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Exchange 2007 backup speed has slowed down

gparker
Level 4
Partner

Hi, we're running Backup Exec 2010 R3 SP2 which has been backing up our Exchange 2007 SP2 server to tape via a backup policy we created many months ago.

The Exchange backup speed was fine - averaging almost 3000MB/min - until 16th July when it dramatically slowed down to a rate averaging 550MB/min. As a result, our Exchange backups have gone from taking approximately 6 hours to now 25 hours.

We have not modified the Exchange backup policy, job template or selection list settings.

We have not introduced, upgraded or changed the configuration of the anti-virus software on either the Exchange or Backup Exec servers.

We have not applied any hotfixes or service-packs to the Windows OS on either the backup exec or Exchange servers apart from the standard security and critical updates from Microsoft.

We have not applied any hotfixes or service-packs to the Exchange 2007 application since November last year when we applied SP2 to Exchange.

We applied SP2 to Backup Exec just last week to see whether this would improve or correct the issue, however this made no difference.

The Exchange server seems to be performing well otherwise, users are not complaining about slowness.

We backup several other servers regularily and none of them have slowed down in their backup performance.

A few months back we did a restore from an Exchange backup via mounting a Recovery Storage Group, but this SG has since been dismounted even though it still exists.

I am at a complete loss to understand why the Exchane backups have slowed down so dramatically.

9 REPLIES 9

gparker
Level 4
Partner

Hi Jackie007, thanks for your help, but the infomation you pointed me to relates to Netbackup. I'm running Backup Exec.

I will try a file-system level backup of one of the drives on the Exchnage server to compare the speed with the Exchange agent backup method, but as I stated above, the backup speed was fine for many months and decided to slow down from 16th July onwards. So my situation is not one where I'm troubleshooting or trying to tweak a new Exchange backup job...It's one where backups have been running merrily along for quite some time and then decided to go slow.

Regards,

George.

CraigV
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited

Hi George,

 

Start with a restart of the media server and see if this resolves the issue. Sometimes a server restart can sort out performance issues.

You should also copy an amount of data (small files & large files) between the media server and Exchange server to rule out any network issues.

Thanks!

gparker
Level 4
Partner

Thanks CraigV.

I restarted the Backuk Exec services on the media server but not the entire media server itself. The services restart didn't make any difference, so I'll schedule a server reboot and see if that helps.

I'm also testing copying a 2.5GB file from the exchange server to the BE server to evaluate possible network issues.

George.

 

gparker
Level 4
Partner

Hi,

It looks like there is a network bottlneck on the BE server. When I copy a 2.5GB file to the BE server, the transfer speed is around half the speed when copying the same file between other servers.

CraigV
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited

...check the following then:

1. Make sure your AV isn't scanning the BE services, and if so, put in an exclusion for them!

2. Check the NIC/s on the media server and make sure they are hard-coded for the fastest speed available on the NIC (ie. 1000MB FULL), and do the same on the switch.

3. Restart the media server.

gparker
Level 4
Partner

Hi Craigv, we tried all that stuff, but still no luck. We still haven't gotten to the bottem of this mysterious slow down in the backups.

CraigV
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited

Mmm...thanks for the update. If this is a branded server like HP, Dell or IBM for instance, they all have management agents and management pages (Dell has DRAC, HP has Systems Management Homepage). Check those to see if there are any failed, or failing hardware.

I've seen a failing hard drive in an HP ProLiant DL380 G4 (1 of my site media servers) cause major issues with backups which were only fixed once the hard drive was replaced.

moula
Level 3
Partner Accredited

Hi,

We are having one exchange 2007 server with multiple storage groups and database, a total of 1.8 TB data and I am using backup exec 2010 R3 SP2 with all patches. Initially the job rate was more than 3 Gbps and jobs sucessfully. Very recently the backup job rate has reduced to 1Gbps and the job is taking more 24 hrs to complete hence backup jobs is getting cancelled due to timeout.

Kindly provide some solution if any one have

 

Thanks and Regards

Saleem