SQL Server Online Backup Server

A while ago I was looking into how to have a backup server for our live SQL Server. The backup server had to be able to be accessible while the live server was running, this is so that we could use it for reporting purposes.

These are the different options (and the reasons why they weren't suitable for us) :
1. Mirroring - the database mirror can’t be accessed – it's only available if the live database goes down.
2. Log Shipping - the Backup database disconnects users while new transactions being are being applied.
The only viable option was Continuous Replication where data is replicated in realtime every fixed period of time (normally a few minutes).
For our needs Clustering was too expensive. For the record it's for reliability only and offers no performance gains.