More Backup Software

Two unusual network backup solutions

This month, in my ongoing review of backup solutions for Windows NTnetworks, I tested two packages, Stac's Replica and Barratt EdwardsInternational's (BEI's) UltraBac 4.1. Each package proved its worth based on themerits of its functionality, and both solutions stand out from other packagesbecause of the unorthodox approach they take to address backup and archivaloperations.

While vendors whose applications target Fortune 1000 companies are paringdown their solutions to simplify implementation for small to midsizeorganizations, BEI and Stac are developing solutions that target ever-largernetworks. Although neither company's upgraded solution was available as of thiswriting, some benefits of their soon-to-be-released kin were apparent in theevolving versions I tested.

In addition to these vendors are solutions providers, such as @Backup, thattout the Internet as the way to ensure safe, secure offsite archival and backup,and Eastman Kodak's OPEN/stor open file management product (for a review of thisproduct, see Bob Chronister, "OPEN/stor," page 90).

All these choices mean you will have even more difficulty figuring outwhich product is best for your network. Although these packages have the samebasic premise of information backup and archival, they are all very different.

Replica 3.0 for Windows NT Single Server Edition
Stac's backup software, Replica 3.0 for Windows NT Single Server Edition,reminds me of a racecar--it's fast and built only for speed, not versatility.For administrators, this limitation means you will forgo some features you'dexpect from backup software, such as data encryption, virus scanning, orselecting the files or folders you want to back up, and you don't have a choiceabout incremental or differential backups.

The feature that makes Replica fast is the same feature that limits it--thesoftware lets you back up only full drives or volumes at a time. The nameReplica is appropriate because the product offers more replication than backupcapability. Replica can quickly assemble and deliver a data stream to tapedevices because it doesn't read file tables and individual file and folderinformation, but requests entire blocks of information at a time. Thus devicescan record at full throttle, rather than continuously pit-stopping to wait formore information to come down the track.

On my test network, Replica produced a steady throughput of 130MB perminute (MBpm) when writing to the Lab's high-speed DLT device, as opposed to ahigh of 90MBpm with other backup software packages. Similarly, with Replica, theLab's DDS recording device ran roughly 30 percent faster than with productsusing a more traditional recording methodology.

Replica's approach to file structures and how it selects the data it willback up is Spartan, but it has a scheduler that lets you decide when to back up.Like the rest of the software, the scheduler is straightforward and direct. Withno incremental or differential backups to consider, the scheduler amounts tolittle more than a weekly calendar and a clock.

Replica's technology is useful for disaster recovery schemes. If you useReplica's three slightly modified NT setup disks with a fourth disaster recoverydisk specific to Replica, the software can restore a system with a failed harddisk on the fly. In less than 30 minutes, I completely restored 2.7GB on theLab's test server using the high-speed DLT drive. The software also tracks harddisk partitions and restores them with the rest of the data. (Be aware thatReplica does not support proprietary disk partitions such as those that Compaqand HP use.) However, Replica will not let you adjust the size of the partitionsduring a restore, so you can't replace a crashed hard disk with a smaller disk.

Not being able to resize partitions irritated me, and I was miffed becauseReplica does not integrate the creation of the NT setup disks into its disasterrecovery scenario--these disks are vital to the disaster recovery process.Further, a dialog box pops up to tell you to create the disks, but doesn'texplain how to do it. Instead, the dialog box points you to NT's onlinedocumentation, where I searched for NT setup disks, set up, anddisaster recovery without finding the information. To be fair, I'lladmit Stac details the process in the printed manual, but I shouldn't have to gohunting.

Despite these annoyances, I found several features to like in Replica. TheDirect Media Access feature is useful; because of Replica's method of recordingdisk information, you can access a recorded volume (e.g., an entire partitioneddisk) as if it were a removable hard disk. Configuring a tape to access it thisway is easy. I copied the C: partition of the network server to a DDS tape andselected Restore. With just a couple of mouse clicks, I mounted the media as anindependent drive on the network, chose a drive letter to associate with it, andmade it available to all authorized users. Replica mapped the new drive to theserver and labeled it a Removable Disk, and I didn't have to reboot the server.

Replica lets you access the media as you access a drive: through WindowsExplorer, Network Neighborhood, and so forth. Another nice feature is that youcan access the "disk" after you shut down the Replica interface fromthe administrative machine. And, although this version of the software is notsupposed to support multiple tape drives, it does. During backup, I was able toaccess a medium mounted as a removable disk.

Users can see information and even run programs from the tape, but on aread-only basis. As you might expect, running a program from the tape istime-consuming. The software took more than 20 seconds to open a smallapplication stored on the Replica-created removable disk, as opposed to justover a second to open the same application resident on the local hard disk.

Stac ported the software to NT from NetWare, so you'll notice somesimilarities to the NetWare version. A small agent installed on the tape serverwhere the recording devices are connected lets you install the administrativeconsole software on a Windows 95 machine. This feature lets you access remoteservers, such as those locked away in secure closets, for backup procedureswithout somebody having to be physically present at the machine. This procedureis odd for an NT network, but typical for a NetWare network because NetWareservers do not have a graphical interface. (Be aware that Replica's NT versiondoes not support NetWare servers or workstations.)

Replica 3.0 is not a product targeting enterprise installations, but asingle server edition that supports one tape drive. According to Stac, anenterprise edition of Replica will be available by the end of this year. It willsupport multiple tape devices, multiple servers, and robotic autoloaders.

For now, however, Replica 3.0 is a powerful tool that approaches backupfrom an entirely different angle. The interface, as shown in Screen 1, like therest of the software, is relatively straightforward with only a few windowspertinent to its operation, and tabs within these windows make navigation abreeze. A full history of jobs is readily available, and a toolbar icon givesusers direct access to a Web site that contains the latest information on theproduct. One option that I would really like this software to have is afunctional right mouse button.

The lack of support for the numerous file structures in distributedenvironments, virus-checking capabilities, encryption, and support forincremental or differential backups will keep Replica's market share segmented.However, small to midsized businesses that need to protect their intellectualproperty in a hurry will be hard-pressed to find a faster product that's easierto use.

UltraBac 4.1
BEI's UltraBac 4.1 backup and recovery software reminds me of one of myfavorite restaurants--it doesn't look like much on the outside, but the insideis full of pleasant surprises. The entire software package fits on two 1.44MBfloppies and installs in less than a minute, which is impressive. The softwareis intuitive, informative, and robust (it even includes autoloader support).

When I first ran UltraBac, the interface did not impress me--it is a graybox with seven menu items and six buttons. However, my opinion changed quicklybecause the interface option names are intuitive; when you choose Mode, Select,Tools, or one of the others, you get what you'd expect.

For example, when you select Mode, you get the options Verify, Restore,Backup, or Cancel. When you highlight Select, you get the choice of including orexcluding files by name, viewing the selection logic, and selecting the type ofincremental backup you want to perform. This option is also where you selectwhich tape device you will be using.

UltraBac works by backing up user-defined sets. After UltraBac creates aset, you can specify a variety of incremental backup methodologies includingmonthly, weekly, daily, and modified; also, you can specify the number of daysbetween incremental backups. The software had no trouble identifying andoperating the three SCSI tape devices hooked to my server and switching amongthem. To maximize the software's backup speed, the UltraBac engineers wrotedevice drivers for Exabyte, DLT, and DDS tape devices--I was running one ofeach. I installed the UltraBac-supplied drivers over the drivers that camewith NT 4.0, but I didn't see any noticeable performance improvement.

Under Tools, you can select View Output Media Info to display acomprehensive list of the features and functionality of the selected tapedevice, and the properties of the media within the drive. This list includespassword and write protection, compression, locking and unlocking, loading andunloading, filemark searching, and many other attributes--50 in all. I mentionthis list because I have tested many backup solutions, and haven't been able toview this information. To finally find a product that offers it, especially onone screen, was refreshing.

Another useful feature is that you can perform a quick erase in addition tothe much more time-consuming secure erase. UltraBac also lets users define howlong a particular job will be write-protected, and it provides a tape copyingutility for making multiple copies of the same job.

When you run the scheduler for the first time, the software looks for otherservers and prompts you to add them to a list of UltraBac-supported servers.Better still, UltraBac can install itself to other servers on the network andlets you monitor their progress remotely, using the UltraVue utility. Thescheduler also lets you group several sets from different network resources fora consolidated backup operation. Backup logs come in three different flavors,depending on how much detail you prefer, and UltraBac supports emailnotification, tape ejection, and rewind.

UltraBac's documentation claims that you can run concurrent versions of thesoftware on the same server. Just to see how far I could push this claim, Istarted three separate sessions of UltraBac that were backing up the same 1GBfile to three different tape devices. I enabled software compression on eachbackup operation to identify how much of a load UltraBac could put on a server'sCPU. After all three jobs were running, I opened the UltraVue system monitor tosee what the system thought of my test. UltraVue correctly identified andtracked the progress of all three jobs, as shown in Screen 2, and placed the CPUunder approximately a 50 percent load. My only question is how many SCSI devicescan I run at the same time without seriously hindering performance?

BEI boasts that UltraBac is one of the fastest solutions on the market,which is a reasonable claim. I know of one package, Replica, that bulldozes itsway through backups by downloading logical blocks of information from a discsequentially, without regard to file or folder information. This method is notvery elegant, but certainly effective. UltraBac effectively matches Replica'sthroughput on all the devices tested with the exception of the high-speed DLTdrive--in this case, Replica was more than 30 percent faster than UltraBac'sbest.

However, by recording a digital image of hard disk to tape, UltraBac canmimic Replica for disaster recovery scenarios. By capturing disk information inthis fashion, UltraBac maintains and restores disk partitions, so you cannotreplace a failed disk that has less capacity. You'll want to shut down all otherapplications before capturing a disk image, because open files will not becorrectly preserved. In all other ways, the recovery scenario worked well, andUltraBac restored my hard disk at the rate of 71MBpm using the DLT drive.

Selecting Options, Preferences from the main toolbar displays aneasy-to-read and manage window with a slew of tabs that provide informationabout everything you need to know for a backup job. Here is where you tellUltraBac what compression to use, whether to record the Backup Registry, and thefile attributes to include during the backup. The options are self-explanatory,and using the tabs to get from one option to the next is quick and easy.

Everything is not sugar and spice, however. Although there is a place toenter scripts to be run both before and after UltraBac completes backupoperations, the software doesn't include any encryption or virus checkingcapabilities. And UltraBac doesn't support the right mouse button. AlthoughUltraBac supports Windows 95, SQL, and Exchange through agents, this versionwon't be good for administrators with distributed multiplatform environments.Also, the software doesn't support writing data streams from multiple sources tothe same tape drive concurrently--a must- have in large and very large networks.

If BEI really wants a seat at the Fortune 1000 table, the company will needto add some of this functionality to UltraBac, especially being able to writemultiple data streams simultaneously to a single device. However, UltraBacincludes enough delectable features that administrators of small tomidsize networks won't likely be hungry for more.