As above, at the moment, I am running veritasBE, with a Dell DLT carousell and the full backup can take up to 3 days with 80gb DLT tapes.

I am configuring a NAS with Veritas to run a full backup everynight over a 1gb Switch, but will still need an offsite copy.

Are there any faster devices to backup to that can be over written every other week? So it will be week A week B and Monthly Full. The amount of data is currently anything up to 410GB.

Advise appreciated!

Thanks

1. There are several methodologies for backup; (a)full, (b)incremental, (c)differential.
You can reduce the volume of data moving to the backup media by performing
(a) once, note the date/time and thence use (c) thereafter. Any recovery would
need the (a) volume and the last (c) volume.

2. full backups are wasteful in more ways than one. They take the most time,
copy data that you can recover by other means, and they consume the most media.
Systems have three kinds of data on the HD(s); the OS itself, the programs
you run, and the most important -- YOUR DATA. The OS can be reinstalled from
the original media as can the programs. The real stuff that needs protection
is YOUR DATA. Microsoft compounds this with the registry and the massive
information therein necessary to make their system work (btw: no other uses this technique).
so be sure to get it backed-up too!

YOUR DATA should be (in Win/XP) under Documents and Settings.
edit: Under Vistia it's C:\Users\ /edit
Some bits and pieces may be elsewhere (eg: I have an Apache web server at \Apache)
but you should have a good idea where the pieces are located.

SO, choose a good method(b,c) and restrict the backup to YOUR DATA
and life will get more simple

Last thought: an alternative/additional techique is data replication

edit:
In addition to performance and media consumption, there's an issue that most
people ignore:

If the system will not boot, how can I run the restore?

The problem can occur is several ways; a) HD failure and possible replacement,
b) backup was on the same hd (should be but not always obviously the wrong choice),
c) backup is on another system and it can't be accessed, and
d) unless you recover using the same OS, your backup program may not run at all.

The process of using a backup to recover your system is a three step process;

1. first get the hardware reliable or purchase a new system
2. second, install the OS of your choice -- hopefully the same as the original
3. run the Restore program using your backup data file(s)

You may elect to Reinstall programs after the recovery or do it before; myself, I
think I would like before AND to attempt recovering the Programs at the same time.
Due to Windows Registry issues, this might have a low probabilly of success.
/edit

I would use firewire of usb backup hard drives. I know tape is more secure and stable but hard drives are much faster.

tape is 'secure' only in the sense it can be removed and placed under lock-n-key.
however, it is possible (and it does occur) that a bad spot in the tape can not
be corrected durring the write process and it will not be discovered until one
attempts to recover using it -- obviously too late and fatal

with modern external USB HDs, the same 'security' is possible with the advantage
of speed and automatic remapping of 'bad blocks'