Zero to Bitcoin in sixty seconds - how to set up a Bitcoin client in case you need it fast?
Well, I would run the bitcoind in a VM, and regularly snapshot it.  If it fails, rollback the snapshot and reboot. Back online in &lt; 10 min, assuming frequent backups and you start working right away.  Not sure if this is the use case you're asking about, but that's what I'd do for max uptime.