Store File-based Database Backups in Azure | Best Solution for Minimizing Costs

Store File-based Database Backups in Azure

Question

The accounting department at your company migrates to a new financial accounting software. The accounting department must keep file-based database backups for seven years for compliance purposes. It is unlikely that the backups will be used to recover data.

You need to move the backups to Azure. The solution must minimize costs.

Where should you store the backups?

Answers

Explanations

Click on the arrows to vote for the correct answer

A. B. C. D.

B

Option B: Azure Blob storage that uses the Archive tier is the most cost-effective solution for storing backups that are unlikely to be used for data recovery.

Azure Blob storage is a fully managed, highly scalable, and durable object storage service that allows you to store and access large amounts of unstructured data from anywhere in the world. The Archive tier is designed for data that is rarely accessed and stored for long periods, with a minimum storage duration of 180 days.

Compared to the Cool tier, the Archive tier offers even lower storage costs, but the retrieval time is longer (up to 15 hours). Since the backups are not expected to be used frequently, the longer retrieval time is acceptable.

Option A: Azure SQL Database is not suitable for file-based database backups because it is a relational database service designed for transactional data processing, not for storing file backups.

Option C: A Recovery Services vault is designed for disaster recovery and provides backup and restore capabilities for workloads running on-premises and in the cloud. However, it is not optimized for long-term backup storage and can be more expensive than using Azure Blob storage with the Archive tier.

Option D: Azure Blob storage that uses the Cool tier is designed for data that is accessed less frequently than the Hot tier, but more frequently than the Archive tier. The Cool tier offers faster retrieval times than the Archive tier but is more expensive. Since the backups are unlikely to be used for recovery, using the Archive tier is the more cost-effective option.