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  1. #1
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    Backup via rsync vs. cPanel Backup via FTP

    Hi everyone,

    on one of my dedicated servers, I do daily backups twice a day. Once via rsync to bqbackup.com and once via the cPanel backup feature to another remote FTP. The cPanel backup is quite ressource intensive and pushes my server load up. And that is not mentioning the higher amount of traffic that the cPanel backup is causing.

    I wonder whether the backup via rsync (I sync /home, /etc and /var) has any disadvantage compared to the cPanel backup feature. Otherwise I would do both backups via rsync. I read about problems with MySQL databases and, of course, migrating through the cPanel "Restore Account" function will not be that easy.

    Looking forward to your opinions! Thank you in advance!

    Kind regards
    -Amitz

  2. #2
    cPanel creates a proper backup of all MySQL databases in the account. That is pro to cPanel accounts.

    It is good to actually rsync the cPanel backups to offsite backup provider like bqbackup.com.

    It is definitely safer than just relying on rsync alone.
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  3. #3
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    FTP connections may time out and stop incomplete. I would recommend rsync unless you don't have any options.

  4. #4
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    Have you looked at cPremote at all? It's a great plugin that uses rsync instead of FTP for cPanel backups. These backups can be restored very easily from within WHM. There's also a free trial.

    More info on their website: http://cpremote.net/

  5. #5
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    First of all, thank you for your helpful comments!

    Quote Originally Posted by [JSH]John View Post
    Have you looked at cPremote at all? It's a great plugin that uses rsync instead of FTP for cPanel backups. These backups can be restored very easily from within WHM. There's also a free trial.

    More info on their website: http://cpremote.net/
    I was not aware of this product at all and it seems that it is exactly what I am looking for! Thank you very much for pointing me on it! I guess I will use the trial and see if it wors fine.

    Kind regards,
    -Amitz

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Amitz View Post
    First of all, thank you for your helpful comments!



    I was not aware of this product at all and it seems that it is exactly what I am looking for! Thank you very much for pointing me on it! I guess I will use the trial and see if it wors fine.

    Kind regards,
    -Amitz
    Check http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1046546 and http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1049660

    BQBackup system may even be better than cPremote and free too. We'll see.

    I did try cPremote but didn't like it. Some of the spelling and grammer is wrong for some of the information. That put me off.
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  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by HostXNow View Post
    Check http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1046546 and http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1049660

    BQBackup system may even be better than cPremote and free too. We'll see.

    I did try cPremote but didn't like it. Some of the spelling and grammer is wrong for some of the information. That put me off.
    I tried it yesterday (cPremote) and did not like it too. Do not ask me why, but it did not work as it should and left me with a bad feeling.

    The thing is: I already have an account at BQBackup that I use for rsyncing the server and am just looking for an additional solution.

  8. #8

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Henry wilson View Post
    Loads of useful info has been removed from that thread regarding what Scott was going to add to the script, etc.
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  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by Amitz View Post
    I read about problems with MySQL databases and, of course, migrating through the cPanel "Restore Account" function will not be that easy.
    Rsync can back up the binary MySQL table files, but if there is a lot of DB activity during the file transfer, it's possible to end up with the table in an inconsistent state. Running a mysqldump script (available all over the internet) would give you properly locked dumps, which would then get picked up when Rsync runs.

    As far as keeping the backups in WHM's format, one option is to have WHM do a local backup in their newer incremental format (not the old .tar.gz archives), and then Rsync your cpbackup folder. That will give you the efficiency of Rsync, while making it a bit easier to restore to another WHM server.
    Last edited by bqinternet; 06-08-2011 at 02:49 PM.
    Scott Burns, President
    BQ Internet Corporation
    Remote Rsync and FTP backup solutions
    *** http://www.bqbackup.com/ ***

  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by HostXNow View Post
    Loads of useful info has been removed from that thread regarding what Scott was going to add to the script, etc.
    Looks fine to me. It's in the ad section, so the mods have no reason to touch it. To be fair to competitors that also follow the rules, I can't really discuss the new scripts here, but I'll try to remember to continue updating the other thread that people keep linking to.
    Scott Burns, President
    BQ Internet Corporation
    Remote Rsync and FTP backup solutions
    *** http://www.bqbackup.com/ ***

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by bqinternet View Post
    As far as keeping the backups in WHM's format, one option is to have WHM do a local backup in their newer incremental format (not the old .tar.gz archives), and then Rsync your cpbackup folder. That will give you the efficiency of Rsync, while making it a bit easier to restore to another WHM server.
    That was it!
    I never noticed the incremental backup option of cPanel, I must have been blind... So what I do now since some days is letting cPanel do the incremental backup to a folder and then rsync the content via cronjob to you at bqbackup and my secondary backup space provider. Result? Backups take minutes instead of hours and I save loads of traffic.

    Thanks to all of you and, by the way, kudos to Scott for his great service!

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by bqinternet View Post
    As far as keeping the backups in WHM's format, one option is to have WHM do a local backup in their newer incremental format (not the old .tar.gz archives), and then Rsync your cpbackup folder. That will give you the efficiency of Rsync, while making it a bit easier to restore to another WHM server.

    Cool. I guess that's how cPremote works. They use the cPanel incremental rsync stuff. But does cPanel incremental lock the tables like mysqldump does? I'm guessing it does...
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  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by HostXNow View Post
    Cool. I guess that's how cPremote works. They use the cPanel incremental rsync stuff.
    That was my first thought also. I guess this very simple solution makes cPremote useless if one is not totally afraid of the console and doesn't need to have everything clickable in WHM...

    Quote Originally Posted by HostXNow View Post
    But does cPanel incremental lock the tables like mysqldump does? I'm guessing it does...
    I simply assumed that it does... Does anyone has a proving link at hand while I search the net myself to make this clear?

  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by [JSH]John View Post
    Have you looked at cPremote at all? It's a great plugin that uses rsync instead of FTP for cPanel backups. These backups can be restored very easily from within WHM. There's also a free trial.

    More info on their website: http://cpremote.net/
    I can voice on this aswell, I have used this for afew months now, Whiles theirs afew spelling mistakes within the plugin the main workings does as its ment too

    You can easily MASS restore accounts aswell just by uploading them into the correct restore folder on cPanel, It also keeps the directory structure in shape.

    Regards,
    UK Based Proactive Server Management.
    Zabbix Enterprise 24/7 Monitoring.

  16. #16
    I'd take a look at BackupPC, along with a MySQL dump script (basically a one-liner) - backuppc let's you manage rsync and pulls from the backuppc, so you get better manageability but the advantages of rsync.

  17. #17
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    We use both rsync and cPanel backups.

  18. #18
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    I use Virtualmin and rdiff-backup.
    Virtualmin does a weekly full backup and daily incrementals (which include the latest DB); These are scp'ed over to another server

    The rdiff-backup just takes care of the whole machine except folders like tmp and var (it's my oops protection in case I break a config file)

  19. #19
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    I have just switched to rsnapshot that is running on a separate VPS and rsyncs the incremental backups made by cPanel on a daily basis. Works great so far!

  20. #20
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    The insecurity of FTP would worry me, if I was transferring every cPanel account with that method every night. That, and the bandwidth drain of it.

    I run cpbackup locally (not by FTP), and then put an rsync script line into scripts/postcpbackup to send the entire backup directory to a remote server. That way I can restore anything from the files on the main server, I have the redundancy of knowing things are kept offsite, and the security of doing all the transfers using SSH.

    I hadn't heard of cpremote until I read this thread - but looking at their feature list I can't see anything it gives you that my approach does not.
    Not as active on WHT as I used to be, but still drop in and receive email notifications from here.
    My personal blog site: https://www.oakleys.org.uk/blog

  21. #21
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    @JamesOakley: You have read the whole thread, have you?
    I am already 3 steps away from using FTP. My actual solution is right above your post and I must say that rsnapshot does a great job until now!

  22. #22
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    That's me put in my place

    I think I'd read the whole thread bar your last past (!), with people giving suggestion after suggestion, and was then thinking "No - it's not as complicated as all that!"

    Glad rsnapshot is working for you. What I'd love to know is how you find the incremental backups (which is only now possible, given you're running your backups locally). I felt safer with one tarball for each account at each point it's backed up. I wasn't clear what files you get if you opt for the incremental route. How does it work in practice, and what are the benefits of doing that rather than taking a full backup each night?
    Not as active on WHT as I used to be, but still drop in and receive email notifications from here.
    My personal blog site: https://www.oakleys.org.uk/blog

  23. #23
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    Quote Originally Posted by JamesOakley View Post
    That's me put in my place

    I think I'd read the whole thread bar your last past (!), with people giving suggestion after suggestion, and was then thinking "No - it's not as complicated as all that!"

    Quote Originally Posted by JamesOakley View Post
    Glad rsnapshot is working for you. What I'd love to know is how you find the incremental backups (which is only now possible, given you're running your backups locally). I felt safer with one tarball for each account at each point it's backed up. I wasn't clear what files you get if you opt for the incremental route. How does it work in practice, and what are the benefits of doing that rather than taking a full backup each night?
    When I put the incremental files in a .tar myself and feed cPanel's Backup with them, it restores the whole accounts with everything inside that you may need. I can also just copy the incremental files untar'd back to the server and cPanel Restore works like a charm. I have tested this hundreds of times before I was absolutely convinced that it works just as good a taking a full backup each night.

    There are just some things you have to pay attention to:
    cPanel Backup on the server where the backups should be restored has to be set to "Restore only" (Enable/Disable/Restore only" and "Incremental Backups..." has to be set to "Enable" in case you would like to restore data that was also created the incremental way. I nearly went nuts at the beginning because I still had that option on "Disable" and cPanel told me that it could not restore the incremental data.

    The big plus for me using local incremental backups and then rsnapshotting them to another server is that I would normally need 100 GB for 7 full daily backups. And backup space is expensive. With "my" solution, I just need around 20 GB because only one daily backup is stored in full and the rest just contains of hardlinks to the unchanged files and the few changed files.

    Another plus: Server Load. During full backups, my server load always doubled or tripled from its normal values. Now I don't even see a change in load while doing backups. I am very, very happy with this solution!

    Kind regards
    -A

  24. #24
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    Quote Originally Posted by bqinternet View Post
    As far as keeping the backups in WHM's format, one option is to have WHM do a local backup in their newer incremental format (not the old .tar.gz archives), and then Rsync your cpbackup folder. That will give you the efficiency of Rsync, while making it a bit easier to restore to another WHM server.
    Hi,

    how can i let my script to make sure the cpanel incremental is finished and call Rsync to Rsync the cpanel incremental to my remote server ?


    thanx

  25. #25
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    Amitz,can you write more detail about how do you run cpanel backup and use rsnapshot to backup to remote server ? thanx

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