When backing up Exchange Server 2010 it appears to backup the data with zero issues. However, it takes 20+ hours to run a Differential backup due to the length of time it takes to update the catalogs. This was an issue for us in the previous version of Backup Exec 2010 R3. The issue was not consistent though. For instance; in 2012 we had an issue in late July and early December. The issue in July seemed to correct itself? The issue from December is still ongoing. The backup rate is at about 282 MB/min. Whereas while updating catalogs runs at about 1 MB/min. This definitely appears to be the issue as the entire backup is less than 10GB. The full backup runs normally and does not take an extended period of time while updating catalogs. For all Exchange backups we are running GRT. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi, Is your media server fully patched, and have these patches been push-installed to any remote servers? Do you also have enough free disk space on the data store that the Exchange server is hosted on? Lack of space can bring VMware down in performance if it doesn't have enough disk space, or has multiple snapshots it needs to commit. Thanks!

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH198730 Catalog Meta-Data job that runs after an Exchange Granular Recovery Technology (GRT) enabled backup set hangs and does not complete. Would recommend you to open a support case

Yes. fully patched and remote agents up to date. There is plenty of free space on both Exchange and Backup Exec Media Server. I have opened a case with Symantec and had it escalated. This issue is ongoing since middle of December. I hope someone from Symantec support sees this and will assign someone to my case for assistance.

...I've also hit the support flag here for you. If you get helped, please post back here with wha the solution was and close this off... Thanks!

Hi, did you have your problem fixed ? I have exactly the same issue : BE 2012 + Exchange 2010 Both with latest BE patchs Backup on deduplication disk storage GRT enable FULL backups OK Incremental backups ==> KO Job stucks on "Updating Catalogs" for hours. Backup job is small (about 10 GB) and seems ok.. Thanks in advance

Exchange 2010 Backup : Updating Catalogs Very Long

18 Replies

MarvinFS
Level 3
12 years ago
now i'm trying a full backup to simple disk device - the speed is 3500mb\min stable from the start!

what the heck?! Where to look for the issue?
MarvinFS
Level 3
12 years ago
oh no, i was wrong - it was vmware related and actually worked very well!! https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/performance-tuning-keys-vmware-backups-and-restores
MarvinFS
Level 3
12 years ago
I've got my hands on the new beta SP2 now - after installation and agents updating (reboot was required)

i'm now testing the full back up of my DAG - exchange 2010 sp2 rollup6

i've created a new job leaving all by default exept i've unckecked the checkpoint restarts.The job is backuping to de-dup disk device.

(exchange options - passive then active copy)

i may say that the speed is just terrible now...

well, it was about 1500-2700MB\min (i got pure 1Gb low latency network with no network issues) after the beta sp2 it's about 450-550MB\min which is terrible!

I'm backup up from physical to physical servers...

Please advice.

I cant remember, but i think there were some registry related settings for improving performance of a BEW agent and Exchange back up - i'm afraid they were overwritten by update.
MarvinFS
Level 3
12 years ago
We are having the very same issue.

actually now we're testing bews2012 as a candidate for production.

DAG Exchange 2010 (2 db servers, 2 cas servers) all fixes are up to date

bews2012 all patched up

agents are also up to date

backing up to raid-5 de-dublicated disk array on windows server 2008r2 with more that 100MB\sec write speed using 1Gb link.

the full backups are seems to be at normal (at least acceptable) speed, but incrementals are disaster !

having 1.7TB total size (4 DBs) incrementals are at speed 10-30MB\sec on updating catalogs state.

Waiting very much for a patch.
kml
Level 4
12 years ago
Backup Exec 2010 R3 SP3 ! :D
CraigV
Moderator
12 years ago
...er, BE 2010 R3 was released a while back which superceded BE 2010 R2...I suspect you mean whatever version will replace BE 2010 R3 SP2!

Thanks!
kml
Level 4
12 years ago
I think we'll just have to pray and wait for BE 2010 R2 and BE 2012 SP2....
ejutras77
12 years ago
Any progress on this one ?

Just got hit.

Incremental backup of my exchange 2010 server hangs on Updating Catalogs with BE 2012 fully patched.
rickleon912
12 years ago
Hello all. I'm guessing there has been no update with this issue. I am having a similar / near identical issue. Exchange 2010 backups are running extremely slow. We are using 2010 R3 however missing the last 3 hotfixes (191248, 194471, & 195395). However being that it seems like they have to do with VMWare stuff it doesn't effect me. Our Exch 2010 backup was 2TB last weekend and it ran 23 hours. This past weekend's back was 2.2TB and it ran for 43 Hours. Our incrmental tonite has been stuck on updating catalogs for the past 3:45 mins. This is a major issue and I would to know if there is a resolution.

@Gurvinder: My "UseTrueImageBackup" reg key was already set to ZERO.

@Jaydeep: Are your engineers making any progress on this?
JasonCGD
12 years ago
Anyone heard from symantec support about the issue above? I have BE 2010 SP3 + latest hotfixes with the same issues. File and Sql backups going well, exchange cannot backup. After a reboot of exchange 2010 servers and BE 2010 server, one exchange backup will start and almost complete (hangs on processing catalgues). If you restart the backup exec services, the next backup will fail immediatly due to VSS error on both exchange servers. Exchange servers require reboot to correct vss error (Vss dump - State: [8] Failed
Last error: Retryable error), while sql and file backups are running perfect.