Removeable B2D disks full

[hongevo]

Hi all

I have a single SBS2003 server running BES 12.5, with 2 removeable B2D disks.

The job is configured to run from the RB2D Pool, and "append, overwrite if no append is available" - Overwrite Protection is set to 1hr.

FULL Backup jobs are currently running Mon-Fri and taking up ~43GB space each, the External HDD's are 430GB usable space each. The idea is every week the drive is swapped.

Now...it all worked fine but here is the problem.

The disks are full, and it isnt overwriting. What do I need to set to make it so?

All I want is for the disks to hold as many jobs as they can, each, and then when space is low, to overwrite the oldest job on that disk.

I have just set the job to always overwrite but in my head that means it will only  keep one job on each disk at a time?

Please advise...thanks

Hong

[CraigV]

Hi Hong,

Try setting your overwrite to something like 3 days. That way you will keep data for 3 days before being overwritten, and will prevent it overwriting the previous job.
Furthermore, you can look at setting your size at which BEWS stops writing to disk when it reaches a certain % if need be.
This has the indication of overwritable period that isn't set correctly, and if you post some screen shots here it can get verified.

[hongevo]

I have set the OPP to 3 days now.

I has also configured the RB2D disks to stop when only 10GB is left, which they have done - so I know that is the problem. It isnt overwriting the oldest job on the RB2D, it's simply giving up becuase it has reached that 10GB left threshold.

Considering I want to keep as many days on the Disks as possible, and overwrite the oldest job - should I have the job set as Overwrite or Append, Overwrite if not possible?

If you tell me which Screenshits would be best I would be happy to provide them!

[Ken_Putnam]

The problem is that you are appending.  When an append job finished, ALL of the BKF files in the "append family" have the OPP date reset.  As such, none of them will ever expire until the last one closed expires

For disk files it is easie  to just make all your jobs Overwrite.  That way, when the disk either fills up, or a BKF file exires (depending on the option you have set), BackupExec can reuse the disk space

If you want to use the max space available in the Pool, set the option from Tools\Options\Media Management to "use scratch media  before overwriteable media in the target media set"

[hongevo]

Thanks Ken.

Can you just confirm for me:

If I set the job to plain old Overwrite, will it:

1. Overwrite each job regardless of how much space is left (in effect only keeping 1 job on the disk at a time)

2. Keep writing jobs until there is no space left, THEN overwrite? (this is what I want)

3. OR is that scratch media option you mentioned the way to get it to work as number 2?

Thanks

[Ken_Putnam · Accepted solution]

When the option is set to "Use Overwriteable media in the target media set  before scratch"  Backup Exec will reuse BKF files in the media set before it will create new ones

When set to "Use scratch media before Overwriteable", it will create new BKF files until there is no longer space available, then start reusing the oldest BKF files  So you need to select this option

You will need to expire the data currently on the disk in order to overwrite it. The easiest way would probably be to set the OPP for that media set to 5 min for the first run of all Overwriteable jobs,  and then change it to whatever retention you need after the first job has completed

[hongevo]

Thanks.

Just to confirm, mine says:

Overwrite scratch media before overwriting recyclable media in the targeted media set
and
Overwrite recyclable media contained in the targeted media set before overwriting scratch media

I have the first one selected.

Also, the single BKF file on my removeable drive is 415,502,934KB and this should still have the 1hr OPP on it, becuase the job hasnt run since I have changed it to 3 days then back to 1hr.

The job is set on Overwrite.

Hopefully this will work?!

[Ken_Putnam]

Looks good, but


I'd set set the max file size on the B2D device down to the default.  You don't want a single large BKF file, since that would try to overwrite every time you run a job

[hongevo]

Thank you!