Case Study: k-12 education success story
We had a ransomware attack…corrupting the entire financial system. Using Unitrends Backup, it took 15 minutes to restore the server and remove the threat!
The Challenge
“We support 1,800 clients with a staff of three. You name [a challenge], we face it — time, staffing, budget, etc.,” says Patrick Bernotas, technology director at Taylor Community Schools. “Before Unitrends, we used a Dell LTO tape autoloader. What a pain! We had to manually rotate tapes and it took about 2 days to recover just one server image. We very much needed peace of mind on backup and data recovery for our critical student and server data.” So, in 2013, Bernotas began a search to replace their tape backup solution.
“We very much needed peace of mind on backup and data recovery for our critical student and server data.”
After much deliberation, Taylor Community Schools chose a Unitrends Recovery Series physical appliance — a slim 1U model that can protect 10TB of data. “I think the appliance fits our business model and our operating cost as we are a K-12 education environment. The need for disaster recovery and backup are a priority and is needed for day-to-day operations. Though most schools cannot afford an enterprise solution, this is where Unitrends fits very well,” said Bernotas. “We use the Unitrends appliance for disaster recovery of our virtual machine infrastructure. It is an inexpensive, easy-to-use platform that is truly set-it-and-forget-it. It was easy to set up, simple to use, and has a low total cost of ownership.”
Follow Up
“The Unitrends solution is no comparison to a tape backup system,” continues Bernotas. “The Unitrends Recovery Series appliance is very robust and easy to use. Our Unitrends appliance backs up all server images and VMware snapshots as well as telecom and communications archive databases,” he says. “We had a ransomware attack that propagated to our financial server due to file sharing, corrupting the entire financial system. Using Unitrends Backup, it took 15 minutes to restore the server and remove the threat!”
“A very reliable and consistent backup and recovery solution, of which we are a repeat customer.”
We had a ransomware attack...corrupting the entire financial system. Using Unitrends Backup, it took 15 minutes to restore the server and remove the threat!
Taylor Community School Corporation
Taylor Community School Corporation is a public school district in Howard County, Indiana. The school district serves extreme southern Kokomo, Indian Heights and the entity of Taylor Township — all in Indiana. The district includes Taylor Elementary School, Taylor Middle School and Taylor High School. Patrick Bernotas has been the technology director for Taylor Schools for 25 years. He is responsible for all school-owned technology and internet services as well as audiovisual, telecom and school communications.
Learn MoreUnitrends Solution for Taylor Community School Corporation
Protected Environment
- Fully virtualized Windows environment
Benefits
- Ransomware protection
- Protection against accidental file deletion
- Full disaster recovery capabilities
"Cost and versatility the application comes in two forms an appliance or Virtual Appliance (aka install as a VM). Each has its advantage and disadvantages."
"Firstly I like that once we got it configured initially, we hardly had to touch it. The backup schedules run regularly and send email reports to confirm they are done. Secondly the user interface is intuitive and easy to use."
"I think the best has been the support. The few times we have had issues or questions, we've been able to get someone local to the United States and have no problems with the answers given."