Backup Methods

This section explains the most common backup methods, their advantages and disadvantages, as well as important safety measures and backup strategies.

Continuous Full Backup
Full Backup (Data Mirroring)
Incremental Backup
Differential Backup
Reverse Incremental Backup
Security Measures
Backup Strategy

Continuous Full Backup

With this method, all data is always copied into a new, separate backup folder. The backup folder is an exact copy of the source. See guide 'Full Backup'.
Advantages

Backed-up data is immediately available when needed.
Restoration is straightforward and fast.

Disadvantages

Compared to incremental or differential backups, time and storage requirements are higher.

Full Backup (Data Mirroring)

New and modified data is copied into the same backup folder, and missing data in the backup folder is deleted. The backup folder is an exact copy of the source. See guide 'Data Mirroring'.
Advantages

Backed-up data is immediately available when needed.
Restoration is straightforward and fast.
Compared to continuous full backup, time requirements are lower.

Disadvantages

Storage requirements are higher than with incremental or differential backups.

Incremental Backup

With an incremental backup, only modified or new data since the last full or incremental backup is saved in a new backup folder. See guide 'Incremental Backup'.
Advantages

Time and storage requirements are low.

Disadvantages

Restoration is complex and time-consuming, as you need the full backup and all subsequent incremental or differential backups.

Differential Backup

All modified and new data since the last full backup is saved in a new backup folder. See guide 'Differential Backup'.
Advantages

Restoration is easier and faster than with an incremental backup, as only the full backup and the last differential backup are needed.

Disadvantages

Time and storage requirements are higher than with incremental backup.

Reverse Incremental Backup

This method always creates a full backup in the same backup folder. Deleted or overwritten files are moved to a separate, continuous backup folder.
Advantages

Backed-up data is immediately available when needed.
Restoration is straightforward and fast.

Disadvantages

Time requirements are higher than with incremental or differential backup.

Security Measures

To optimally protect your backups, you should observe the following measures:

For maximum security, use full backups on regularly rotated storage media.
Use at least two different storage media for your backups.
Avoid writing multiple backups consecutively to the same medium, as a failure could result in data loss over an extended period.
For critical business data, store a full backup in a secure location (e.g. a bank vault) to prevent loss from theft or fire.
Protect your storage media from unauthorized access using encryption software such as VeraCrypt.

Backup Strategy

This backup strategy requires a total of 5 storage media.

From Monday to Friday, a continuous full backup is performed daily on a separate storage medium:

Monday: Full backup to medium 1
Tuesday: Full backup to medium 2
Wednesday: Full backup to medium 3
Thursday: Full backup to medium 4
Friday: Full backup to medium 5

This way, you have access to the daily backup data of the past 4 weeks if needed. With the backup option 'Create backup generations', you can define the number of backups and adjust it to the size of your storage media.