I guess I don't really have a want for sftp. I would love something like backuppc that was lighter weight.
Let's see --- backuppc -- this?
http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/info.html
Looks like some really nifty features in it. Also looks to have a good bit of overhead to do everything it is doing. Way more than rsync by itself.
"BackupPC is written in Perl and extracts backup data via SMB using Samba, tar over ssh/rsh/nfs, or rsync."
I like rsnapshot a lot. I wish it could push backups though instead of the pulling only. I guess I could mount a remote directory for it to work, but I would worry about performance that way.
Give SSHFS a look
I use it alot to overcome all sorts of oddball issues with goofy bandwidth. Simply, it allows you to map director/filesystem via SSH over any network. It does create overhead, but no more than any other technology like SSH.
With SSHFS you can push or pull data.
Rsnapshot looks interesting also
Any rsync based solution that allows for a base full backup and incrementals and/or deduping, is good. Especially true where you are backing up full desktop installations. OS installs are highly duplicative from one user to next.
Good thread though. I like these. Helps expose new/unknown solutions that are out there.