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Help Needed - Backup Design

mousehunt
Level 3

Hi All,

I need some advice on a project I am currently given.

My client wanted to backup his data to tape. His data size is about 200TB which 160TB is MS Exchange, 10TB is SQL and 40TB of other files.

The number of servers is around 100 to 150. All Windows.

The backup window is 12 hours and nothing more and tape encryption is mandatory.

My client decision is to backup to LTO6 tape straight.

I know this is a tough requirement. So I actually suggested to backuup to disk first like NBU Appliance then to tape. I suggested 12 hours to disk and another 18 hours to tape whcih I also considered a tough design.

The client some how is open to this option but he still insists on a solution direct to tape first the the disk to disk to tape as a secondary solution.

Honestly speaking, I have never design such a huge backup before. So I am at a lost. I am already thinking just the numer of media servers alone can already create a server farm. I also do not know how much data a media server can process within an hour.

So can I have your suggestion and opinion on both solution?

Solution 1 - Direct to tape.

Solution 2 - Disk to Disk to tape.

Please let me know if you suggest like a 10Gb backup LAN, trunking FC etc. ideas.

Thanks in advance.

 

 

15 REPLIES 15

RamNagalla
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Certified

1) 160 TB exchage data.

are you looking to configure the GRT backups for exchage.. if yes Tape backup is not supported for GRT you can only get the GRT ablility when you backup to disk.. 

even if you duplicate the data from disk to tape.. you need to duplicate back to disk if you want to use the GRT restore.

if cliet is looking for GRT enabled backups of exchange , this definatly chages the client view.

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited
Direct to tape is 100% possible providing: 1. The throughput of the media servers can cope with the number of cients 2. The clients can get their data to the media servers quick enough So proving 2. is possible (disk read seed /network etc ...) then it is a case of having enough media servers, with each being able to write to each of their tape drives at max speed. Martin

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited
Direct to tape is 100% possible providing: 1. The throughput of the media servers can cope with the number of cients 2. The clients can get their data to the media servers quick enough So proving 2. is possible (disk read seed /network etc ...) then it is a case of having enough media servers, with each being able to write to each of their tape drives at max speed. Martin

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited
I'll add some TN links later today with some details of how to calculate the numbers of servers ...

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited
I'll add some TN links later today with some details of how to calculate the numbers of servers ...

StefanosM
Level 6
Partner    VIP    Accredited Certified
one think that is good to know is how many exchange databases you have and how many exchange systems are holding the active databases. before checking what netbackup can d, I suggest you to consider to implement enterprise vault for email archiving. EV will help the backup, deflating the exchange databases.

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited

As promised...

Designing your backup system
http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=HOWTO56078
 
How to estimate the number of master servers needed
http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO56073
 
Best practice for NetBackup catalog layout
http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH144969

Sango
Level 3

Hi mph999,

Thanks for the follwing info.

I understand for this solution to work, I will need a large number of media servers but I just do not know how many do I need.

For example, if I have the following media server specification,

 

2 x 6C 2.6GHz.

16GB RAM

2 x 300GB HDD

1 x 8Gb FC

How many GB can it process in an hour? In our smaller scale design, we usually use 300GB/hr but for such large deployment and strict requirement, I would like to have a better sizing.

I was thinking if I will to continue to use 300GB/hr, in 12 hours a single media server can process 3.6TB idealy.

So using this number, 200TB/3.6TB, I will need about 56 media servers and I guess I need a 10Gb backup LAN.

I was also thinking of splitting the wole network into several smaller backup LAN.

Thanks for all the suggestion so far.

 

 

 

StefanosM
Level 6
Partner    VIP    Accredited Certified

and how you will split your exchange to 56 streams?

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited
 
 
It comes down to how many tape drives can a media server support a full speed.
 
LTO6 speeds are around :
 
160MB/s - Native
400MB/s - Compressed
 
Looking at HBAs ...  this is approcximate only, as you tend to lose a bit due to overheads ...
 
4Gb/s = 4/8 GB/s  = 512 MB/s
8Gb/s = 8/8 GB/s  = 1024 MB/s
 
So if you have for example, a 4Gb HBA and had compressible data, the HBA has to be sending it to the drive at a rate of 400MB/s
This would mean that you require 1 HBA port for each drive, as a single HBA  is fast enough to drive any more than one drive at a time.
 
Then you have to consider how many HBAs the backplane of the media server can support ?
 
So when this lot is considered, you'll probably discover that if you can get the data to the media server quickly enough, the media server would only be able to run 4 or 5 LTO6 drives at max speed at the same time.
 
It's possible in theory, but in practice ....
 
The much better option is to backup to disk first, and by that I mean proper performing SAN attached arrays (then the client backup spped is less important) and then stream this to tape afterwards.
 
Martin
 

Maurice_Byrd
Level 4

What is the recovery time objective - RTO?  If you need to restore 160TB of data from disk you should put a cot and a t.v. in the server room.  You'll want to explain to your client that restoring the data will take at least twice as long as backing up the data.

Backing up to disk first will make you look like a hero when it's time to restore data. 

mph999
Level 6
Employee Accredited

If running at max speed, tape can out perform disk ...  depending of course on what type of disk you have and how it is setup.  Though I agree, on average it is likely that disk would be faster, but not always.

LTO6 needs 400MB/s (compressed) ...  that takes some doing ....  LTO7 is planned to be considerably quicker so heaven knows what will happen then.

In my view 'many' companies are not getting the best performance out of their tape drives due to various reasons ... - though I'm talking about backup speeds here so not really a very fair comment.

Overall, I would recommend backing up to fast disk that is capable of outperforming the tape drives - that is the best solution.

Perhaps someone could post up their disk performance speeds so we can get an idea of real world performance figures ....

Martin

 

Maurice_Byrd
Level 4

I just noticed a typo on my RTO comment... I meant to say that restoring 160TB from TAPE will take at least twice as long as the backup took. But probably longer than that.

 

Harpreet_Singh1
Level 3

Hi,

I am curious, if you have found the correct solution for this huge backup.

Please share with us.

Harpreet

Sango
Level 3

Hi All,

Thanks for all the replies.

Firstly, Sango = Mousehunt and I do not know how it got jumbled up.

We worked with Symantec in our country and come out with two solutions.

One is backup raw from all the host client. This will require about 10 to 12 NBU appliance. We will also need to trunk some FC and network cables to achieve the speed.

Another option is that we do a clone from the storage and snapshots were created using the clone as the base image. This is a requirement from the customer.

From the snapshot, the data is backup from the snapshot. This will reduce the NBU appliance to between 6 and 8.

Once again thanks for all the replies.