February 1
Part 4 of a set of articles in our series on Data Safety
Keep it Simple, Silly
Configuration of RAID arrays have been greatly simplified over the years. With the very low cost of high-capacity drives, it seems every small and medium office has introduced some sort of multi-drive setup to their business. Home users now can enjoy easy access to high-capacity: simple redundancy NAS units offer lots of space for huge collections of data – photos, music, etc. Even the most basic RAID arrays can easily maintain important data without having to rely on a single hard drive.
It’s Not A Matter of If, but When….
There are important details to remember when storing your data this way: even a RAID can fail. While it is highly unlikely that multiple drives will fail simultaneously, external damage: fire, flood, or a power spike, could damage all drives and your redundancy with them. A RAID will also not protect against logical damage, virus, accidental deletion or overwrite will destroy the data as surely as a failed drive. A single drive failure can be a minor inconvenience while your users wait for a rebuild to complete. A multiple drive failure can lead to a significant down-time and data loss. (Pro-Tip: 5 Steps for Rapid RAID Recovery)
If You Can’t Stand the Heat…
Another thing to consider is environmental factors. A small or medium-sized business may have multiple computers or servers in a closet or “server room”. Proper ventilation and airflow isn’t always a first-draft design choice in a broom closet, and a hot server will soon mean a down server. And when the sink overflows in the unit on the 2nd floor, this doesn’t count as water-cooling. Plan your IT infrastructure properly to suit your needs and environment. You won’t be alone: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/351365/Liquid_Storage
Category: data loss prevention, helpful hints
Tags: backing up, business continuity, business continuity plan, data safety series, protect data, raid array failure, server
