VMware backup over SAN: Appliance to ESX zoning

[Itegral]

Guys,

I have a Solaris based Master server and 5 x 5220 Appliances (media). I am interested to configure VMware backup over SAN.

I need confirmation on whether zoning between Appliance (media server) to ESX is required? If yes, then Appliace is Initiator, what mode the ESX HBA port is supposed to be in?

thanks all..

[SymTerry]

Yes zoning is required, but you should not have to do anything with the port. NetBackup doesn't communicate with the esx for SAN. Communication is still done though the Lan. After zoning, NetBackup should see the same storage as ESX to back it up. 

Refer to the vmware admin guide for more information. (DOC6461)

[Itegral]

The Appliance will be used as backup host.

So to be clear, you said "NetBackup doesn't communicate with the esx for SAN" - that means zoning between Appliance (media server) to ESX is NOT required?

Right now, I have zoned Appliance with storage and mapped it - is this enough?

Please confirm the below for me;

Appliance (initiator) to Storage (target) = done

ESX (Initiator) to Storage (target) = done

ESX (initiator) to Appliance (initiator) = no required??

[chashock]

Correct, you don't zone the ESX hosts to the appliance, you zone the appliance to the datastore LUNs.  In other words the appliance HBA is an initiator in the same zone as the target storage where the ESX datastores reside.

Another way to put it is to make the appliance look like your ESX hosts in your zone sets.

[Itegral]

I remember we used to zone the Media servers with ESX and storage both for backup over SAN until ver 7.1. Has something changed since?

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/articles/netbackup-vmware-backup-over-san

it says "you need to zone your veritas media server with your esx servers", why?

[chashock]

A couple of points.  It doesn't say to zone your media server TO your ESX servers.  I realize the picture could confuse the situation, but also understand that is a Connect Forum post, not SYMC documentation.  Follow the documentation around zoning requirements for VMware backups and you'll see that you zone your backup host to the datastores, not the ESX servers.

Also recognize that post is geared toward 7.0/7.1 it seems, and VADP has changed some with 7.5+.  I'd suggest using the docs for the version you're working with.

[Itegral · Accepted solution]

I am closing the discussion with the following comments.

We carried out some tests, and it emrged that zoning between backup host to ESX host is required.

Also, zoning the backup host to datastores (LUNs) was done in our case but backup host cannot access the datastore using the specified transport. This error is received from the VMware APIs, checking the FC connectivity with storage team confirmed that only one path was zoned between backup host and specified LUN.

After the successful backup, we removed the zoning between backup host to ESX host, it failed. So we established the zoning between backup host to ESX host again, it again worked.