Deduplication: Mixing 7.5 Server with 6.5 Agents

[BackupTheFuture]

I'm pretty sure this can be done but I'm looking for a litlte official documentation. Finding it has been hard.

I have a NetBackup 7.5 Server with Deduplication. There are 3 clients all using 3 different agents. The agents are versions 6.5.6, 6.5, and 6.0. I'm looking for an official document that confirms the following:

1. I cannot use client side deduplication on any 6.x agent

2. I can use server side deduplication on 6.5.X clients but not on 6.0 or lower clients

The deduplication guide notes that the 6.5 agent can be used with the PDDO option on a Netbackup server. But, integrated deduplication (as in the case of 7.5) is not exactly the same as using PDDO. It would be nice if the dedupe guide said,

Using integrated deduplication and writing to a deduplication storage pool, agents versions 6.5 and higher can be backed up using server side deduplication.

There is a meeting coming up on a new project and someone is asking to see the 'official word' on dedup and 6.x agents. I say 6.5 will work with server side dedupe. Anything lower does not. True?

Thanks.

Rob

[BackupTheFuture]

Wait, I kind of answered most of my question. Page 23 of the dedupe guide

In addition to the previous storage destinations, the PureDisk Deduplication  Option provides deduplication storage for a NetBackup environment. The PureDisk  Storage Pool Authority provides an agent that you install on a NetBackup media  server. This solution was created before NetBackup included integrated  deduplication. If you use this storage option, use the PureDisk documentation to  plan, implement, configure, and manage the storage and to configure NetBackup  to use the agent. For a PureDisk storage pool destination, you can use NetBackup  6.5 or later NetBackup hosts. Hosts include the master server and the media servers

Ok, so this tells me I can use 6.5 agents to backup to a 7.5 dedupe pool on a 7.5 media server. But I still would like to confirm, any 6.x agent is without client side dedupe. True?

Rob

[PeteWall]

I think your understanding is correct.  The PureDisk agent that is installed on NetBackup 6.x media servers is used to connect the NetBackup media server to the PureDisk storage using PDDO (PureDisk Deduplication Option).  This does not provide client-side dedupe however, but a way to connect the PureDisk storage pools to the NetBackup domain.

To use the Client Direct option, giving you client-side dedupe, you would need the embedded dedupe agent on your client installs.  That is only available from NetBackup 7.0 and later.  You wont get that with the PureDisk agent.

-Pete