Backup on a Budget

W. Curtis Preston

Not everybody has the money to buy a million-dollar storage area network (SAN) completely dedicated to backup and recovery. Not everybody needs a SAN! In fact, the traffic on backupcentral.com shows that thousands of you can't even afford to buy backup software at all. (The pages that offer help for free backup software are among my most popular pages.) If this group of people includes you, then I want you to know that I haven't forgotten you. In fact, this column is just for you.

First, let's discuss some of the reasons why you might say, "We don't have enough money for backup software." Many of these reasons are very valid, but my personal opinion is that some of them are not:

You Are a Small Business on a Shoestring Budget

Many businesses operate on very little money, and purchasing commercial backup software can be very expensive. If you're in this category, perhaps you've been ignoring the issue of backup altogether and have buried your head in the sand. If so, I would rather you save the money that you would spend on software and spend some of it on better backup hardware.

You Are a Free Software Enthusiast

If you run Linux and StarOffice simply because you want to support the concept of free software, then I'm talking about you. While no one who uses Amanda would claim that it has all of the features that commercial backup products offer, its capabilities are sometimes quite amazing — and it's free! The developers of Amanda are as interested in advancing the cause of free software as they are in developing a good backup product.