Despite their best intentions, IT pros sometimes fall short when it comes to implementing a reliable backup solution. See whether these any of these mistakes sound familiar.

All of us in IT have been taught from Day One that performing regular backups is critical to an organization’s well being. Yet even seasoned pros sometimes make certain mistakes. Here are a few of the common mistakes I’ve encountered.

1: Not making system state backups often enough

In Windows environments, system state backups have a shelf life. For domain controllers, the shelf life is equal to the maximum tombstone age (60 days by default). After that, the backup becomes null and void. Even for non domain controllers, the age of the backup is an issue.

Each computer on a Windows network has a corresponding computer account in the Active Directory. Like a user account, the computer account has an associated password. The difference is that the password is assigned, and periodically changed, by Windows. If you try to restore a system state backup that is too old, the computer account password that is stored in the backup will no longer match the password that is bound to the computer account in the Active Directory, so the machine won’t be able to participate in the domain. There are workarounds, but it is usually easier to just make frequent system state backups of your servers.

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