What is a Raw backup?
• Raw backup provides a consistent copy of the database by storing a binary copy of the data files. There are several advantages of raw backups over logical backups: • Backup and especially recovery are much faster. For example, it not unusual to see that for the very same database the raw backup is 5-10 times faster than the logical backup, and recovery of the raw backup image is 20 times faster than recovery of the logical backup. • Because it is simply a copy of the database files, a raw backup has a predictable size. • It provides better scalability than logical backup, which could be important if your MySQL database is rather large, for example, 10-20 GB or more. • The disadvantage is that raw backups can be recovered only to the same version of MySQL server running on the same operating system as the original data files.
