Hi. I am looking for a backup hosting company where I can send data from a couple of linux/windows servers owned by me and some windows servers owned by clients. Jungle Disk looks very good price wise compared with market and I like idea that it can do backups of changed data only. I think as a reseller looks like branding can be removed for when I install on clients servers in their office. I also note the data can be stored in encrypted format and would only ever be accessible with keys generated so I guess that covers any concern over datacentre staff because they would never be able to view the data. So questions I had are:

1. Is my above view/understading accurate.
2. Anyone using the service at the moment and how have they found it.
3. Which is the best version to use. Workgroup edition or Server edition?
4. The pricing is that per individual user / per individual server. Or can I run the same initial single signup client account on multiple servers.
5. Is the data on their side stored on raid 1 or 10 config? Just thinking if they dont have raid and had a hard drive failure would I have to send say a full set of 100GB of data again or do they recover it themselves as have a RAID recovery option to get the files internally.
6. Are there any security/data integrity concerns with this company.
7. How processor instensive is the system when it comes to scanning/generating the files. If running this on my linux web server don't want it grinding to a halt just because this service takes over all processing power and takes ages to run/upload.

Thanks

Well I've never personally used them before so I probably couldn't speculate on most of these, but it would seem like a backup company would make sure they have plenty of their own backups to ensure data is not lost. This means the best RAID etc...

We run a backup program on all our servers once a week in the early mornings, it backs up the entire hard drive(s) at once and isn't that intensive, it's generally a task that runs slowly as it needs to, like many anti-virus scanners etc.. It will adjust to go faster or slower depending on the current CPU/RAM/DISK I/O etc... I'd imagine though even without this their backup solution wouldn't slow things down too much, that would probably be a mega deterrent for a lot of people.

If data is very mission critical it would be a good idea to spread your bets. May be get two backup options with two different companies running at the same time. Be sure to check which were their data centers are so that the two backups you pick are in geographically separate locations.

From what I understand jungledisk uses rackspace cloud or the amazon cloud.

I myself prefer companies that have there own servers but if you want to save money jungledisk is good.

I've used it before, the windows app works reasonably well. It's fairly easy to manage, the Amazon billing system is useless IMO.

Thanks for responses guys. I think I would go via the rackspace hosting rather than Amazon to avoid the per request hit pricing. I considered using data centres own backup solutions but figured it may be better to use external location to minimise risk of any major data center melt down.

Does anyone have any experience with the linux software and if it works just as nice as Mike mentions for Windows. Can I control it from ssh command prompt or does it need me to be logged into a graphical version?

Finally any views on the licensing. Do I need 5 licenses for 5 servers or as I am in control of all server would 1 user license cover me for use on 5 servers?

Thanks.

I use JungleDisk and chose rackSpace storage as opposed to Amazon. All seems to work quite well. Have not had it long, about a month or 2. Support is excellent.

Dave

The problem I found with Jungle Disk is that if you use them as your virtual team's file server, not as a backup, then your files are not backed up in a remote location and are at risk due to human error (ie. deletion). It is because of this that I am now looking for another service provider. Reviewing another thread here I found http://www.rsync.net, which addresses the above problem as follows:

"If you are backing up data that you are retaining yourself, at your own location, then a standard offsite filesystem is probably sufficient. rsync.net then becomes your backup, and the data exists at all times in two locations (your location, and your rsync.net filesystem).

However, if you do not maintain a copy of your data yourself, that is, if your rsync.net filesystem is the ONLY location that your data is stored, we suggest you purchase the geo-redundant product. Remember - if you maintain a copy, your rsync.net filesystem is your backup. If you do not maintain a copy, and you do not use the geo-redundant product, your data is NOT backed up. It exists in one location only (granted, a very secure and well maintained location, but still just one)"

could you just buy 2 user accounts on jungle disk. 1st for your file server then the 2nd account for the backups. also does the software not have a retention system i.e. you can keep a copy of any deleted files for 14 days or something. not trying to push jungle disk i havent had chance to use the system yet but it just looks cheaper on a per GB basis. could i ask what your opinion was like of jungle disk, did it provide good speed, zero downtime, raid protection of their drives etc? thanks.