Data protection is essential for any business, as data loss or corruption can lead to severe consequences. Two standard styles of securing data in the digital world are snapshots and backups. Both have distinct functionalities, unique purposes, and benefits. Here’s a quick guide to help you choose the best option for your data needs.
Snapshots: What they are and when to use them
Snapshots are point-in-time copies of data that capture the whole state of your server at a particular moment. Generally used in virtual platforms, snapshots create quick copies of data and restore servers to the original state seen at the time of the snapshot. Snapshots are created quickly, are space-efficient, and suitable for short-term recovery within the same storage system. However, snapshots are not recommended for long-term data storage, as they have a short retention period of normally 72 hours. In a fast-paced tech world, snapshots may also lead to data consistency issues when used to capture continuously changing databases.
Understanding backups
Backups involve creating a separate and independent copy of data stored in a separate location from the original data. They can provide a more comprehensive data storage plan and better protection against human and system errors.
Backups are ideal for long-term data retention and archiving, providing a comprehensive and consistent copy of the data at a specific time and across an entire system. However, backups can consume more time and storage space, especially for large datasets, which might result in longer recovery times for your business.
Making the best choice for your data needs
When choosing a data retention plan for your business, having a robust data protection strategy might involve a combination of both snapshots and backups to provide the best data security and readiness. With ALTERNcloud, you can deploy either option:
Snapshots with AlternCloud
- Choose from 40 to 150 compute snapshots, depending on the cloud deployed.
- There is no limit to compute snapshot sizes.
- At 10 to 60 seconds per GB of disk space used by the compute instance, ALTERNcloud has some of the fastest compute snapshot performances amongst IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) providers.
- Create up to 50 new servers in one single click from an existing snapshot.
Backups with AlternCloud
- Backups are multi-jurisdictional – with 10 jurisdictions and growing – for data sovereignty choices.
- Choose the location of the Tier-IV-designed, SSAE-18-compliant data center where your data is stored across five continents.
- Includes support for 20+ platforms such as operating systems and databases
- File and disk-image backup
- Anti-malware scanning of backups
- Off-cloud protection for any workload
