Synthetic backup questions
Hello, I'm thinking of implementing Synthetic backups on our regional sites as they currently use 3rd party software to sync down to a centralised location, and I'd like to get this all within NBU if possible, but I just have a few questions on how I should layout my policies...
My thinking is it takes a full backup, then differentials, and then when I do a synthetic full, this is essentially a full backup?
So if I were to do a policy with this:
1 - Initial seed, full backup to disk on NBU master server
2 - Daily diff - Mon-Fri
3 - Synthetic full to disk - Last Saturday
4 - Synthetic full to tape - Last Saturday
Will it then start reusing the synthetic full to disk, instead of the initial seed? So I can essentially have 1 full from the remote site as the seed, and then I'm done and don't have to pull 100GB of data from a 10Mb link? Or do I have to keep the initial seed? What retention should I use on the policies? Our general rule of thumb is Monthlies = 7yr retention... So I'd assume, on the initial seed (if I can use synth fulls to disk as the comparison after the 1st month) I set that to a 1 month ret, and then the synth full to tape, 7yrs, with the diffs at 6 weeks, like the rest of our diffs...
Thanks,
Rich.
Have you got "Collect true image restore information" & "with move detection" boxes ticked in the policy? This is a requirement for synthetics.
Just for a bit of additional info, within any one of the schedules click on [Help] -> Schedule attributes field descriptions -> Synthetic backup. There's quite a few "Related topics" which could be beneficial e.g. "Recommendations" (don't use multi-streaming with synthetics) & "Policy considerations" (which covers the point I mentioned above).
As far as your (or my) "logic" is concerned, you should be fine - just test with one client if possible until you're confident that you're getting what you want (that's the route I took, 1 or 2 at a time) - & don't forget the synthetic will effectively be a backup from the time of the last incremental (this came to light for me when looking in the Backup, Archive & Restore GUI as no full backups could be seen on a Saturday that corresponded to the synthetics, they appeared on the Friday until I added the extra incremental just prior to the Saturday synthetic).