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5 Hidden Costs of Cloud Backup

  • 5 Hidden Costs of Cloud Backup-

    Compounding Storage Needs

    Hidden Cost No. 1: Compounding Storage Needs

    Retaining backup copies is now a necessity for many companies for a variety of reasons, from protection against human error, natural disasters and system failures, to compliance with regulatory or policy requirements.

    The storage required to retain multiple copies of your backups can be substantially larger than the original source data. A common strategy for keeping data for long-term retention is the grandfather-father-son (GFS) backup scheme, which results in a lot of backup copies. In this scheme, a set of daily, weekly, monthly and yearly backups are retained using a first-in-first-out (FIFO) pattern. Even if only the data that is changing daily is stored in the cloud and the backups are being compressed, the amount of cloud storage used can add up over time.

    Consequently, it matters a great deal where the gigabytes (GBs) and terabytes (TBs) you are purchasing reside. Most cloud storage and backup solutions charge for every GB of storage used in the cloud. So, as your backups grow and consume more cloud storage, so does your bill. But there are cloud backup solutions that only charge for the amount of data protected on the source side. Evaluate each cloud backup solution to determine whether you’ll be paying for protected data or raw cloud storage.

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5 Hidden Costs of Cloud Backup

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  • 5 Hidden Costs of Cloud Backup-2

    Compounding Storage Needs

    Hidden Cost No. 1: Compounding Storage Needs

    Retaining backup copies is now a necessity for many companies for a variety of reasons, from protection against human error, natural disasters and system failures, to compliance with regulatory or policy requirements.

    The storage required to retain multiple copies of your backups can be substantially larger than the original source data. A common strategy for keeping data for long-term retention is the grandfather-father-son (GFS) backup scheme, which results in a lot of backup copies. In this scheme, a set of daily, weekly, monthly and yearly backups are retained using a first-in-first-out (FIFO) pattern. Even if only the data that is changing daily is stored in the cloud and the backups are being compressed, the amount of cloud storage used can add up over time.

    Consequently, it matters a great deal where the gigabytes (GBs) and terabytes (TBs) you are purchasing reside. Most cloud storage and backup solutions charge for every GB of storage used in the cloud. So, as your backups grow and consume more cloud storage, so does your bill. But there are cloud backup solutions that only charge for the amount of data protected on the source side. Evaluate each cloud backup solution to determine whether you’ll be paying for protected data or raw cloud storage.

Backup and disaster recovery are typically cited among the top use cases for cloud computing. Companies are increasingly realizing that cloud-based backup is more efficient, more reliable, easier to use and less error prone than traditional methods such as tape or other rotational media, not to mention it enables extremely effective disaster recovery. In 2015, we saw a major upswing in cloud adoption for storing backup copies. In 2016, expect to see cloud backup and disaster-recovery-as-a-service (DRaaS) options become the norm for new backup deployments at organizations of all sizes.

Most companies can easily lower OPEX and CAPEX with cloud backup. But not all cloud backup options are the same, and a true cost comparison entails evaluating more than just each offering’s top line cost per GB. In this slideshow, cloud-recovery leader Unitrends details five “hidden” charges that companies must consider when researching the best and most cost-effective cloud backup solution for their business.