NetBackup and SAN disks

[CheeHoong_CHONG]

We are thinking of implementing SAN disks for windows servers. Anyone using NetBackup of SAN disks and any benefits as compared with defacto client/server setup in terms of backup/restore speed etc? Thanks in advanced

[Yasuhisa_Ishika]

CheeHoong,

You means SAN media server, don't you?
SAN media server is restricted license of media server. SAN media server can write data ONLY came from media server itself. So we can't configure remote client on SAN media server.

Benefits of SAN media server is as below.

1. price
SAN media server is lower in price than full-featured media server.

2. off-traffic
Data streams are processed thru SAN, not IP network.

3. throughput
Throughput isnt't limited by network throughtput. So we just consider tape device performance and client host performance.

[CheeHoong_CHONG]

Not exactly, what I meant was SAN disks on a network servicing multiple servers. Is there a setup to backup/restore entire SAN disks volumes. I am not referring to one to one Veritas netbackup client or SAN media-server kind of setup for these servers. In short, one operation to backup/restore entire SAN disks. Thanks

[Graeme_Welsh]

you would need to look at some kind of 3rd party snapshotting software which will be available for your type of SAN
with netbackup advanced client, u can snapshot an entire volume, but would need the same amount of disk space again to host the snapshot

[CheeHoong_CHONG]

Not that, I mean backup/restore of entire SAN disks to tape-media, eg LTO2 etc.. How can Veritas NetBackup support this? Which version or edition? re:original post...Thanks

[Yasuhisa_Ishika]

What you want to do is unmounting all volumes of SAN disks on each Windwos server, and mounting all volumes on one backup server?
If you don't want to unmount but want to backup on one backup server directly, 3rd party snapshotting products are needded as Graeme wrote. Create snapshots and mount snaped volumes on backup server.

[zippy]

Subject: Re: NetBackup and SAN disks

CheeHoong,

You have said that "backup/restore of entire SAN disks" using your Netbackup system via you LTO2 tape.

"This is a very broad question - statement"

I will take a stab at it...........

There is no reason a backup of this kind is not supported.

Just make sure you SAN Hardware supports your Server's hardware.
If the SAN and Servers are supported to work with each other then...
Make sure your SAN - Servers are supported by Veritas.

Go here to check:
http://seer.support.veritas.com/NAV_BAR/clustersearch.asp?ENG_Type=1&SrchPageID=techsearch.asp&crumb=&highlight=on&SearchArea=All&rc=25&display=&SearchTerm=matrix&ddProduct=NBUESVR&show_seer=1&show_pdf=1&include_techfiles=1

Also this is a very good link - book for SAN - NAS Concepts

Chapter 4:
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/sansnas/chapter/ch04.html

It shows the various kinds of SAN type backups and the pro's and con's, and yes Veritas Supports these type of backups, as long as your Servers are supported by your NAS as noted above.


Network Available Storage (NAS) = NDMP http://www.ndmp.org/ (this is supported and Licenses are availed from Veritas)


Support Matrix - Interoperability are the key here and only you know if all your hardware - software is compatible with each other. Once you have established this baseline then you can choose the best method of backing up your environment.

Jim D