OS: Windows Small Business Server 2003
Current application: Customized offsite backup service
Favorite Pro features: Easy replacement of failed disks, low cost

Off-Site Backup Made Profitable Using Drobo
Everybody knows they should back up their data. Some businesses keep multiple onsite backups, and still lose their data. Rob Miller, owner of IT consulting firm F1 Technologies, has seen it happen. “A client had a couple of external USB drives that they were storing their data on,” said Rob. “They had more than one backup, but they had them both in the same location and their office got flooded. They lost both of their drives.” After many requests from worried clients, Miller started offering customized off-site backup as a service, using Drobo as the storage device.

F1 Technologies provides computing, networking and web services to small and medium sized business clients. Rob has designed and managed his clients’ data networks, telecom systems, internet connectivity and client-server systems. When clients started asking about off-site backup, Rob researched available solutions. When he saw the high costs of existing services, he decided to offer his own branded solution. He chose Windows Small Business Server to run the solution, and Drobo for the redundant storage. “My environment is designed for my clients because they are smaller businesses, and they don’t have the deep pockets that larger corporations have,” said Rob. “This is for people that aren’t big enough to have a data center.”

Optimizing an Offsite Backup Solution for Small Business at an Affordable Price
A variety of different clients have turned to F1 for offsite backup services. They include a print shop that backs up graphics, video and Quickbooks files, and a medical imaging company that backs up encrypted hi-res scans. Client response has been excellent. “To date, I’ve yet to have a client complain about it. I have one client in particular that frequently restores files from the Drobo. They’ve never complained about performance. It’s always there.” Drobo costs a third of other RAID arrays on the market. Without Drobo Rob says he couldn’t profitably offer his clients an offsite backup service.

No Hiccups When Drives Fail
Rob  uses Drobo as primary storage for his Exchange email database and website hosting, and to serve photo and video libraries. “I actually beat up my unit, if that’s a useable term. I really have a wide variety of things that I do with the device and I do put a heavy load on it. Uptime is very good. I’ve never had a hiccup with my Drobo.”

With the heavy demands Rob puts on his hard drives, he’s had drives fail in his Drobo during the 18 months he’s owned it. “As an IT consultant, I see drives fail all the time. I’ve had two drives fail in Drobo. I popped the drive out, put a new drive in and it’s seamless - just a matter of taking a drive off the shelf because I stock spares and popping it in. Within a matter of hours, it’s back to normal. It does exactly what it’s supposed to do.”

Scaling Storage to Meet Customer Demands
F1’s business is growing, and Rob is carefully considering how to scale his storage capacity to meet customer demand, while maintaining redundancy. “DroboPro will enable me to quickly add capacity as my off-site backup business grows. The upside of that is that as more and more people get digital cameras that have higher megapixel rates, and digital camcorders are going to high def, it’s going to take up more and more space on their computers. DroboPro will allow me to throw larger, more economical drives in the unit without having to buy another chassis for storage. I can stick with a minimal amount of devices and still have the flexibility of the Drobo solution. And the ability to pick and choose faster interfaces if necessary.”

Rob recommends Drobo to many small and medium sized businesses. “I can probably come up with hundreds of uses for it. Even schools that aren’t big enough to have a data center, that would need something for centralized scores reporting, backing up whatever data their teachers have, plus homework storage. Schools are even doing video now in every classroom.”

Drobo Maintenance Protects His Investment
Rob recently renewed the maintenance contract on his first Drobo. “Honestly, this device has made me so much money it was worthwhile to protect the investment at almost any cost. But it’s valuable for my business to know that I was protected should anything happen to it. I’ve considered having a spare on hand just to have it anyway, but to get the 24-hour turnaround was good.”

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