CrashPlan – A New Backup Paradigm

CrashPlan PRO offers a paradigm of backup that includes a single solution for on-site and off-site backups that is more affordable than traditional tape backup and more costly off-site programs that exist today.

Perhaps a new paradigm is a bit of a stretch. However, since a new paradigm is really just a new model of some process, perhaps indeed CrashPlan Pro is just that. Let’s look at the CrashPlan backup model and you can decided for yourself.

CrashPlan is a Java-based product that that is cross-platform and runs on Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. CrashPlan allows for on-site and off-site backup of files making it a good single product solution to replace tape and more costly off-site solutions. There is a server product that maintains a backup archive of files from clients and also a database that contains the connected client information and files being backed up along with schedules and other backup parameters.

CrashPlan’s client product installs on the same three platform operating systems and runs in the background once set up. Setup is fairly simple. You are asked for the following account information — account email address, password and server IP address. Obviously a static IP address is needed on the CrashPlan PRO server. For firewall rules that must be created, port 4280 needs to be forwarded and opened to facilitate CrashPlan PRO server communication with external Internet clients.

CrashPlan client then makes the connection to the CrashPlan server. The client settings for directories to backup, exceptions to file types, backup hours and bandwidth limitations can be set by each client and stored in a database on the server. The client software then can backup its files to the server with a 224-bit encryption key.

The data is stored on the server in an encrypted format for security and is compressed on the server to save space. CrashPlan also supports versioning of files, from one version to unlimited versions over time. There is also a setting for how to handled deleted files. CrashPlan can keep deleted files forever or remove them from the archive after a specified period of time.

CrashPlan’s client also offers another unique feature in that it can be set up to act as a backup destination for other backup sources. To replicate backup archives across multiple locations and thereby maintain multiple copies that are geographically resistant to natural disaster, these secondary and tertiary CrashPlan client machines exist in a couple locations other than the main ArrowQuick office.

The main CrashPlan PRO server is a PC that has a JBOD RAID unit called a Drobo with 4 TBs of storage space. A hot spare PC is ready should the primary CrashPlan PRO server suffer a failure. The Drobo unit can be moved via USB cable to the hot spare in seconds. CrashPlan server software is already installed on the hot spare. The current CrashPlan server uses SyncBack to FTP the database dumps to the ArrowQuick website server which is also backed up by MCG each evening. So, should the hot spare CrashPlan server need to be used, we can simply FTP down the last database dump, import to the hot spare, connect Drobo and we are running again.

CrashPlan PRO licences cost $70 each and only are counted by clients that actually backup data to the CrashPlan PRO server. Clients that act as destinations do not count against the licenses at ArrowQuick. An example of how this works can be found at Oskaloosa Public Library and North Mahaska Schools. Oskaloosa Public Library is using their old Dell server from 2002 as a CrashPlan client accepting backup data as a destination in addition to the main licensed CrashPlan client on the main Windows 2008 server backing up to ArrowQuick off-site.

Business clients pay $19.95 per month for up to 50 GB of data backup, with $1 per GB over the 50 GB cap. Non-profit clients pay $12.95 / 50 GB and $1 per GB above the 50 GB cap. Personal computer users at home can also backup to the CrashPlan PRO server for $4.95/month under a 5 GB cap and 5o cents / GB over the cap.

If you have questions regarding the CrashPlan PRO program, please ask me by emailing us at italert at arrowquick dot com.

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