Maryville University Saves Big Bucks with Hybrid Cloud Backup

Maryville University Saves Big Bucks with Hybrid Cloud Backup

By Doug Barney

There are dozens of ways to use cloud storage, everything from Microsoft Skydrive to Carbonite backup, to full blown managed disaster recovery.

Each has its benefits. And the economic benefits of large-scale enterprise cloud storage are bigger than that of SkyDrive, simply because the installations are so much larger.

That’s the case with Maryville University, which was looking at buying a SAN to handle tertiary backup, for up to $125,000. That is just the cost of the SAN. There are also ongoing operational costs of managing in-house storage. And storage gurus have long argued that the cost of managing storage is a multiple of the cost of the hardware whose price falls quickly and regularly.

Considering all those issues, Maryville sought a cloud solution and went with dinBackup from dinCloud. The tool was supported by VAR En Pointe Technologies, which services the school.

The dinBackup system is based on NetApp, similar to NetGard's recently announced NetApp-based vaulting service.

The DinCloud system integrates with onsite NetApp storage and creates another layer of NetApp backup in the cloud. dinBackup works with NetApp backuptools SnapVault and SnapMirror to create the extra layer of backup.

MaryVille, based in St. Louis County, MO, used to have two data centers, on different parts of the campus, that were virtualized and synchronized to handle replication and backup.

There were also two sets of extra offsite backup gear held elsewhere.

All this presented numerous headaches, keeping disparate SANs together, and maintaining all the network connections and the VPN.

Maryville looked at a number of solutions, and chose dinCloud. “dinCloud employees were very knowledgeable and took the time to understand our needs.  Plus, they were able to easily explain their solution – how they would make the connection to us, how they would copy the data, and how they would handle our data when it got to them - not many companies could do that right off the bat. dinCloud had a simple, straight-forward plan and they were flexible and knowledgeable about the systems and our objectives,” said David Brawner, Manager of Network Services, Maryville University.

By moving to cloud backup, Maryville cut operating costs from 20-50 percent, gained a level of business continuity, and swapped capital expense based backup with one that has flat rate subscription pricing more focused on operational expense.

Nine Questions for Maryville’s David Brawner, Manager of Network Services

Q: What were you looking for in a new storage solution?

Brawner: Our primary focus was to provide an off-site, tertiary site for our data that could be asynchronously updated from our on-campus SAN. A vendor who could seamlessly interface with our existing NetApp SAN at the SAN aggregate or volume level to perform this copy was a huge consideration because it would eliminate the need for client-based or host-based backup software. A SAN-level synchronization would also allow us to backup data from various systems regardless of server hardware or OS without interrupting daily activities.

Q: What did you end up implementing?

Brawner: NetApp to NetApp synchronization using SnapMirror. We started in June 2011 and would add 1-2 volumes at a time to get the initial upload taken care of. After working through some VPN issues to make sure everything was secured, we became fully operational in August 2011.

Q: How was the implementation?

Brawner: Initially, we had a little issue with getting the VPN stable, but dinCloud recommended products to help secure the transmission. We started synchronizing volumes 1-2 at a time to get the bulk of data up there and then switched on the daily/nightly updates in August so they would be in sync on a daily basis. Our biggest challenge was securing the encrypted tunnel (VPN) between dinCloud and Maryville.

Q: What would tell other shops facing similar issues?

Brawner: It’s important that you first have a good understanding and knowledge of your own environment when looking for a solution. If you don’t know what you have, you could easily be misled. At the same time, the vendor also needs to know what they would be getting into so they can provide you with all options they have available that will best meet your needs.

Make sure the sales reps and engineers from the vendor company lay out the entire implementation plan in advance – you want to know how they are going to access the data at your site, secure it, manage it, store it, etc. – get all those plans in detail before you sign anything. A lot of sales people will give you a lot of fluff so make sure you do your due diligence and that you’re comfortable with what they are saying/doing before moving forward.

Q: How has the dinCloud tool worked?

Brawner: Having our data backed up isn’t all that glamorous, but the solution is reliable and working as expected. The only thing we have to do is possibly coordinate a change in volume size every so often and make sure dinCloud matches that change on their end.

Q: What benefits did you realize?

Brawner: The biggest benefit has been that the solution is solid – our data is there. In the near future, we are going to be doing some testing to make sure that we can retrieve our data or stand up servers at the dinCloud hosting locations. If we can go to dinCloud and ask them to stand up our emergency server or Exchange server and it works - that’s when we’ll really see the payoff of the system.

Q: Did your existing infrastructure integrate?

Brawner: Yes, and part of the reason was because dinCloud integrates with NetApp – something that we already had. With that, we didn’t need to change out our SAN or install some third-party connector hardware or software. We had a lot of outgoing bandwidth available so we were able to leverage our existing Internet bandwidth and avoid purchasing a separate Internet connection just for the backup process. We only needed to implement a VPN connection to dinCloud to secure the backup traffic as it travels over the Internet.

Q: How did the cloud solution change how IT is managed?

Brawner: One of the biggest things is now we don’t have to mess with the equipment at Columbia College (a site of off-site backup). It’s a 4 hour round trip and that doesn’t include the time when we are actually on site making adjustments, etc. dinCloud’s ongoing support has been the biggest help in this regard because we have been able to reduce man hours. When we do volume size changes, there might be a few tweaks that need our attention, but otherwise, it’s pretty much “set it and leave it”. 

Q: Are there ways to measure the benefit?

Brawner: We haven’t seen any additional revenue because this is a “back-end” improvement, but we were able to avoid some infrastructure costs with dinCloud’s solution. We were able to avoid purchasing a tertiary SAN solution which would have cost approximately $125,000 and we have reduced our maintenance man-hours by approximately 20-30 hours per month.




Edited by Braden Becker
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