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Besides fast external storage, you can improve backup speed by reconfiguring your backup jobs to run in parallel rather than serially. Many IT managers sequentially back up their servers (backup server one, followed by backup server two, then three and four, etc.). Sequential backup quickly fills up an overnight or weekend backup window - but using your system to absorb all the data stream simultaneously is a simple solution.

By using a multi-stream-capable backup-to-disk target, you can back up all of the servers at the same time by simply modifying your backup scripts. By doing this, you can start all the backups at the same time - reducing your overall backup time. With most sequential backups that overlap, each job will take a little extra time when processing multiple data streams at the same time, but the total time spent backing up will be cut.

Many general RAID disk systems aren't multi-stream-capable. However, specialized yet inexpensive backup and recovery appliances can process multiple backup data streams simultaneously. These specialized appliances, such as the Overland REO SERIES, can back up often problematic application servers that are newly equipped with media server software licenses.

By taking advantage of these best practices for backups, you'll quickly reap the benefits, allowing you to focus resources on new storage initiatives. Not only will you have the fastest backup around, you'll have time to ride off into the sunset.

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