It depends on how much you are willing to pay and how much work you are willing to do. Typically you back up data and in a DR install the OS and programs and then restore the data. We use Tivoli Storage Manager and a bare metal restore is an option you can use for an additional purchase of TBMR. But this is a highly involved setup we use for all backups - 800+ servers. Symantec Netbackup is a lot less involved but does not have as many features or options. It just depends on what is available according to the budget you have to work with.

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I agree with Technochic. There are various levels of recovery with particular to RPO and RTO. RPO is Recovery Point Objective (to what point in the latest backup you want to recovery to) and RTO is Recovery Time Objective (to how long would be acceptable to recovery such server. For simplicity, I would setup an identical server on the DR site and use a "replication" software which would send the "changes" over to the DR server. Replication software I would look at would be XOSoft suite or DoubleTake.

Then you can add backup software in a B2D2T configuration.

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It is not a good idea and I don't personally recommend you to immediately rebuild your server by reformatting the entire content of the hard disk drive. The best thing you can do is to continuously backup your files manually and in incremental ways. It is also important to create the system restore so that you can assure the safety of your computer system.