Sharepoint foundation 2010 backup in a single server deployment

Question

We have a single server sharepoint foundation 2010 installation and I'm wondering what would be the best backup/restore plan.

I need to be able to move the content to a new SP installation or restore the backup when something goes wrong.

I did some google search on this and I found some options. But I kind of confused what would be the best one.

So far I came across this options:

1. Data Protection Manager - this should be an utility which provides a backup functionality for the a whole windows server system (sharepoint including)

2. Powershell Stsadm command - a command which will do the backup to a file. Does this backup method also backup the web app files ?

3. Manual backup I read somewhere that there is a possibility to backup the sql server independently and also copy backup the web app files. And when restoring SP just import the sql backup and override the files.

I'm wondering what options best suits for me?

Answer 1

If you have clear SharePoint instalation without any wsp package installed, when content database backup is the most useful way. You can simply backup content database by using sql server tools, set up new farm, create web application, restore content database and attach it to web application.