points are there to minimize headache. If you can’t connect to the remote server, replication is going to be difficult and a lot of hand-holding over the process will take place. If you collocate, you will need to maintain your hardware, and having competent remote hands to install new hardware/fix issues will go a long way. If you rent a server, a hardware guarantee of some sort is a wise idea as well. If you need to rely on a backup, and the remote server has failed without you knowing about it, you can kiss sanity goodbye; there is no going back.

I hope these articles help. There are a lot of options I didn’t cover, and in redundancy no two setups are usually exactly alike. Just remember that a backup plan is better than nothing, multiple sets of backups are better than just a single backup, and a geographic redundancy scheme even better still. Also remember that Google is your friend. You can find a lot of backup articles for workstations and servers from other contributors there.

Cheers!