>       
>       Hello all,
>        
>       I am working for a middle-size company and we are planning to deploy
a backup solution for our systems. 
> Most of our servers are MS 2003 based servers (like DC, Exchange, SQL and
some Web servers).
>        
>       I just wondered if there are some other amanda users who backup
their MS based servers lik Exchange, SQL 
> and etc. with amanda? Are there any specific problems using amanda with
Windows Servers? 
> Are they happy with their performance and the effectiveness of the Amanda
software with 
> their windows servers? Are there any direct built-in software support for
such servers (like SQL)?
>        
>       Simply i would love hear feedbacks of Amanda users who backup their
Windows 
> servers using amanda and guide me during our decision for our backup plan.
>        
>       thank you in advance for your helps ! and hope to hear from you
soon,
>       Emre.
>       system and software eng.

I am doing the same here including Exchange and SQL. I am using the Amanda
method that uses smbclient to backup the windows servers. Unfortunately
there is no way to exclude file patterns, etc with that. For Exchange I do
an exmerge dump each night on the server so that I can restore
mails/mailboxes if necessary. I also do an exchange backup with the MS
Backup software to a file on the exchange server. That file gets backed up
also. Oh yeah, for all windows servers I do an MS Backup of the "System
Settings" or whatever it is MS calls it to a file on the server. For SQL it
does a similar thing. Backup data to a folder on server including trans
logs, etc. That all gets backed up by amanda.

So, you can either have the windows server dump the data to your amanda
server and then back it up (as suggested by another user) or have the amanda
server backup the windows servers using smbclient. In the end it seems the
same....

Regards,
Gordon