Combined versus separate: The fate of backup and archive tape management
The future of archived tape management and backup assets is in the balance. As companies continually look for new and better ways to save money, implement data storage and ensure security, support and infrastructure oversight, there’s more push to consolidate assets and move to digital option. These kinds of assets may present firms with a facade of success and superior operations, but does combining backup with archive tape tools provide any real benefit, and is it even compliant or safe?
Acknowledging assets
Computer Weekly stated that backup and archive are two very different things, and it is essential that organizations recognize these differences. Recognizing the advantages of having both these systems is more than just a luxury for enterprise compliance and risk management, the source warned. Each of these options must maintain their own unique identities or else organizations could find themselves unable to perform vital IT functions.
“Backup is for restoring a file, object, database, volume or system based on some recovery time objective and recovery point objective,” said Greg Schulz of Storage IO. [T]he archive is a picture of the data and its state at a point in time.”
Maintaining functionality
So why are companies combining these strategies? The source reported that an Enterprise Strategy Group survey showed over 80 percent of companies used backup tape software and other tools to construct their archive environments. The primary driver behind such decisions is to save money and cut duplication, apparently. But is this really a bright idea?
If firms want to save money, Storage and Destruction Business Online stated that tape tools are already among the most cost effective. There’s no reason to try and run deduplication between different kinds of assets, as each of these tools is used for a completely different reason. Reducing duplication in each environment helps companies reduce their storage footprints and increase asset accuracy, but it’s unwise to combine archive and backup applications.
B&L’s Archived Data Manager is an ideal option or maintaining a tape solution that’s ideal for legacy asset oversight. It consistently ages out information in a compliant fashion and can work in tandem with other B&L backup tape tools, thereby increasing administrative accuracy while cutting costs. Instead of risking corporate continuity by improperly skewing backup and archive, using tools that offer ideal options for archive management and tape tracking are ideal.