Cross-platform backup solutions for Mac/Windows/Linux...which is more reliable?

June 22, 2005 12:23 PM

I'm currently running Retrospect Server 5 on a Mac OS X box. It's backing up the following clients: 2 Windows 2003 servers, a Windows 2000 server, 2 Mac OS X 10.2 Servers, a few Mac OS X Panther clients, and 2 linus boxes. Backups are done to external hard drives as well as to a VXA tape changer. The Mac Servers and clients will soon be upgraded to Tiger, so I'm going to need to upgrade Retrospect. However, Retrospect is somewhat flaky at times, and I've heard about some reliability issues with Retrospect 6. I'm considering switching to BRU Server by the Tolis Group. I've heard lots of good things. My question is, does anyone have any actual experience with similar setups for these two backup solutions and which one should I go with? Or maybe is there a better backup solution in the same price range I should be considering?
posted by edjusted to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

Best answer: I sent your question to my Mac consultant friend -- who has spend many an hour setting up and troubleshooting Retrospect and BRU solutions -- and this was his answer:

At this point, I'd stick with Retrospect 6. It is a much more solid solution than Retro 5, although there are still some glitches. BRU is just not ready for the mainstream until they get their GUI problems worked out. It's useable (sometimes), but you have to spend a lot of time with it.
posted by pmbuko at 12:37 PM on June 22, 2005

For more info on BRU, see pages 15 - 18 of this PDF (an in-depth review of 3 enterprise-class backup solutions for OS X environments).
posted by pmbuko at 12:43 PM on June 22, 2005

Try to keep your servers running Panther Server. The Retrospect client works okay under client 10.4.1, but the Workgroup and Server are flaky under Tiger Server. So far as I know Apple still sells Xserves with Panther, and you can ask your purchase contact for that in your quote.
posted by Rothko at 1:06 PM on June 22, 2005

Yeah, the current inventory of Xserves comes with Panther pre-installed and a Tiger drop-in pack. This may change at any moment, though.
posted by pmbuko at 1:30 PM on June 22, 2005

I've had a lot of success with Retrospect 6 and a VXA tape changer running on Panther. It's probably the smoothest backup setup I've had. There's still issues with the clients sometimes, but that seems to be more to do with the condition of the client machines than anything wrong with Retrospect or its client software.
posted by ursus_comiter at 1:38 PM on June 22, 2005

Response by poster: Thanks for everyone's answers. I guess I'll brave Retrospect 6!
posted by edjusted at 5:25 PM on June 27, 2005