Preston, 

Why not do both? 

Once a day, I run a scheduled "savegrp -O" to save my employer's NetWorker 
server's index files and daily bootstraps to a Data Domain device, then clone 
them to tape for off-site storage. I also do the usual thing where each 
client's index files are saved after the client's backup completes. The main 
benefit I see is the ability to restore stuff easier in a DR site if aliens 
from another world swoop down on my employer's primary data center and blow it 
all to smithereens with a heat ray. Restoring the many index files becomes 
easier in a DR situation because considerably fewer tapes need to be loaded and 
read, plus I can pick and choose which clients' indices to restore first, if 
necessary.

On Feb 14, 2012, at 6:05 PM, Preston de Guise wrote:

> On 15/02/2012, at 10:02 AM, bingo wrote:
> 
>> At least you should have 2 pools:
>> - one for the data
>> - one for index and bootstraps (to recover them faster, if necessary)
> 
> I have to say I *always* advise against separating indices and bootstraps off 
> to dedicated pools.
> 
> It makes for a bunch of configuration hassles, and it also increases media 
> contention when there is no logical reason to have separation. You don't 
> really recover indices any faster by having them on their own devices; 
> they're still going to be multiplexed to the same degree as backups to any 
> other device, and by having them written to dedicated pools, you increase 
> drive contention.
> 
> Cheers,
> Preston.
> 
> To sign off this list, send email to listserv AT listserv.temple DOT edu and 
> type "signoff networker" in the body of the email. Please write to 
> networker-request AT listserv.temple DOT edu if you have any problems with 
> this list. You can access the archives at 
> http://listserv.temple.edu/archives/networker.html or
> via RSS at http://listserv.temple.edu/cgi-bin/wa?RSS&L=NETWORKER

To sign off this list, send email to listserv AT listserv.temple DOT edu and 
type "signoff networker" in the body of the email. Please write to 
networker-request AT listserv.temple DOT edu if you have any problems with this 
list. You can access the archives at 
http://listserv.temple.edu/archives/networker.html or
via RSS at http://listserv.temple.edu/cgi-bin/wa?RSS&L=NETWORKER