We are considering replacing our central email system with a Mirapoint
email server. Right now, our email server is a system that runs Tru64
Unix. The technical representatives from Mirapoint told me that they
recommend using Legato with directly attached NMDP tape drives to back up
their server (it would be about 850GB in capacity). We use standard file
level backups now with Legato 6.1.1 on a Tru64 Unix server. to back up our
existing mail server with full backups done once a week (staggered across
different volumes and tape pools) and incrementals done on the other six
days of the week.

I am finding the documentation on NMDP backups to be very sketchy. As I
understand it an NMDP backup takes a disk image and backs that up instead
of doing a file based backup. Does that mean that each day when we back up
this Mirapoint server, that it is in effect a full backup of all the data
on that system, or is the NMDP protocol smart enough to back up only
changed files?

If this NMDP protocol does a disk image backup, how does one restore a
single file? For example, how would we get back a four month old log file
if it is needed for a legal investigation?

Can these Mirapoint NMDP files be restored to a regular Unix system, or
must they be restored back to a Mirapoint system? I would think so since
Mirapoint's OS is based on BSD Unix.

Is it realistic to expect to bring in this Mirapoint server with our
existing tape library? We would add additional tape drives to it in order
to use with a direct connection of those drives to a Mirapoint server.

We also plan to migrate our Legato server to a Solaris server fairly soon.
I hear that Solaris is a better platform for our backup server needs than
Tru64 Unix. We actually have the new server on-site, but we are waiting
for delivery of a few small components to go with it.

If anyone on this list has any experience on using a Legato server to back
up a Mirapoint system, please let me know what your experiences are.

Thank you,


Stan Horwitz

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