Does the amount of time for this backup seem logical?

[Tactical-N8]

I have Backup Exec 2012 SP2 installed on a Windows Server 2003 R2 x64 machine.  I then have a remote server running Windows Server 2012 Standard with a RAWS installed.  I can back up this remote server (about 270 GB) accross the network to an LTO-3 tape in about 4 hours.

On this remote server I am running 10k rpm SAS drives.  I have a 6 disk RAID 5 configuration that stores all of my data.  I recently installed 2 more 1.2 TB hard drives in a RAID 0 configuration to use for Disk Backup.  However, when I backup to the disk, it is taking 9+ hours to backup the same 270 GB. 

I'm just wondering: Does this seem normal?  I was thinking that it would be much quicker since it is not transfering data across the network.  I am starting the job at 11 PM when nobody is on the network.

[CraigV]

Hi,

Depends on what sort of data is being stored on those 2 new disks. Those 1.2TB HDDs are SATA, correct? Might explain why, even though in RAID0 configuration, these 2 drives are slower than 6 in RAID5...slower and less disks = less spindles = less performance.

However, the type of data hosted on those drives can cause a tape drive to not hit a consistent speed, meaning there is a lot of stop/start in your job. This affects the speed of the backups.

Lastly...make sure there are no maintenance tasks running on the server relating to those 2 new drives that might also impact backup performance.

THanks!

[Tactical-N8]

Thanks for the response CraigV.  The 2 new drives are actually Serial Attached SCSI drives, the same as the drives in the RAID 5 array.

I did change the BE maintenance schedule so that it does not run durring the backup.  I also changed the server maintenance settings on the remote server so that maintenance doesn't run durring the backup job.  We'll see what happens tonight.

[Larry_Fine]

Confirm please:  You have a remote server, running BE RAWS as the source.  You used to backup to local tape on the BE media server.  Now you are testing backing up to disk ON THE REMOTE SERVER? 

If so, I think you are sending all data across the network twice and I suspect that the network hit is affecting performance more than the disk vs. tape aspect.  How is your network utilization when the backups are running?

[Tactical-N8]

Yes, I am trying to backup my RAID 5 array on the remote server to a RAID 0 array on the same server. 

Does the data really go from the remote server to the media server, and then back to the remote server again?

I haven't noticed any network performance issues.  I will monitor it tonight though.

[CraigV]

Yes it would. Everything flows through the media server. Best to either install BE 2012 on this remote server and make it the media server where backups will remain local, or put those 2 large drives into the current media server (if they can be installed in it) & do backups with essentially one-way traffic. Thanks.

[Larry_Fine]

Best to either install BE 2012 on this remote server and make it the media server where backups will remain local

Not possible at this time for the OP due to the remote server running Windows 2012, which is unsupported by BE.  For now, I think backup up to tape is the best choice, unless they want to move the new RAID0 hard disks to the BE media server.  Either way, it would reduce the network traffic.

Or maybe the OP can live with this backup time and was just surprised by the backups taking longer than expected?  The current strategy is not a "best practice", but it isn't "wrong".

[CraigV]

...never said it was wrong, and while fair-enough on the Win2K12 issue (which I never went back too in order to confirm), the second suggestion to move the 2 larger disks to the current media server would stand as a short-term option.

Thnaks!