Microsoft rolls out new data-protection software

Microsoft today announced a new version of its data-protection product, which provides near-continuous backup and recovery for Windows file servers and network-attached storage appliances.

System Center Data Protection Manager (DPM) has been enhanced to support Microsoft Exchange, SQL and SharePoint Portal servers. The software, which is installed on a Windows server and backs up other corporate servers, now also provides an increased number of shadow copies (block-level copies of changed data) – the previous version supported 64 copies; this version supports as many as 512.

The product also can synchronize data as often as every 15 minutes – Version 1 synchronized only every hour.

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Microsoft today announced a new version of its data-protection product, which provides near-continuous backup and recovery for Windows file servers and network-attached storage appliances.

System Center Data Protection Manager (DPM) has been enhanced to support Microsoft Exchange, SQL and SharePoint Portal servers. The software, which is installed on a Windows server and backs up other corporate servers, now also provides an increased number of shadow copies (block-level copies of changed data) – the previous version supported 64 copies; this version supports as many as 512.

The product also can synchronize data as often as every 15 minutes – Version 1 synchronized only every hour.

Version 2 of DPM also maintains system state of the protected servers in the event of failure and supports multiple directory forests and multiple trusted domains.

A single version of System Center DPM can be used to protect as many as 50 Windows servers, Microsoft says.

The product is in public beta and can be downloaded here. It is expected to be available in the summer of 2007.

The current version of DPM is $950 and supports the backup of three servers. Pricing for Version 2 is not yet available.

Read more about data center in Network World's Data Center section.