StorageCraft Technology Corporation, a provider of disk-based backup, disaster recovery, system migration, data protection and security solutions, has detailed a project at The Illand Company to protect critical systems used to track hundreds of thousands of documents, tapes and CDs.
The Illand Company launched a new division in 1990 to offer a range of document management services. From its 540,000 cubic feet premises, the firm stores all types of physical documents for clients such as multi-nationals and government agencies. To manage the delivery, storage, removal and (eventual) destruction of our clientโs documents, The Illand Company uses a dedicated barcode creation and tracking system as well as the contractual details needed to manage the storage process for thousands of clients. โIf we lost any of these critical databases, we would effectively be out of business as it would be almost impossible to find any of our stored items, โsays Bob Fordie, archive manager for The Illand Company, โLoss of access to the bar coding and tracking systems even for a few hours would be a major problem for us and could impact on our reputation as a trusted service provider.โ
For years, the firm had relied upon a tape based backup but had had problems with reliability and poor performance as the size of the backup data grew. Recovery from tape backups also proved difficult to test. However, it was a data loss issue that affected the firms accounting software and the subsequent problems from recovering lost data from tape which prompted the firm into action. โIt was a real wake up call for us and at that point we approached OneStop ITS Ltd for a better solution,โ adds Bob.
OneStop offered a service using ShadowProtect that takes a backup of the critical server image and all database files every 15 minutes. This image is copied onto a removable hard disk that is swapped out with an identical unit each night. In the event of a server crash that prevents the system from correctly restarting, ShadowProtect can instead start an identical virtual server with all applications and data from the images stored on the removable hard disk. This VirtualBoot technology allows Illand to access its critical systems in under 15 minutes. If the main server experiences a catastrophic failure, ShadowProtect can rebuild to alternative server hardware with the entire system including critical database files in under an hour. In the worst case scenario of fire or flood, the off-site copy of the server and database files can be used to rebuild all the firmsโ critical systems.
โThe system has been tested extensively and it provides us with a proven and reliable solution for our business continuity requirements,โ adds Bob, โWe are now looking at an upgraded broadband connection which we will use to automatically backup the server off-site using StorageCraft ShadowProtect ImageManager Enterprise, although we will also continue to use a local removable hard disk as well.โ Bob says: โThey have worked well with us to define our needs, setup the system and run tests to ensure that it is working as planned, he comments, โThe IT systems we use are absolutely critical and making sure that they are protected to the best of our ability is essential for the success of our business and the trust placed in us by our clients.โ For more information, visit –
