Everything regarding our web server is on a single drive, seperate from the installation drive.

Got a Apache, MySQL, PHP and WWW folder (I guess I don't need to explain what is in each huh?)

This all is on a server at our webhost, but of course I got direct access via RDC (it's a dedicated server) and FTP.

What would be the best way to back up the system?
A copy of the www folder of course. Other than that all i can think of is the mysql databases.

I guess it wont work to run a nightly FTP download of everything on the drive. Dont think a simple "copy it back" will result in a fully functional database.

Reason I'm asking is that the database backup plan suggested by the host (they are great..not going to change) are really expensive. And it does not seem to be much more than a nightly copy of the www folder.

By the way, it's a windows 2003 server, running apache,php and mysql. (yeah i know..linux would have rocked but this was decided on someone else for some smart @r$ed reason i still dont know what)