Forum Discussion

Brentwood's avatar
Brentwood
Level 4
14 years ago

how does backup exec backup to disk

How does BE backup a remote server to a backup to disk device?

 

does the data actually go through the BE server, or does it direct it to the B2D.

 

I have data domain storage and backup mutiple servers to it.  I then run a duplicate to tape job after that.

I currenlty have my BE server with teamed nics.  (VM)  I would like to set up another server on the VM box, and could use the nic from the BE server (if not needed)

 

Does having teamed nics help backing up multiple servers simultaneously?

12.x and Earlier
Backing Up
Backup and Recovery
Backup Exec
Basics
  • CraigV's avatar
    CraigV
    14 years ago

    Hi Brentwood,

     

    If you set up the B2D on your DataDomain, witht he B2D folder mapped on your BE server, it will move over the LAN through the BE server.

    If you use deduplication, then you have 1 of 3 options:

    1. Server-side - done on the media server itself, so all traffic moves through it.

    2. Source-side - done on the remote server which then moves traffic to the dedupe folder.

    3. Target-side - done on a dedupe device (like your DataDomain)

     

    Teaming your NICs might give better performance, but where you have better performance on your network connections, you end up bottlenecking elsewhere. For a VM I'd suggest only using 1 NIC, and reassigning the second NIC to another VM. That's how we do it. It saves resources on your hosts for use elsewhere. The speed increase would be negligible, depending on other factors like: speed of the NICs on other servers; speed of the switch ports and how they're configured; type of data being sent over the LAN to be backed up etc.

    Rather look at increasing RAM if you are able to, which will help if you're using an x64 OS, and if you ever decide to go the deduplication route (which needs an x64 OS!).

     

    Cheers!

  • itsmeaffinity's avatar
    itsmeaffinity
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    Hi ,

    If it is remote b2d then data flow will always be from the media server to b2d

    No I dont think that is possible with backup exec to backup mutiple server simuttaneously but yes if you have 5 b2d & if you are doing backup of 5 different server to 5 different b2d it will work

    Thank You

     

     
     
  • CraigV's avatar
    CraigV
    Moderator
    14 years ago

    Hi Brentwood,

     

    If you set up the B2D on your DataDomain, witht he B2D folder mapped on your BE server, it will move over the LAN through the BE server.

    If you use deduplication, then you have 1 of 3 options:

    1. Server-side - done on the media server itself, so all traffic moves through it.

    2. Source-side - done on the remote server which then moves traffic to the dedupe folder.

    3. Target-side - done on a dedupe device (like your DataDomain)

     

    Teaming your NICs might give better performance, but where you have better performance on your network connections, you end up bottlenecking elsewhere. For a VM I'd suggest only using 1 NIC, and reassigning the second NIC to another VM. That's how we do it. It saves resources on your hosts for use elsewhere. The speed increase would be negligible, depending on other factors like: speed of the NICs on other servers; speed of the switch ports and how they're configured; type of data being sent over the LAN to be backed up etc.

    Rather look at increasing RAM if you are able to, which will help if you're using an x64 OS, and if you ever decide to go the deduplication route (which needs an x64 OS!).

     

    Cheers!

  • Brentwood's avatar
    Brentwood
    Level 4
    14 years ago

    I am actually backing up several servers at the same time to thier own B2D folder on the data domain.

    Craig,  so I could remove the NIC team on the BE server, and not lose much performance?  that would be great so I can use it for a new VM guest.  I will remove the one nic and see how performance is for a week.

    Thanks for answering my questions. 

  • Sir_Fang_the_Gr's avatar
    Sir_Fang_the_Gr
    Level 3
    14 years ago

    You can increase the number of concurrent connections instead of creating 5 folders.  The issue here is this: the files inside each folder are not accessable to each other.  If one folder fills up with files that later become stale, they can never be reclaimed by another folder and your disk can run out of space.  I suggest one B2D folder per device if you want to minimize maintance of the files inside.  And yes, a B2D device shows as local storage and data going to it will follow the IP network path through the media server.

     

    To determine the number of concurrent connections your device can handle, queue up 10 jobs to start at the same time to just ond B2D device.  Go into the properties of hte B2D folder and bump up the concurrent connections 1 at a time and watch your job speeds. At some point, you will start to see dimished returns as your backup drives starts to bog down.  

     

    Teaming the NIC's will help only if the network is your current chokepoint.