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How offsite backup works
Our offsite backup system is based on a well established technique for
synchronising computers using a method know as differentlial file copying
(also known as delta copy).
Differential copy
This works by comparing each file to be backed up (the source file) with
the previous backup copy of the same file on the offsite backup server
(the target file).
If the files are identical, there is no need to make a backup of that file,
so the system goes on to the next file.
If there are differences between the source and target files, then the system
only sends the differences and not the whole file.
The differential file copy method coupled with the bandwidth available over a
modern broadband connection means that offsite backup is now a feasible and
cost effective alternative to the traditional backup techniques such as
backing up onto tape cartridges.
Offsite backup capacity
The power of delta copying makes it easy to make a daily backup even of huge files,
for example, a ten gigabyte Microsoft Exchange mailstore can be handled effortlessley.
(Uploading a ten gigabyte file over broadband without delta copy would take
several days of continuous upload).
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