Shorter backups with feature pack 1?

[Gil_Emery]

So one of the benefits of 15 Feature Pack 1 as advertised was up to 62% shorter backups with LTO tape drives.  having updated to FP1, my backup times remain the same.

Without going into the specifics of the systems, I updated all the agents etc to the latest version, are there other tricks that need to be done to increase the speed?  We are backing up directly to tape, with real servers, not virtual.

Does this speed increase just impact virtual servers?

[CraigV]

Hi Gil,

Check the Readme on the link below as it will outline the changes with FP1:

https://symwisedownload.symantec.com/resources/sites/SYMWISE/content/live/DOCUMENTATION/8000/DOC8201/en_US/readme_en.html?__gda__=1440306920_99962f0febca571d5c3706682ef7b6c7

Thanks!

[Gil_Emery]

So I did take the time to read the changes,  but still see nothing mentioning how to take advantages of the so called 62% shorter backups with LTO.

Maybe I am blind, but do not see what I need to do..

[teiva-boy]

Odds are they are now allowing larger block sizes to be written to tape?  Something I think you couldn't change before...

Try a format of a new fresh tape, and test again.  

[teiva-boy]

I've also posted your question to Mikko here:

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/feature-pack-1-backup-exec-15-delivers-improved-performance-intelligent-backups-and-enhanced-p

He has been a good resource in the past for technical questions, been on the team for a long time.  Hopefully he can chime in on his blog with an answer.

[Colin_Weaver]

The 62% potential gain relates to tape rewinds that can happen between sets within a job or possibly between append jobs. It is not an overall perfomance gain for the byte count within a backup set as the benefits will only be seen against the total time for the job/jobs in environments that might have been experiencing the rewinds between sets previously. (Every rewind was losing significant time against backup windows.)

[ZeRoC00L]

Conclusion, just a marketing statement claiming (unreal) faster backups.

[Colin_Weaver]

Just to put some background on this we actually had customers notice the unnecessary rewind in older versions  and tell us that it was wasting backup window time, hence doing something about it is a performance gain. Agreed it may not be a performance gain for everyone.

[Gil_Emery]

Well, that is the answer as to why I have not seen an increase in speed and will not waste any more time figuring out how to get it.

would have loved to see a faster backup,  62% of 15 hours would have been nice  :)

[teiva-boy]

So preventing some "shoeshining," then?  Because BE doesn't support multiplexing and you can't meet the minimum stream speeds?

[teiva-boy]

Thanks Mikko :)

[BackupMikko]

The "up to 62% shorter backup times with LTO tape drives" refers to updated LTO logic as correctly described by Colin above and does not impact the job rate itself. The mileage obvisously will vary depending on job type: Full, Incremental, Differential with Incremental backups receiving relatively the most noticeable impact.

Best,

@BackupMikko