Everyone always says it’s a good idea to have a backup plan just in case your primary plan bites the dust. I couldn’t agree more. Recently my personal Xbox 360 failed and this has caused plenty of grief in my household. I used my Xbox to stream content from Windows Media Player on my desktop to the TV (via Media Center edition of Windows XP). This has worked great and has been able to provide me with a means to entertain my child. Of course, this going out has caused a screaming baby because now she can’t watch her “movies”.
Now, had I had a proper backup plan, this wouldn’t be an issue. See, I put all of my trust into a single device and/or single method to accomplish something. When this device failed, my operation came to a halt. I didn’t listen to the advice I’m always telling our customers… have a backup or backup plan. This is where our “extra services” come into play. Not only do we offer backup solutions (eVault, NAS…) but we also offer solutions that allow you access to high-availability configurations (Citrix XenServer, for example). With XenServer you can configure a cluster of systems and setup automatic failover. This would prevent any major outages of your website/services. If this isn’t something you think would work for you, utilizing eVault backups might. We now offer eVault Bare Metal Restore. Now, the problem is somehow applying these to my Xbox so my kiddo can go back to watching her movies… Long story short, don’t rely on a single solution. Always have a backup plan or system in place to prevent headaches in the future. You won’t regret it if you do.