http://seer.entsupport.symantec.com/docs/298300.htm

So there is no way to do backup/restore directly in Exchange Server (for speed reasons), and we cannot choose only last full backup to duplicate in tape, unless we delete other backups inside folder. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
What is the usual backup/recovery speed over 1Gigabit network in normal circumstances?

Thank you in advance for any input.

Any input from you experienced guys?

This is my basic setup:

• GIG-E network
• BEWS 12.5 on dedicated 2003 R2 x64
• BEWS GRT agent for Exchange 2007
• backup to disk folders on Media server to hold Exchange backups (BTD folders located on iSCI SAN but internal storage should be fine too)
• backup to disk to tape job with relevent settings
• Backup to SAN, 2 databases ~ 100users at an average of 4GB per mailbox: I am getting ~ 1200 MB/Min GIG-E network going to iSCSI SAN
• Restore from SAN (1 mail message with a 6MB attachment) took 23 seconds.
• Restore from Tape (1 mail message with a 6MB attachment) took  9 minutes including loading/unloading time. Note that when restoring from tape, BEWS stages the entire Information Store during the job so make sure you have enough disk space where you define this location. By default it is C:\TEMP.

My Exchange 2007 server and BEWS 12.5 server are on dedicated boxes (DEll 2950/1950).
Backups run to a Dell MD3000i twice daily and then to a Dell 124T LTO3 autoloader. I keep about 2 weeks of backups on disk. I have the deleted items retention time at 21 days. This has worked out very well for me. I only get a few tape restores now and then.

I've been running this for a year and it's been workng great. Fast as I need it to be

penniwise100,

Thank you very much for all this information. This will help me a lot.

My concerns over restore speed are only in case of major problem, and we have to do complete restore in newly installed server, how long it will take in this scenario comparing restore from tape directly to Exchange Server, and if possible somehow to do it directly from tape drive in Exchange Server.
In addition, is it possible to duplicate BTD to tape, but to take only last full backup, not all full backups inside that certain BTD folder.