06-16-2015 04:53 AM
I have been a Netbackup user for several years, however I am new to the appliance itsself and have some basic questions if someone can help.
It is my understanging that the appliance has basically 2 usable partitions, AdvancedDisk and MSDP. A couple questions on that:
1. If most of the data being backed up is from a Netapp that has already been deduped on the Netapp side, is there any reasons/gains from deduping with MSDP on the appliance.
2. Can you not have muliple partitions of the same type. For example can I not have 2 MSDP or 2 Advanced Partitions, or can I only have 1 of each. I just ask because to me, it seems logical that if I wanted to keep both NFS and CIFS backups on the same type parttion, but on separate partitions.
Also, this appliance shipped with version 2.6.0.4 and Netbackup 7.6.0.4. Should I go ahead and update it to 2.6.1.1 and 7.6.1.1?
Thanks.
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06-16-2015 05:15 AM
Q1. If most of the data being backed up is from a Netapp that has already been deduped on the Netapp side, is there any reasons/gains from deduping with MSDP on the appliance.
A1: Depends upon whether the NetApp NDMP stream is itself effectively re-hydrated/re-constitued by NetApp. i.e. You need to ask NetApp whether their NDMP stream of an ASIS de-duped volume contains the 'post ASIS' view of the volume, or an effective 'pre ASIS' view of the volume.
.
Q2. Can you not have muliple partitions of the same type. For example can I not have 2 MSDP or 2 Advanced Partitions, or can I only have 1 of each. I just ask because to me, it seems logical that if I wanted to keep both NFS and CIFS backups on the same type parttion, but on separate partitions.
A2: I know that you can have only one MSDP instance per NetBackup Media Server. I'm not sure about how many Adv.Disk pools an appliance can have. I suspect only one, because AFAIK the CLIsh only lets us create one. Whereas, I beilieve that roll-your-own Media Servers can have multiple Adv.Disk pools, but still also only one MSDP pool/instance.
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Q3. Also, this appliance shipped with version 2.6.0.4 and Netbackup 7.6.0.4. Should I go ahead and update it to 2.6.1.1 and 7.6.1.1?
A3: Some of us have had problems upgrading a new configured but essentially unused N5230 from v2.6.0.3 to v2.6.1.1 - for different reasons. Others had problems due to presence (or lack) or certain EEBs. Whereas my upgrade went smoothly, except that afterwards the appliance complained about incorrect BIOS - and so needed a manual re-flash of certain low level components. If it's a new appliance, and not yet productionised, I would go to the highest version possible, i.e. v2.6.1.2. FTI, I've just upgraded two largish N5230 from v2.6.1.1 to v2.6.1.2, and all went well - but took about 2 hours for each one. (P.S. Don;t forget to upgrade OpsCenter to v7.6.1.2 first - if you have one).
Before upgrading from v2.6.0.4 to v2.6.1.1 why not open a support case to determine whether your current BIOS version needs to be re-flashed.
06-22-2015 01:53 PM
Unfortunately the deduplication on the NetApp is not the same as the deduplication in use within NetBackup (as well as any other dedupe device other than a NetApp actually). One methodology that I've seen to be a huge help to many of our customers is to check out the Accelerator functionality within NetBackup. It will mean you need to have a client with visibility to the CIFS/NFS shares on the NetApp but will give you the ability to restore the data to anywhere as opposed to being constrained to restoring to a similar device as is the result with NDMP backups/restores.
On the appliances you can only have a single MSDP as well as only a single advanced disk pool. This is also the case for BYO NBU media servers. The reason is that the media server acts as a storage server for each of these kinds of storage and a media server can only act as a storage server for a single pool of each type.
Personally I would recommend upgrading to the most recent version you can prior to initial configuration, but that's really more of a personal preference thing and less of any kind of requirement. If you can I would absolutely go to a 2.6.1.x release if possible.
06-16-2015 05:15 AM
Q1. If most of the data being backed up is from a Netapp that has already been deduped on the Netapp side, is there any reasons/gains from deduping with MSDP on the appliance.
A1: Depends upon whether the NetApp NDMP stream is itself effectively re-hydrated/re-constitued by NetApp. i.e. You need to ask NetApp whether their NDMP stream of an ASIS de-duped volume contains the 'post ASIS' view of the volume, or an effective 'pre ASIS' view of the volume.
.
Q2. Can you not have muliple partitions of the same type. For example can I not have 2 MSDP or 2 Advanced Partitions, or can I only have 1 of each. I just ask because to me, it seems logical that if I wanted to keep both NFS and CIFS backups on the same type parttion, but on separate partitions.
A2: I know that you can have only one MSDP instance per NetBackup Media Server. I'm not sure about how many Adv.Disk pools an appliance can have. I suspect only one, because AFAIK the CLIsh only lets us create one. Whereas, I beilieve that roll-your-own Media Servers can have multiple Adv.Disk pools, but still also only one MSDP pool/instance.
.
Q3. Also, this appliance shipped with version 2.6.0.4 and Netbackup 7.6.0.4. Should I go ahead and update it to 2.6.1.1 and 7.6.1.1?
A3: Some of us have had problems upgrading a new configured but essentially unused N5230 from v2.6.0.3 to v2.6.1.1 - for different reasons. Others had problems due to presence (or lack) or certain EEBs. Whereas my upgrade went smoothly, except that afterwards the appliance complained about incorrect BIOS - and so needed a manual re-flash of certain low level components. If it's a new appliance, and not yet productionised, I would go to the highest version possible, i.e. v2.6.1.2. FTI, I've just upgraded two largish N5230 from v2.6.1.1 to v2.6.1.2, and all went well - but took about 2 hours for each one. (P.S. Don;t forget to upgrade OpsCenter to v7.6.1.2 first - if you have one).
Before upgrading from v2.6.0.4 to v2.6.1.1 why not open a support case to determine whether your current BIOS version needs to be re-flashed.
06-16-2015 05:58 AM
See this post re the BIOS issues:
https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/choice-upgrade-path-v2603-v2611
The above post also contains a link to another post where another user had different issues with upgrades due to EEB problems.
06-18-2015 09:47 AM
There should be no problem keeping CIFS and NFS backups on a single MSDP pool. In fact, I'm not sure why you would want to separate them?
06-22-2015 01:53 PM
Unfortunately the deduplication on the NetApp is not the same as the deduplication in use within NetBackup (as well as any other dedupe device other than a NetApp actually). One methodology that I've seen to be a huge help to many of our customers is to check out the Accelerator functionality within NetBackup. It will mean you need to have a client with visibility to the CIFS/NFS shares on the NetApp but will give you the ability to restore the data to anywhere as opposed to being constrained to restoring to a similar device as is the result with NDMP backups/restores.
On the appliances you can only have a single MSDP as well as only a single advanced disk pool. This is also the case for BYO NBU media servers. The reason is that the media server acts as a storage server for each of these kinds of storage and a media server can only act as a storage server for a single pool of each type.
Personally I would recommend upgrading to the most recent version you can prior to initial configuration, but that's really more of a personal preference thing and less of any kind of requirement. If you can I would absolutely go to a 2.6.1.x release if possible.