Never tested
The job said success for three years. When it mattered, the restore failed, or took days nobody had planned for.
- Monthly file restores
- Quarterly full system restores
- Timed and recorded
Backup & disaster recovery · Toronto & the GTA
A backup only counts if you can restore from it, fast enough, on your worst day.
Most businesses have backups. Far fewer have tested one, and fewer still hold a copy an attacker could not delete. We back up your servers, files and Microsoft 365, keep an immutable offsite copy, and restore real data every week so the plan is proven rather than assumed.
Managed backup and recovery for businesses in Toronto, Markham and across Canada, with your data held in Canadian regions.
- Restores tested every week
- An immutable copy admins can't delete
- Canadian data residency
- No long-term contracts
In scope, every week
- Every file server and database
- Microsoft 365 mail, Teams and SharePoint
- Laptops and desktops
- Line-of-business applications
- A written recovery runbook, rehearsed
The only real test: restore something, time it, and check people could work from it.
What goes wrong
Six reasons backups fail when you need them.
None of these show up in a green backup report. Every one of them is why a business that “has backups” still loses a week.
On the same network
The backup server sat on the same domain with the same admin login. Attackers deleted it before the file server.
- Separate credentials
- Offline or immutable copy
- Not joined to the domain
Retention too short
The deletion or encryption was noticed after the backups had already rolled over, so the good copy was gone.
- Retention matched to how late you notice
- Monthly and yearly points
- Records rules respected
Things left out
The NAS, the accounting database, the shared mailbox and the cloud app nobody owned were never in scope.
- Full inventory, reviewed yearly
- Cloud and SaaS included
- New systems added as they arrive
One copy, one place
The backup drive lived beside the server it protected. One theft, flood or fire takes both.
- Offsite copy
- Different media and provider
- Geographically separated
No runbook
Nobody had done a full restore before, so the order of recovery and the passwords were worked out under pressure.
- Written restore steps
- Credentials stored safely
- Rehearsed with your team
Downtime cost
What would a day without your systems actually cost?
Use your own numbers. The answer tells you how fast your recovery needs to be, and what a better backup is worth — before anyone quotes you for one.
Staff cost and lost revenue only, using 48 working weeks of 40 hours. Recovery work, penalties and customers who quietly don't come back come on top.
Cost per working hour
$1,255
4 hours$5,021
1 working day$10,042
3 working days$30,125
1 working week$50,208
The rule of thumb
The 3-2-1-1-0 rule.
An industry rule of thumb rather than a regulation, but it covers what auditors, insurers and security frameworks ask a business to have.
3
Copies
Your live data plus two backups, so one failure is never the end of it.
2
Types of storage
For example a local appliance and the cloud, so one failure does not take both.
1
Offsite
Away from your building, for fire, flood, theft and a very bad Tuesday.
1
Offline or immutable
A copy that cannot be changed or deleted during retention, even by an administrator.
0
Errors
Restores tested and verified, not just jobs reported as successful.
Backup and recovery services
Set up, watched and tested by the same team.
A backup you configured once and nobody looks at is a guess. Everything below is run by us, reported to you, and tested on a schedule.
Managed cloud backup
Servers, databases and file shares backed up automatically to cloud storage, encrypted end to end, with version history and timestamps that satisfy an audit.
Managed backup Toronto
On-premises backup appliance
A local appliance for fast restores of large data sets, paired with an offsite copy. Big recoveries stop depending on your internet connection.
Local backup appliance
Microsoft 365 backup
Mail, Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive kept separately from Microsoft's own retention, recoverable years later and in bulk after a bad deletion.
Microsoft 365 backup
Ransomware-proof copies
Immutable, air-gapped copies on separate credentials, so an attacker with your admin password still cannot delete the backup before encrypting production.
Immutable backup
Disaster recovery planning
A written plan covering what comes back first, who does what, who to call, and how staff keep working while it happens.
Disaster recovery plan
Weekly restore testing
Real files restored from real dates and opened, with the timings recorded. You get the results, not just a green tick.
Backup testing
Business continuity
Replacement hardware procurement, loan devices, temporary remote work policies and a plan for extended power or premises outages.
Business continuity
Tiered data storage
Storage designed around how critical each data set is: live, near-line and archive, on site or in the cloud, with the cost to match.
Data storage strategy
Monitoring and reporting
Backup jobs watched daily. A failed job raises a ticket the same day, and you get a monthly report you can hand to a client or auditor.
Backup monitoring
The Microsoft 365 gap
Microsoft keeps the service running. It does not keep your data.
It is the most common misunderstanding we are called in to fix. Retention is short, and it is there for the service, not as a backup of your business.
SituationMicrosoft 365 on its ownWith your own backup
Deleted email
Recoverable for 14 days by default, up to 30 if configured
Recoverable for as long as your retention policy says, including single messages
Deleted files in SharePoint and OneDrive
Recycle bin, 93 days
Restorable years later, by version, after the recycle bin has emptied
Ransomware encrypted files that sync
The encrypted version syncs too, and overwrites the clean one
A clean copy from before the attack, restorable in bulk
A staff member deletes a shared site or mailbox
Recoverable briefly, then gone once retention lapses
Full rebuild of the site or mailbox from a known-good date
Defaults vary by licence and configuration. We check what your tenant actually retains before recommending anything, and we will say so if native retention already covers what you need.
Building the plan
Design the restore first, then the backup.
Start from the recovery you need: which systems must come back first, how fast, and how much recent work you can lose. That decides the tooling, the frequency and the cost.
- 01
Inventory
Servers, file shares, databases, Microsoft 365, cloud apps and laptops. Everything that would hurt to lose.
- 02
Set RTO and RPO
Per system, agreed with you, using what an hour of downtime actually costs your business.
- 03
Design the copies
Three copies, two storage types, one offsite, one immutable — sized to the recovery you need.
- 04
Protect the cloud data
Microsoft 365 and line-of-business apps backed up separately from the vendor's own retention.
- 05
Write the runbook
Order of restore, contacts, where the credentials live, and who makes the call to fail over.
- 06
Watch it daily
Failed jobs raise a ticket the same morning, not at month-end reporting.
- 07
Test and review
Monthly, quarterly and yearly restores, with timings kept and the plan updated as you grow.
RTO · Recovery Time Objective
How long you can be without a system. Four hours and four days are completely different, and very different in cost.
RPO · Recovery Point Objective
How much recent work you can afford to lose. An hourly backup and a nightly backup are not the same business risk.
Clients
What people say when we pick up.
Long-standing relationships across manufacturing, professional services, transport and healthcare — many measured in years, not months.
“Sun IT Solutions has given us predictable monthly IT budget costs, eliminating surprises and downtime. They provided us with the right IT solution and a comprehensive business plan to meet all future needs.”
Kevin Stanley
President, Skyreach Window Cleaning Inc.
“They are quick to respond to any issues or questions we have and Lloyd always offers solutions so that the same problems don't arise again. Thank you to Lloyd and his team — we can focus on our business while they take care of our IT needs.”
Mike Mintsopoulos
President, Truck Equipment & Service Co. Ltd
“Following our serious server crash the service they provided our business was the absolute best. A technician was onsite almost immediately and worked non-stop to get us back up and running, with almost no downtime.”
Amelia Folco
President, Jupiter Industries Inc.
“Sun IT Solutions convinced us to switch to a VoIP telephone system. It has been virtually trouble free and our telephone costs dropped by more than 80%. We have no hesitation whatsoever in recommending them.”
Richard Waite
President, Salix Systems Limited
Backup FAQ
What people ask about backup and recovery.
Ring 416-479-0505 if you want an answer about your own environment rather than a general one.
Three copies of your data, on two different types of storage, with one copy offsite, one copy that is offline or immutable so it cannot be changed or deleted, and zero errors when you test a restore. It builds on the older 3-2-1 rule and, in practice, covers what most auditors and insurers ask a small business to have.
Backups are one part. Recovery is the plan around them
Talk to an engineerCloud servicesMicrosoft 365, Azure and server migration with Canadian residency.Cybersecurity24/7 monitoring, incident response and ransomware prevention.Managed IT servicesSupport, patching and backups for one monthly cost per user.IT supportHelp desk and onsite support when something stops working.
Backup check
Could you get back to work by tomorrow morning?
We review what you back up, where the copies live, who can delete them and when you last restored anything. You get a written summary of the gaps and what to fix first — whether or not you work with us.
- 416-479-0505
- help@sunitsolutions.ca
- Offices in downtown Toronto and Markham, with remote support across Canada. Backups held in Canadian cloud regions by default.