strivewind

don't think i can answer you all of the questions, but i can give some ideas.
1.  depends on how much data you'll need to backup, if it is not so much.  You can consider to have full backup of the data everyday.  Full backup is simple and easy to restore.  if not, maybe you can do incremental backup on Monday to Thursday an Full backup on Friday.
2.  you can choose to backup the data onto hard disk or tape.  Backing data to disk is faster than to tapes.  So if hardware is available, you may want to back data to disk and tape together.  
3.  Also, you should also consider to take the tapes off site. So that if disaster strikes onto your backup system, you still have a copy of data on tapes in another location.
4.  Symantec Backup Exec is what i've used for many years, you can check out their web site to find out more information about this product.

Hope this helps