A while ago my entire network of systems in my office crashed. We couldn’t recover any data despite many attempts. We lost several days of time that should have been devoted to other projects, not data recovery. We also lost all the time, hard work and money we had invested in the work that we couldn’t recover. Unfortunately we learned the data backup lesson the hard way, and have started doing regular online backup of our data. There are a lot of companies that provide online data storage services to help companies and individuals avoid data loss. In our research there are really two general options. Backup software that stores the data online for you or storage services that act as targets for your existing backup software. We already have backup software and archives so we were looking for a storage service.
I read a few articles that said there are basically 2 storage as a service options, Amazon and Nirvanix. Originally I thought they were just developer focused, like Amazon S3, but then I dug a little deeper and saw that they are actually more geared towards businesses. My CTO didn’t want into get into some lengthy contract so the pay-as-you-go model that both offer was a great alternative. I sent both companies a few questions and got NO reply from Amazon but did hear back from Nirvanix. Being responsive is very important for me. I just can’t afford having someone spend all day trying to solve an issue waiting for a customer support rep to get back to them. I’m also not storage savvy, and they gave me the guidance I needed, and you can actually talk to a person over there! I wished I’d discovered them earlier, before my office’s massive data loss, but better late than never.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
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