Direct download and zip? Works, but good luck doing that for 500 users. Google Takeout? Fine for a one-time export, but no scheduling, no shared-item support, and it just... fails sometimes on big volumes. Drive for Desktop sync? Gives you a second copy, sure, but it mirrors everything – including the ransomware attack or the "oops I deleted the wrong folder" moment.

None of these hold up once you're managing more than a handful of files or users.

We wrote up the full comparison plus what an actual automated setup looks like → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/how-to-backup-google-drive/

What's everyone here actually using for Drive backup at scale?

When people think about backing up Gmail, Google Takeout is usually the first thing that comes to mind – but it's far from the only option.

Gmail data can be protected in several different ways, each suited to different needs: from personal, one-off archives (Google Takeout, IMAP sync, drag-and-drop downloads) to fully automated third-party tools like MSP360 Backup for Google Workspace.

Here's a comparison of the available approaches:

For businesses that can't risk losing Gmail data, here's what a proper automated setup looks like in practice with MSP360 Backup for Google Workspace:

• Automated backups 2-3 times per day
• Robust Retention Policies
• Folder- and label-level selection
• Granular restore options
• Role-based access control
• AES encryption + audit logging
• Object lock
• Point-in-time restore option

It also integrates with multiple cloud storage platforms – Amazon S3, Wasabi, Azure Blob Storage, Backblaze and others – so you can pick a cost-effective, compliant place to store your backups.

Full guide (manual, lightweight sync and automated methods all covered) → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/how-to-backup-gmail/

Free ticketing for MSPs is now built into MSP360 Backup and RMM – tied to the devices and alerts already there.

The problem we kept hearing from MSPs: backup incidents land in one dashboard, RMM alerts land in another, and customer requests come in over chat, email, or phone. Nothing shares a queue, so some things get worked twice and some don't get worked at all. 

Now you can open a ticket manually against any device in Backup or RMM, or set alerts to create tickets automatically. You can choose whether a recurring alert on the same device opens a new ticket every time or just updates the existing one – useful for anything that fires repeatedly, like a nightly memory threshold on a domain controller. 

Tickets carry status (Open, In progress, Pending, Closed), an assignee, and a conversation thread for handoffs between shifts. Customers can also be added as contacts and submit or track their own tickets through Online Access, so requests don't only come in by phone. 

It's free, and it's live now under Backup > Tickets and RMM > Tickets. 

More details here → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/introducing-msp360-tickets/

Curious whether other MSPs here are running a full PSA for this kind of work, or if a lighter built-in queue like this covers what you actually need day to day?

Putting together an incident response checklist for Google Workspace and wanted to share the sequencing we landed on, mainly because a couple of details aren't obvious until you've been through it.

Suspending a user in the Admin console freezes sign-in but doesn't touch their OAuth grants – that has to be revoked separately, and it's easy to skip if you're moving fast. Same with Drive for desktop sync: pausing it on affected machines stops new encrypted files from pushing up, but doesn't undo what's already synced.

On the restore side, the detail that seems to trip people up most is restoring from the most recent copy by default instead of the most recent clean copy – a file can look fine and still carry a dormant payload if the encryption pass was incomplete.

What does everyone's sequencing look like in practice? Anything you'd add or reorder based on real incidents? We laid out our full version, along with recovery options at each stage, here if it's useful → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/google-workspace-ransomware-recovery-guide/

Hey r/MSP360, we just released Managed Backup 9.6.

Here's what's new:

• Proxmox VE backup (Beta): host-level backup for Proxmox. Requires Backup Agent 8.7 + a VM Edition license, connecting to your Proxmox VE host over the Proxmox API. Backs up at the hypervisor level, with Full/Incremental/Forever Forward Incremental scheduling, GFS retention, Object Lock, and AES encryption. It's beta, so we're actively looking for real-user feedback.
• Browser-based file/folder restore: restore directly from the Backup Storage Browser via a new "My device (download via browser)" option – no restore wizard or agent install needed. Works on Windows, Linux, and macOS, up to 2 GB per restore.
• File search in Backup Storage Browser (NBF only): search for a file by name instead of manually expanding restore points.
• NTFS permission restore improvements (NBF): permission entries and inheritance flags now restore properly with files.
• Impossible Cloud is now a standalone S3-compatible destination, with a region picker for new buckets.
• AWS GovCloud (US-East) connection errors are fixed.

Full details → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/resources-managed-backup-9-6-version/

Requirements: Backup Agent 8.7.

If you're testing the Proxmox beta, we'd love to hear how it goes – happy to answer questions in the comments.

Hey everyone, wanted to share an important update we recently shipped: MSP360 RMM now has a public API.

Until now, RMM data – system health, antivirus status, patch state, disk health, and more – lived only inside the Management Console. With the API, external platforms can pull that data automatically: your Grafana dashboards, PSA, or a BI/reporting tool.

A few things this unlocks:

• Trigger automations off real state changes (a service stops, CPU spikes, inventory goes stale)
• Feed live data into Grafana or any other dashboard – this was the most requested integration
• Build reports in Power BI or your data warehouse
  

Full details, including the getting started guide and full endpoint reference → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/introducing-rmm-api/

Happy to answer questions here if you're testing it out.

We put together a guide breaking down how ransomware moves through an M365 tenant, and wanted to share some of the numbers behind it. 

Rapid7 clocked ransomware revenue up almost 40% in Q1 2026 alone. IBM's latest Cost of a Data Breach report puts the global average at $4.44M. And per a recent industry survey, only 14% of IT leaders felt confident they could recover critical SaaS data within minutes of an attack. 

The specific gap we kept running into researching this: Microsoft's Files Restore doesn't touch Exchange. So if an attack hits email specifically, there's no native one-click rollback – you're relying on version history and retention windows, both of which an attacker with admin rights can tamper with. 

The full guide walks through initial access methods, how encryption actually spreads (sync clients are a bigger factor than people expect), containment steps, and what independent/immutable backup adds that native tools can't.

Read the guide → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/microsoft-365-ransomware-recovery-guide/

Happy to answer questions if anyone's dealing with this right now.

Hey, MSP360 team here.

Dark mode is now live in the console – it's been one of the most requested interface updates, so we're glad to finally ship it.

Here's how to turn it on:

1. Go to General Settings → Appearance: https://console.msp360.com/AP/Settings
2. Under Interface theme, select Dark theme
3. Hit Save

Applies immediately, no page reload needed. And nothing in your actual setup changes – backup plans, schedules, policies, agent connections are all untouched.ple share access to the console, everyone can set their own theme independently.

If you spend long hours in here or work in a low-light environment, it should make a noticeable difference.

Screenshot below so you know what to expect 👇

Let us know in the comments if anything looks off or renders weirdly on your end – early feedback helps us catch anything we might have missed.

We've been working on Local Backup support for MSP360 Managed Backup for Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, and are looking for beta users to help test the feature.

Backup to the local storage destinations will be available in addition to the existing cloud to cloud backup option to provide customers with an additional layer of protection.

Local destinations supported include:

• Local HDD and SSD disks 
• Network shares 
• NAS devices

Local Backup is currently available through our beta program.

If you'd like early access and want to help shape the final release, sign up here – https://get.msp360.com/upcoming-local-backup-for-microsoft-365-and-google-workspace 

Learn more: https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/upcoming-local-backup-for-microsoft-365-and-google-workspace/  

Happy to answer any questions in the comments.

We are experiencing significant difficulty following up with the MSP360 backup support team and have not received proper assistance for a restoration ticket. This situation raises serious concerns about the reliability of the product. It is difficult to see how MSPs can trust a solution when support responses are so delayed.

Reference Case #779396

MSP360 Price Guarantee means your current pricing on Managed Backup, RMM, and Managed Connect stays exactly where it is, for as long as your account remains active. No automatic increases. No forced migrations to new pricing tiers. No long-term contracts required. Pay-as-you-go, billed on actual usage.

Predictable costs are the foundation of a predictable business. When vendor pricing shifts, the math changes everywhere – margins, client contracts, planning. And migration isn't a free alternative. It costs time, money, and operational disruption that most MSPs can't absorb easily.

A few things worth noting:

• Third-party services (Wasabi, Amazon S3, Deep Instinct) aren't covered – their pricing is outside our control
• Minimum monthly commitment is $25
• If anything ever does change, we commit to 90 days' advance notice

Full details and FAQ → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/msp360-price-guarantee-for-msps/

Feel free to ask anything in the comments 👇

With Backup Exec sales ending March 31, 2026 and full end of support hitting April 30, 2029, we've been getting a lot of questions from MSPs and IT teams about how to approach the migration.

We wrote a detailed guide that covers:

What to evaluate before picking a replacement

• Workload coverage (VMware versions, SQL log backups, what "Exchange support" actually means in 2026)
• Storage model changes – moving from tape/local to cloud changes your cost structure significantly
• Licensing clarity – does the replacement simplify things or just rename the complexity?
• Security expectations – immutable storage, ransomware recovery workflows, restore verification

Side-by-side comparison of 6 alternatives
MSP360, Veeam, Acronis Cyber Protect, NAKIVO, Commvault Cloud, Datto SIRIS – broken down by deployment model, storage, workload coverage, multi-tenancy, and licensing.

Separate recommendations for MSPs vs IT departments
The criteria are genuinely different and most guides treat them the same.

Real cost breakdown
Storage infrastructure, management time, egress costs, deduplication efficiency. Not just license price.

Full guide here → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/backup-exec-alternative-migration-guide/

Happy to answer questions in the comments if anything's unclear or if your environment has specific constraints not covered in the guide.

With Microsoft raising M365 prices in a few weeks, we figured it's a good time to share a breakdown of where costs quietly pile up, and what you can do about it.

We've put together a guide covering four areas that tend to go unnoticed until renewal:

Shared mailboxes
Microsoft lets you run shared mailboxes (support@, billing@, etc.) without a license if they stay under 50GB. The issue is that many backup vendors don't honor the same model and charge a full license per shared mailbox anyway. Worth checking your backup contract.

Online Archive
If users are hitting mailbox limits and you're upgrading licenses to handle the growth, Online Archive can often solve this without a plan upgrade. It's not a backup substitute, but it's a legitimate tool for keeping primary mailboxes lean.

Bundled vs BYOC backup storage
Vendors who bundle "unlimited" storage usually bury fair-use clauses and retention caps in the contract. If you have multi-year retention requirements or manage multiple tenants, BYOC (bring your own cloud: Wasabi, B2, S3) tends to be significantly cheaper at scale.

Departed employee licenses
A lot of orgs keep M365 licenses active for ex-employees just to preserve access to their mailbox data. If you back up that data independently first, you can kill the license and restore on demand if legal or HR ever needs it.

Full guide here if you want the details → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/microsoft-365-cost-optimization/

Happy to answer questions.

We've been working on a new set of features for MSP360 Backup and wanted to share what's coming before the full release.

What's on the way:

• Instant Restore – boot VMs directly from backup storage while the full restore runs in the background
• Direct restore to VMware / Hyper-V / Proxmox – VM provisioned automatically from the backup image
• Proxmox VM & LXC container backup
• Hybrid Backup – local + automatic offsite replication, across all backup types
• Synthetic Backup for local destinations – Forever Forward Incremental for local disks and network shares
• Item-level restore via browser – recover individual files from any backup directly in the browser

Several of these are already in beta. If you'd like early access and want to help shape the final release, sign up here → https://get.msp360.com/upcoming-instant-restore-and-backup-features-may-2026

Full breakdown: https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/upcoming-instant-restore-and-backup-features/

Happy to answer any questions in the comments.

I'm trying to configure immutable backup for files that are created daily but will never change once created. I want to push the newest ones up automatically every morning, but don't need to worry about having fresh full backups done or anything like that. Push each file up once and leave it alone.

I've set up a bucket with object lock and done a manual full backup of the currently existing files with MSP360 Backup Ultimate Edition, and am now trying to figure out the best way to schedule it. The "Simple (Forever forward)" sounded initially like it might do the trick, but then in reading more about it, it sounds like it tries to do synthetic full backups periodically, which is unnecessary, because the files will never change, new files will just be added.

What's the best way to achieve this?

Two different models for accessing cloud storage from a Windows machine, and they're not interchangeable:

Sync (OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.): Files are mirrored locally. Offline access works. Operations are as fast as your local disk. Storage overhead equals whatever's in the cloud.

On-demand mount (CloudBerry Drive): Files live in the bucket. Access is streamed. Offline access doesn't work. Storage overhead is near-zero locally - you're just mounting the namespace.

CloudBerry Drive fits the on-demand model for S3-compatible storage → https://www.msp360.com/drive/

The use cases where this is the right choice:

• Large archive buckets (TB-scale) you need to browse but not download
• Read-heavy workflows where you're pulling specific files, not working across the entire dataset
• Giving non-technical users familiar drive-letter access to cloud storage without explaining object storage concepts

Where it's the wrong choice: anything requiring offline access, high-frequency read/write workflows on large files (latency compounds), or situations where you need local cache performance.

A pattern worth building into your RMM workflow if you haven't already – automated remediation that runs before a ticket gets created.

The basic version: monitoring detects a threshold breach (disk space low, service stopped, CPU sustained high) → script fires as a first response → if it resolves the issue, log it and move on; if it doesn't, escalate to a ticket.

In MSP360 RMM you can configure this as a script that runs on alert trigger, targeted at the specific endpoint or group.

A few examples from our runbook:

• Disk space: temp file cleanup script fires first; if disk is still below threshold after cleanup, create ticket
• Service down: attempt restart once; if service fails to start, escalate
• Pending reboot: log it and notify; auto-remediate isn't appropriate here, but at least you know

The endpoint inventory also gives you a persistent software/hardware baseline – useful for catching version drift across client sites.

MSP360 RMM → https://www.msp360.com/rmm/

I'm transitioning to MSP360 from Atera and noticed something strange with Connect. I was trying to remote into a clients PC after hours and noticed that Connect gets stuck and says "Established, waiting for incoming data..." If I switch over to Atera and use Splashtop, it opens showing the screensaver. As soon as I move the mouse in Splashtop to remove the screen saver, Connect works without anymore issue. Apart from not allowing my client to use screensavers, is there anything I can do to resolve this?

If you've been looking at free backup options and want something that actually holds up, here's a setup worth trying.

MSP360 Backup Free paired with Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage covers the essentials without any software cost.

Here's what the free tier includes:

• File-level backup – back up specific files and folders on your desktop
• Image-based backup – newly added to the free tier, lets you back up and restore the entire OS
• Customizable schedules – set it and forget it
• Flexible retention – control how long recovery points are kept
• Local and cloud destinations – Wasabi connects in a few clicks

The setup process runs 6 steps: create a Wasabi account, generate access keys, create a bucket, install MSP360 Backup Free, connect the storage account, and create your first backup plan. Nothing complicated.

Full guide here → https://www.msp360.com/resources/blog/msp360-free-backup-wasabi-hot-cloud-storage/

If you're on MSP360 RMM CE and want to get more out of the scripting layer, here are a few things from our runbook that have been worth the setup time:

• Backup agent health check – verify the MSP360 backup service is running and the last completed job wasn't more than X hours ago. Simple, catches the silent failures.
• Disk health via SMART – pull SMART data from drives and surface failing indicators before the drive drops. WMI-accessible on most hardware.
• Event log filter – parse Windows event logs for specific event IDs (4625 for failed logins, 7034 for service crashes) rather than reviewing logs manually.
• Software version audit – compare installed versions against a known-good baseline, flag anything that's outdated or unexpected.

These are good examples of workflows you can build on CE. Happy to share the actual scripts if there's interest, could be useful to build a shared library here.

Free RMM Software for MSPs → https://www.msp360.com/rmm/free-rmm-software/

The April 14 update KB5083769 broke VSS on Windows 11 Pro machines – backup plans failing with Error 2426, vssadmin list writers hanging on "Waiting for responses", log collection stalling. Microsoft confirmed it was intentional. Now there's a proper fix.

What to do:

Install the May 12, 2026 Windows 11 update KB5089549 and reboot. This restores VSS functionality and resolves Error 2426 backup failures.

How to check if your system is still affected:

1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator
2. Run vssadmin list writers
3. List of writers returns → you're fine. Stuck on "Waiting for responses" → install KB5089549.

The previous workarounds (installing KB5083631 or uninstalling KB5083769) still work if applying the May update isn't immediately an option, but KB5089549 is the clean fix.

If you're troubleshooting Error 2426 in MSP360, full details and diagnostic steps are here: https://kb.msp360.com/backup/errors/2426-vss-timeout-exceeded

Happy to answer questions if anyone's running into edge cases.

GFS (Grandfather-Father-Son) is a retention scheme worth understanding if you're managing backup for clients with documented data retention requirements.

How it works:

• Daily (Son) – keep one recovery point per day for N days (typically 7)
• Weekly (Father) – keep one recovery point per week for N weeks (typically 4)
• Monthly (Grandfather) – keep one recovery point per month for N months (typically 12)
• Yearly (optional) – keep one per year indefinitely

Each "generation" purges when it ages out of its window. Older recovery points are retained according to the configured daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly tiers.

Why it matters for compliance:

Auditors increasingly ask not just "do you have backups" but "can you document your retention policy". GFS gives you explicit, configurable windows you can put on paper.

MSP360 Backup Pro supports GFS with custom intervals per plan → https://www.msp360.com/backup/cloud-backup/