Forum Discussion

irix's avatar
irix
Level 3
9 years ago

Backup from disk storage to tape in one step

Hello everyone,

 

we have 5 Windows and 2 Linux server which we're backing up daily.

On weekend we want to copy the last full backups of each serven to tape in one step.

That means with only one job so there is no interruption of the data stream form disk to tape.

This data stream have to include the backup of all 7 servers. We don't want to duplicate each server right after the backup to disk.

Using this solution, the tape has no need to stop during different jobs. so the transfer rate will be higher.

But we don't know how. Can we create one job to "backup" the disk storage to tape?

(I don't think so, because I want to be able restore one server from the tape without restore the whole disk storage)

Nothing found in the forum so far.

 

Thanks.

 

15
Backing Up
Backup and Recovery
Backup Exec
Best Practice
Configuring
Restore
Windows Server (2003-2008)
  • Colin_Weaver's avatar
    Colin_Weaver
    9 years ago

    You can create a duplicate job that duplicates only the last full backup and this can then be scheduled for once a week.

    I have not tested this to see if there are any limitaions but in theory you could put all you servers in the same initial job to disk (with a daily start) and then in the same job definition have a duplicate state for once a week that only duplicates the last full.

    You cannot do this if all your initial jobs to disk are separate as separate duplicate jobs will be needed if the initial jobs are separated.

     

    Also I would recommend splitting the Linux systems into a separate job just becauee you sometimes need settings for one OS type that do not apply to another. (Open file for instance on Windows boxes that you may not use against Linux and if you leave them all in the same job youy may get warning messages reported. )

     

     

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  • VJware's avatar
    VJware
    Level 6
    9 years ago

    You can setup a Duplicate backup job and then manually select the backup sets which needs to be duplicated. This would be manual since one has to select the necessary backup sets and secondly, this job will have to be created each week.

    KB on how to duplicate backup sets - https://support.symantec.com/en_US/article.HOWTO98918.html

  • irix's avatar
    irix
    Level 3
    9 years ago

    This isn't exactly what we need.

    We want backup 2 disk 2 tape BUT:

    - backup 2 disk daily. each server have it's own backupjob, only the destination is the same

    - disk 2 tape weekly. one job coping all latest full backups to tape (to store data outside the office)

     

    Why we came to this idea:

    I was on a techday about BE15 and the best practices. There the consultat told us first to store all data on disk and then copy all data at once to the tape. So the tape does not have to stop and start for each server over and over again.

    This will increase the speed for writing data to tape. So the duration of the duplication job will be as shorter as duplicate each serverbackup seperatly.

    I hope this is clear now.

    Thanks!

     

  • VJware's avatar
    VJware
    Level 6
    9 years ago

    When you manually select the backup sets, you are in effect creating only one duplicate job. The automatic duplicate alternatives would not be one single job, but multiple ones.

  • irix's avatar
    irix
    Level 3
    9 years ago

    Is there a way to have only one duplicate job but without doing it manually each week?

     

    When I duplicate to tape right after the normal backup job. Will it takes the data again from the server and slow down the network or will it takes the data from the disk storage?

  • VJware's avatar
    VJware
    Level 6
    9 years ago

    Unfortunately, no automated way unless you have multiple jobs.

    Duplicate job will not access the source server. It will access the disk storage.

  • irix's avatar
    irix
    Level 3
    9 years ago

    Ok. In this case, I will usw the build in backup to disk to tape feater but schedule the the deplication not right after the backup job to disk ends.

     

    Is there a way to schedule the duplication job to start after an other duplication jobs ends?

    I only can chose jobs from the same server as trigger. I want to run each duplicate to tape jobs one behind the other.

  • Colin_Weaver's avatar
    Colin_Weaver
    Moderator
    9 years ago

    You can create a duplicate job that duplicates only the last full backup and this can then be scheduled for once a week.

    I have not tested this to see if there are any limitaions but in theory you could put all you servers in the same initial job to disk (with a daily start) and then in the same job definition have a duplicate state for once a week that only duplicates the last full.

    You cannot do this if all your initial jobs to disk are separate as separate duplicate jobs will be needed if the initial jobs are separated.

     

    Also I would recommend splitting the Linux systems into a separate job just becauee you sometimes need settings for one OS type that do not apply to another. (Open file for instance on Windows boxes that you may not use against Linux and if you leave them all in the same job youy may get warning messages reported. )

     

     

  • irix's avatar
    irix
    Level 3
    9 years ago

    Hi Colin,

     

    thanks for this hint. I forgot this feature completely.

    I will do one backup job for the full backup and schedule this one duplication job.

    Also I'll seperate the different OS.

     

    I think we have our final solution.

    One question finally:

    I think, some time ago, someone told me that I should create one job for one server. One job including several servers is not recommended. Is that right? Anything against one job including several servers?

  • Colin_Weaver's avatar
    Colin_Weaver
    Moderator
    9 years ago

    When we took away the ability to do multi-server jobs in BE 2012 it had two main effects

    - a lot of customers got annoyed as for various reasons they liked multi-server jobs

    - any customer using tapes as part of their backup operations found it was almost impossible to manage their tape usage

    For a while we believed most of the problems were really just an education issue, however the tape handling problems showed us we had made a mistake and that the one job per server idea is OK for disk based backups but if you have a scenario where you want to get all your overnight backups or duplicates onto the least number of tapes and make it easy to offsite that night's backups, the single server per job idea meant you had to be really careful with the append vs overwrite settings and the start time of all the duplicate jobs as if you weren't you could end up using 1 tape per server (even if the tapes were not full) or even worse would attend the office in the morning to find that your backups/duplicates had stopped and were asking for you to insert tapes because of conflicts of append requirements and the real-time tape statuses as the tape requests were made.

     

    As such (especially for tape based operations) we do not recommend one server per job unless you really understand the append and overwrite settings vs job start settings and timings to meet your tape usage requirements. We might still recommend one server per job for disk operations (as long as duplicates to tape are not involved)