Question : Problem: Anyone using Windows 2008 backup utility in production?

Ever since Windows has been around most of us had to go out and use 3rd party backup software like Veritas, Acronis, etc because the built in backup utility lacks in just about everything, from speed to options. Did Microsoft get it right yet with the backup utility? Anyone leave their 3rd party software for it? A couple of cool things I read about it is that it now does block level backups, which should be much faster than before, and also how it backs up to a virtual disk file so you can mount it elsewhere if you need to restore something. Any good or bad experiences with it?

Answer : Problem: Anyone using Windows 2008 backup utility in production?

I am currently using the Windows Server Backup tool on one particular Windows Server 2008 machine, but, I have to say, I was quite disappointed with it.

Firstly, if you want to use the backup scheduling facility, your backup has to be made to a local hard drive within the workstation (or to a physically attached USB drive). The System State backup is the same. It's very difficult to get your scheduled backups created through the interface to be overwritten, unlike previous versions of NTBACKUP where it was a simple radio button selection, so you end up with the disk / backup location quickly filling up with backup files.

When you have several servers to backup, I find the best option is to backup to a remote drive attached to the network or one of the other servers. In this case, backup to a network drive is only supported when you run a manual backup, and manual backups cannot be scheduled through the interface. So, for this reason, I am having to run my backups by using a batch file to start a "manual" backup (so it can store on a remote drive), but this approach then effectively loses most of the Windows Server Backup functionality. Fortunately, the manual backup will overwrite other backups.

Also, I've not yet found a method of making anything other than incrementals, although admittedly the full backups to seem to run much, much quicker than in ntbackup.

If you're running scheduled backups (through the interface) to a local USB drive, you do have the ability to configure automatic drive rotation, so you don't need different backup jobs for different days/weeks when the USB drive is changed. This feature is pretty impressive but again, only works for scheduled backups, not manual backups to remote drives.

-tigermatt