American Global Software

Backups and Disaster Recovery for small to medium business, are you prepared? Minimize Disruption, Eliminate Destruction.

We've worked our way through a couple of instances over the last month. Everything is going swimmingly and then BAM, lightening hits, or that one last virus stops by for a visit and that one is the straw that breaks the camel's back.

In one case the server's surge protection didn't stop the surge and the data on the server was hit and the attached backup drive was hit at the same time.

In another case, viruses and malware had gotten to the point where the machine was so slow and unstable it was unusable. So we cleaned out the viruses but there were so many viruses in so many places once we cleaned them out the machine would no longer run. It is the same as a doctor that tells you that we got all the cancer but the patient is dead.

We are finding that most small business people have enough to do running their businesses that worrying about their technology takes them away from the important business at hand. Yet we are becoming increasingly dependent on that technology so that if even a little piece of it fails it is very disruptive to your business.

There are disruptive events and there are destructive events. Our goal is to minimize the disruptive and eliminate the destructive.

There are some things that might happen to your technology that might be disruptive.

• If you lose power for a period of time.
• If your internet service goes out for a period of time.
  
• If the router in "the back room" gets overheated and stops working

Disruptive events interrupt what you are doing but once the event is over you can just pick up where you left off. In some cases the best (and most cost effective) response to a disruptive event is have a cup of coffee and take a breath until the problem is fixed.

Destructive events are different. once the event is fixed you can't pick up where you left off. You have lost something important which will have to be rebuilt or you will have to go on without it.

• a disk drive crashes and destroys the only copy of your data
• a virus infects a file and destroys your only copy of an important computer file.
• a virus infects your systems and in turn uses your computer to email clients and infect their computers
• your air conditioner fails over the weekend and the machine with your customer data fails taking that data with it.
• hurricane Irene drops a tree on your roof and floods your office
  
• an administrative assistant has an oops moment and an important file is deleted.
• Someone breaks in your office and steals the laptop on your desk. 
• With all this mayhem, I'm beginning to sound like an Allstate commercial!

Very quickly we find that while the hardware and the disks can be replaced it is much more difficult to replace what is in them and on them. You can buy a new file cabinet but the papers inside are gone. Rebuilding data and rebuilding your reputation is the most costly plan to count on.

We have been building an array of tools to either eliminate the destructive or to turn it merely into disruptive.

• Remote and on-site monitoring tools to make sure your operating systems and programs have the latest patches and versions
• Virus and Malware software that we monitor remotely in order to proactively prevent and fight virus infections.
• Remote control software that allows us to answer questions and help with server and desktop support questions as if we were there at a moment's notice.
• Off-site backup that will store your files offsite in case you lose local copies and backups.
• Where practical we build/order machines that are built so that when one disk drive fails a second drive picks up where that one left off so you lose nothing and can replace the first drive with little or no disruption

We are finding that protecting against destructive events is much more cost effective now than it has been in the past, especially compared to the cost of trying to recover from the destructive event. For a small business it is not cost effective to completely eliminate disruptive, with all their money, not even Amazon or Microsoft can do that. But you can nearly eliminate the destructive. Give us a call and let's talk. You might be pleasantly surprised.