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Adding a media server to remote offices

rbkguy
Level 4

Hi Everyone!

I was hoping to get some feed back on and issue I am currently tasked with. We are currently using Netbackup 6.5.5 in our head office with about 100 servers with DSU and tape library. We also have 7 remote offices that are using an older backup exec version and pushing their SDLT 320 tapes to their storage limit.

Option 1:

Upgrade to a newer version of backup exec and purchase new LTO 3 or 4 tape drivers.

Option 2:

Purchase the 7 LTO 3 or 4 tapes drives and install a media server in each of the 7 sites and run the policies from head office.

I like option number 2 so that we can eventually take had advantage of puredisk and technologies like that but at this time I am strapped for time and also have a slow wan link between a few sites.

So my questions are:

1.Has anyone done this and will I need a second master server to handle the load.

2. Will I need to pay for a full licence for each media server.

I understand that there are contracts or licences to pay for per TB that you backup and have access to everything but we are federal government and don't seem to have that option.


 

Thanks a bunch!

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions

alazanowski
Level 5

We ended up migrating from BE for our remote sites to Netbackup, but we also did it under the per TB licensing. I am pretty sure Netbackup 7's model seems to be based on the per TB and no longer a individual license (your current licenses are then converted to the relative value on MSRP and translated into the PER TB offering). I'd be surprised with such a large vendor as a federal government that they wouldn't offer this (it was initially the large organizations that they tested this out in). I think the minimum requirement is that alltogether all your datacenters meet at least 20 TB of protected data in licensing. I prefer having them netbackup media servers for sake of management through one master (no, you should not need additional master servers, just make sure you have enough disk storage on your master for any increases in image database size).

I would not recommend Puredisk personally. Use the media server deduplication pools in netbackup 7- the backup policies and job manager are significantly easier to control in netbackup than they are in puredisk (PDDO to a puredisk pool doesn't allow for client-side deduplication, but a media server deduplication pool does with the netbackup 7 client on specific os's). We've ended up using the netbackup 7 client deduplication on all of our remote sites (totaling around 1400).

View solution in original post

15 REPLIES 15

Deepak_W
Level 6
Partner Accredited

I have recently worked on one project where we have replaced BE Servers from remote office and have placed NBU media servers at each location with Master server at central office.

 

So surely you can go for option 2.

Benifits are -

  • you can restore BE tapes in NBU after migration
  • there is a seperate SKU for upgrading from BE to NBU, which gives discounting on NBU licesnes. For this get in touch with your symantec rep...

mrinal_sarkar62
Level 6

Hi,

What I can see that you were bit confused...........

let me give you the advanteges and disadvantages for both:-

Advantages of using BE:-

1. Using BE is very good in handling windows based database.(doesn't use TAR format as NB uses  for tapes backup, NB can not directly backup GRT enabled data  to tape)

2. BE is easy to operate.

Disadantages :-

It is much leser robust then NB. NB console is much faster then BE console(as it use mostly JAVA) and can be installed in UNIX system also. BE console is only for Windows. BE is more dependable to Windows, If the Windows is not protectly so thus BE is in turn not so protected to attaks.

 

Advantages of NB:-

1. Central managa console for master serer, for every thing.  You can have OPS server for better managablilty.

2. Robust then BE and can work well in hetrigenous platform.

Check this link below:-

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS212502097020100126

Distavantages :-

2. Bit CLI based controls rather then GUI controls(bit critical for starters)

If the buget is tight I will advice to go for Symantec Backup Exec, as both BE and NB uses more or less same technology in a different way.

If the budget permits go for Netbackup(Option 2) this will help you more in expanding in future.

Another link given below for a quick features of these products:-

http://www.isdsecurity.com/products-symantec.php

It's better not to take dission by your self . Talk to you managment, show them the advantages and disadvantage of both the products and also show them the expandability and intrigation options of Netbackup with products.

I guess , you 'll have the right thing in future so that no one will play a blame game..

Thanks

AAlmroth
Level 6
Partner Accredited

I would skip the troublesome tape management in the remote sites by using backup to disk, and the duplicated to a central data centre.

NBU can work with standalone tape drives, but tape libraries is the way to go if using NBU+tape (it will save you a lot of headache). But purchasing tape libraries is more expensive than a standalone drive.

If you chose NBU, then use media server de-duplication, and attach a disk to the remote office's media server. Within NBU you can then control the duplication of those disk images to a central site, and voilá, you have two copies, and no tape management at remote sites.

You could, after duplicating the images to the central site, duplicate them to tape, and now you would have three copies of your backup.

The advantages with this approach;

* No remote tape management

* Centrally controlled backups and duplication

* Local primary backup copy at remote offices allow rapid restores

* Having 2nd copy at central site allows for DR scenarios

* Having 2nd copy at central site allows central re-deployment of failed server and then shipped to remote site. Nice if remote site doesn't have local IT staff.

 

The are really no major disadvantages, as you would be able to provide a higher data protection level. However, there are two minor disadvantages; potentially a higher license cost for NBU media servers + de-duplication TB, and if the remote sites are disconnected from the central site, no backups nor duplications can be done.

 

/A

rbkguy
Level 4

I would really like to by pass the tape staging and go right to de-duplication but as of night how I have 6 months to get this tested and finished to 7 sites. We have never used de-duplication and we would need to have a prove of concept before I continue with all the other offices.  

 

I will have to look into the prices of the upgrade to netbackup from BE because I don't see them on the sheet. I am not sure if I can push them to purchase 7 Enterprise at 4 Gs a pop vs 7 BE at 1,000 a piece...

rbkguy
Level 4

What about if I just bought the Standard license for the remote sites and just at the one enterprise server in HQ?

J_H_Is_gone
Level 6

We use to have BE at our remote locations but not any more.

(this is not a quick solution but something you can think on)

At the remote locations windows servers they have that "previous versions" thing turned on (remember I am UNIX admin - not windows)

They also have dfs

At prod site we have servers that receive that dfs from all those remote sites.

My backups just backup the DFS server here. (as it is a bit big I did make them SAN Meida servers (but not using FT to push data)

If a restore is needed, first we look at previous versions on remote server.

If not there, then look and see if it is still on the dfs server here.

If still not there, then we restore to the dfs server here and copy it back to the remote server.

I don't have to do that much at all, maybe twice a year.  So this is no big deal to me.

And we know we are getting backups of the remote servers and it just cost us the servers here.  So one extra media server and SSO for the drives in the robot.

rbkguy
Level 4

Thanks for all your replies!

J.Hinchcliffe,

I know you said you were using UNIX but your servers that you have in the remote offices are they just a media server and are they running an enterprise or standard version?

NetBackup Standard = Allowes a Single Combined Master+Media Server
NetBackup Enterprise = Allows Multiple Master/Media Servers

From the above note if I was just to have a Enterprise version (Master + media) in HQ and a standard version (media) in the remote offies this might work for me

AAlmroth
Level 6
Partner Accredited

A Standard server can only be a all-in-one master/media server. Also, if you want to centrally control backups, you would need all to be on Enterprise level. In theory you could install a standard server and then demote it manually to be media server, but even if it worked technically, you wouldn't be compliant to license requirements...

/A

AAlmroth
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Although not formally supported, you could skip media servers for small remote sites where the restore SLA allows restore from the data centre over the WAN link. If you have a central PureDisk storage pool, you could enable client-side de-duplications.

But I would recommend to use local PDDE storage pools in remote offices if you restore SLA is tight.

NBU is not cheap, and de-duplication is definately not cheap...

/A

Deepak_W
Level 6
Partner Accredited

adding to Hinchcliffe's point, you can have only single master server in your backup env....

 

If you have NetBackup Ent server at central location, then you can add NBU media servers (nothing but a ent server license) at each location and can control them centrally from single master.

 

If have standard NBU server, then you cannot add multiple media servers. Also note that there is no concept called Standard media server. Standard media server means a license of NetBackup standard server, this acts as media cum master in your env and you cannot add any media server futher (lock-down)

 

so in your environment, you can have NetBackup Ent server at central location, which will be your master server and subsequently you can add media servers at each location to replace your BE servers.

Note- NBU Media server means NetBackup Ent server license. while installation you will get choice that whether you want to install it as media by adding to existing master server.

 

Hope this helps and clears the cloud...

J_H_Is_gone
Level 6

I only have my master and media servers here.

My remote offices have windows servers.

They set up DFS on the remote window servers to send new files to a windows server here.

I then made that receiving DFS server a SAN Media server, which allows it to only backup its own disk to the tape drives.

So now I have NO NBU or Bakupexec at any remote locations.  No tapes there, no need to get the secretary to change tapes.  All backups are done here.  DFS sends the new files from the remote location to a server here ( set up so each remote server has its own directory on the receiving DFS server) Once the original copy from the remote site is done, it only send new and changed files here.  So not a lot of traffic.

Ed_Wilts
Level 6

We used to have BE servers with tape drives at remote sites.  Remote tape drives suck - they're typically in lousy data centers (and I use the term loosely) and tape rotation can be slack. 

For offices with decent WAN connectivity, you can put in just a media server.  Remember that ALL of the catalog data has to go back to your master so if the connectivity is not great, consider something different.  For our office in India, we went with a remote master rather than push the catalog data half the way around the world.  It's a real data center and has real tape drives.

We eliminated all of the remote tape drives for our other remote offices.  We started with NetBackup media servers with local disks and that worked quite well.  Over time, as we could afford the licenses, we migrated all of these to PureDisk (with its own sets of pros and cons).

alazanowski
Level 5

We ended up migrating from BE for our remote sites to Netbackup, but we also did it under the per TB licensing. I am pretty sure Netbackup 7's model seems to be based on the per TB and no longer a individual license (your current licenses are then converted to the relative value on MSRP and translated into the PER TB offering). I'd be surprised with such a large vendor as a federal government that they wouldn't offer this (it was initially the large organizations that they tested this out in). I think the minimum requirement is that alltogether all your datacenters meet at least 20 TB of protected data in licensing. I prefer having them netbackup media servers for sake of management through one master (no, you should not need additional master servers, just make sure you have enough disk storage on your master for any increases in image database size).

I would not recommend Puredisk personally. Use the media server deduplication pools in netbackup 7- the backup policies and job manager are significantly easier to control in netbackup than they are in puredisk (PDDO to a puredisk pool doesn't allow for client-side deduplication, but a media server deduplication pool does with the netbackup 7 client on specific os's). We've ended up using the netbackup 7 client deduplication on all of our remote sites (totaling around 1400).

rbkguy
Level 4

One more question on this topic. Does anyone use puredisk and duplicate the data to tape? We are required to have Difs for Monday - Thursday and Friday is a full backup that needs to go to tape and offiste. Can this still be done?

AAlmroth
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Do you mean using PureDisk Remote Office Edition and then exporting to a central NBU domain, or using PDDO or PDDE an then duplicating to tape?

 

The first scenario is possible as PureDisk has NBU export, you only need to install NBU client on the PureDisk node and connect as a normal client.

 

The second scenario is a D2D2T environment and quite possible, but re-hydrating is very costly and takes a lot of time.

 

/A