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Backup throughput has slowed right down

simonpieman
Level 3

Hello everyone.

I have a problem with my backup, which I hope someone may have the answer to.

I have a Dell Poweredge T110 with a RAID 1 config using Sata Discs. We are using BE2010 R3.

The server is running Windows 2008 SBS.

We backup to 2 external hard drives over usb and these are rotated every few weeks.

We have 2 backups configured. One does the Exchange backup and has a throughput of around 1400mb/min. We have no issue with this backup.

The second backup does all our data directory, which is some 150GB and is composed of all kinds of files, including Windows Movie files, words docs etc. Until around 3 weeks ago, we were getting around 1300mb/min, with the backup taking around a couple of hours.

We now have a throughput of around 800-900mb/min, with the backup taking considerably longer.The job starts off at around 1200mb/min and then just keeps dropping.

I have done a repair install of Backup Exec. I have created new backup to disc folders on the usb drives. 

I have created fresh backup jobs.All windows updates are installed.

Can anyone suggest a solution ?

Thanks.

Simon

 

 

13 REPLIES 13

pkh
Moderator
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1) defrag the source disk

2) turn off any AV scanning

3) If you are using the archive bit method, change to the modified time method and use the journal.

4) turn off any compression and encryption, if this is possible.

5) USB connections are not very reliable.  If you have other ports, use them and make sure that the disks are recognised to used the highest USB standard.  Sometimes when you plug in a USB2 disk, it is only recognised as USB1 disk.

 

simonpieman
Level 3

Thanks for your comments.

The AV Scanning has been disabled for the BackupExec program folder, as well as the B2D folders.

Just tried the Modified Time Method - no difference.

Turned off compression / encryption - no difference.

As regards the USB Connection issue, the drives have worked fine for several years. The Exchange backup we perform runs from the same server with the same USB drives and performs at a good rate, as it always has.

It is the Data folder backup that is the issue.

If I defrag the disc and the problem persists, what then ?

 

 

 

 

pkh
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Try disabling AV scanning for the source. If you defrag your source and there is no difference, then there is probably nothing that you can do. It could be that you just have too many files. You might want to split the job

simonpieman
Level 3

I tried turning off the AV scanning earlier this morning and it made no difference.

I also tried creating a test backup of 24GB with just movie files and the backup rate was around 924mb/s.

It does not make sense, given that the Exchange backup runs at 1300mb/s.

CraigV
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Run checkdsk /F on the HDD giving you slow performance and make sure there are no bad sectors/clusters.

Thanks!

simonpieman
Level 3

Hello again.

I have not had a chance to do the defrag as yet.

A further backup was attempted last night after doing several test ones in the morning, all with success.

This time the job fails with the following message :

Final error: 0xe000fe36 - Corrupt data encountered. See the job log for details.

BE complains about Directories not existing etc, which they clearly do and are all accessible.

This was happening a fair amount recently, with a restart of the server normally curing it. However, the past week, the reboot never worked.

How do we stop this from happening ?
 

pkh
Moderator
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This is a sign that the directory structure is corrupted.  You need to use a command prompt to run

chkdsk /f

It is important to use the /f switch so that chkdsk can repair the corruption.

simonpieman
Level 3

I also just noticed this at the bottom of the log :

V-79-57344-34108 - An unexpected error occurred when cleaning up snapshot volumes. Confirm that all ...

Is this related or something else ?

pkh
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Turn off shadow copies component and then turn it on again.  Make the disk space limit unlimited to see whether that helps.  You can impose a limit later.

simonpieman
Level 3

Volume shaddow copy is set to manual in Services. Should it be automatic ?

CraigV
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Set it to automatic, but run the checkdsk /f as I suggested just to rule out block-level issues on the HDDs.

 

simonpieman
Level 3

I will have to do the Chkdsk at the weekend, as I imagine it will take some time to complete and cannot afford the downtime.

 

pkh
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No. It should be Manual