Sounds unreal? Read on. I’ll demonstrate how I can reach a recovery time objective (RTO) of less than 15 seconds on my desktop. For you, it may be less, or may be more — for obvious reasons it depends on the size of the backup that you're restoring, network speed, and the power of your machines. Before we start, let me share a bit of history.
I remember discovering backup solutions about 25 years ago, and the wonder of recovery. The ability to pull out the diskettes and tapes and restore some files sounded magic. I started using backups as part of my IT operations – and for sure, it saved me a lot of gray hair and stress.
However, back in 2003, I had an issue with a server at around 11PM, which I had to recover for few hours after that. I realized that while the ability to recover was great, it also needed to be fast.
Disk-imaging technology, faster storage, and new protocols have changed the average recovery time objectives (RTOs) from hours to minutes. But in the modern world, data is so critical that many businesses are working to reduce RTOs even further, and with good reason. Today a business that doesn’t have access to its data can lose $100,000 every hour, in addition to the potentially huge costs of recovering that data.
