Restore Drive

[H_Sharma]

Hello Experts,

We have 8 drives and we need 7 for backups and 1 for restore. We have SSO and 3 ( 2 Media servers and 1 master servers ) are accessing these 8 drives.

Pls let us know how can we acheive this.

Thanks,

[Marianne]

Not really possible with SSO. Unless you split the total number of drives across the STUs so that they add up to 7. This may lead to jobs getting queued if all the drives cannot be used for backups. It is normally easy enough to suspend some backup jobs when an urgent restore is needed.

[mph999]

As Marianne explains, you can set the number of consecutive write drives in the storage unit to 1 less than the numnber of drives you have.

So, if you have x8 drives, set it to 7.  This means that only 7 drives will be used for backups/ duplications leaving 1 free, which could be used for restores.

If, at the moent all your jobs struggle to complete in time, using all x8 drives, reducing this to x7 is probably not going to be a good idea.  However, if your jobs complete with loads of time to spare, then you maybe able to drop one drive without any major impact.

[Michael_G_Ander]

Think it can be done by creating a Storage Unit with 7 drives, but still configure all 8 drives on the master & media servers. At least that was a solution in earlier versions of Netbackup, have never tried it myself as restores always started pretty fast because of their high priority.

[Marianne]

In this environment where there are at least 3 STUs, it won't help to make max drives 7 in all STUs.
Here the number of drives should be reduced in STU properties so that the total in all STUs will be 7.

Configure all 8 drives on all media servers, but limit max drives in STU properties.

[H_Sharma]

So if i make maximum concurrent write drives to 7 instead of 8 on all my 3 storae unit. Thats the solution. Pls let me know if i am correct.

But again how would netbackup identify that this particular drive needs to be free? I believe if it was one storage unit it would be easier for netbackup to make one drive free.

In case of 3 storage units how would it make one drive free. Not sure.

[Marianne · Accepted solution]

If you make max drives in all media servers 7, it means that each media server can use 7 drives simultaneously. So you can see that all 8 drives will eventually be used when enough backup jobs are active. Storage Units cannot select any specific drive. It is allowed to use any of the drives in the robot with same density. So, if you read through my previous posts again, you will see that you need to change the total number of drives across all media servers so that the total number add up to 7. E.g. master - 2 media1 - 2 media2 - 3 ----------------- TOTAL - 7 But only you can decide on these values. Total number of 7 drives across all media servers as per above example will guarantee 1 drive always available for restores. Not a specific drive.

[mph999 · Accepted solution]

Opps, good point Marianne ...  Yep, of course, multiple STU wlll still use all drive as you suggest.

Only way that might work is to leave one drive dowm, then after you start a restore, up the drive and hope the restore picks it up, and not any running backup job.

Other option, is to zone only one drive to the master, and remove that drive from all other media servers, and run all backup jobs on the media servers, and restore jobs on the master.

[H_Sharma]

Thanks Marianne,

Now the question is how to change it where is the option to change these settings.

[Marianne]

Admin Console -> Storage -> Storage Unit

Change Maximum concurrent write drives for each Storage Unit.

[H_Sharma]

Ok got it i thought it was some other option. Thanks Marianne for your support.

And Drive Down Option is also worth considering :)