[story of recovering a server]

It would be nice if this were more automated.

If I were starting out, I'd be inclined to use RAID, even with
replicated servers.  Disks are one of the most frequent failures, and
more annoying than many (swapping in a new power supply is easier than
restoring from backups).   I see RAID as cheap insurance against having
to do lots of sysadmin work when it isn't convenient.