Due to data privacy laws, initial seeds and restore drives are only available for partners/accounts located in the United States.
When you sign up a new client with a lot of data to be backed up, it is recommended that you utilize our initial seed process to ensure your clients get their data backed up as quickly as possible.
Initial seeds work by backing up your data to a USB hard drive and mailing the drive to Barracuda MSP to upload directly to our servers.
This process can be faster than uploading data normally if your client's upload bandwidth is lacking and/or they have a lot of data to back up.
Once the initial seed is complete, you can continue to run backups while the drive is in transit and being processed.
What types of backups can be seeded?
It is recommended you perform initial seeds of data which are largely static. This recommendation usually applies to File and Folder and Exchange Mailbox Level backups.
Other backup-set types, such as Exchange Information Store, SQL, and virtual machine backups are very dynamic and also subject to future Full backups as required by revision rules.
While an initial seed helps to get the first backup to the cloud, future backups may still be sizeable enough to take a significant time to upload.
Deciding When to Use an Initial Seed
Depending on your client's available bandwidth, use the guidelines below to choose when to make use of the initial seed service. For example, if you have an upload bandwidth of 5 Mbps and your backup size is greater than 500 GB, it would make sense to use the initial seed service. If the ratio of upload bandwidth (Mbps) to data size (GB) is greater than 1:100, backing up normally would likely be either just as fast or faster than an initial seed backup.
| Upload Bandwidth | Size of Data Being Backed Up |
|---|---|
| 1 Mbps | >100 GB |
| 5 Mbps | >500 GB |
| 10 Mbps | >1 TB |
| 20 Mbps | >2 TB |
Initial Seed Turnaround Time
Turnaround time depends on the number of incoming seed requests and the size of the computer account being seeded.
There is no charge for the initial seed process. Partner is responsible for providing the external drive and shipping both ways.
Ship to:
Barracuda MSP
Attn: Client Services
100 Apollo Drive, Suite 205
Chelmsford, MA 01824
To get this process started please contact Barracuda MSP Technical Support at 408-342-5300, by Live Chat, or emailing support@barracudamsp.com.