Not a question, but some experience which may be useful to others (and I checked with Mike to make sure he was OK with me sharing this here).

Although WSEE provides a wrapper for the Windows Server Backup tool, which may be sufficient for many, I found it had too many limitations for use on my home server (which also provides media-streaming) specifically around backup speed, disk space and processor utilisation and the limits of a single backup scheme and schedule.

With WSE2016, Acronis Cyber Protect Server Essentials provided an alternative that worked for me at a “reasonable” price – but moving to Server 2022 Standard with WSEE meant that a licence for Acronis became prohibitive. I looked at some well-known alternatives with reasonable pricing but found them each with their own limitations including: some with too limited scheduling, some too complex for my needs, and most not directly supporting ReFS (needing bit-for-bit copy).

I then found Macrium Reflect Server, a UK developed product with a reasonable single-server price point which, after 30 days testing, I have found to be easy to setup and use, with “proper” ReFS support, flexible scheduling options and which is efficient in terms of backup speed, space usage and server impact… so, if you are looking at alternative local backup solutions for your WSEE server(s), it may be worth considering Macrium amongst the products you look at.

Please feel free to comment on this “question” with your own experiences, including any experience you might have with Macrium or other products, as well as any hints and tips you might have around local server backups.