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VMware Backups with SQL GRT

CadenL
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Hello

We've successfully set up VMware backups with SQL GRT enabled and that's working well. I read that VMware backups can't be used for point in time recovery and am interested in how frequently these bacukps can run to reduce the RPO.

Ideally we'd like to do frequent log backups (say every 5 mins) on some of our critical SQL servers but is this feasible with VMware backups? We've enabled accelerator and only do backup to MSDP which is then replicated via AIR.

Is 5min backups using accelerator to agressive and if so what is a more realistic frequency between the backups..... all the databases are only in the low GB's in size and an agent based backup can typically protect the logs in well under 5mins.

hope that makes sense

thanks in advance

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RiaanBadenhorst
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You can run accelerated backups as quickly as you can finish one and start the next. The problem with this is that it has to be full backup, and running full backup so many times will inflate the catalog drastically. It might be a better idea to use a traditional inguest backup method given the RPO you require.

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eduncan
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I would suggest running SQL backups separate from VMware backups based on your frequency needs. Even with Accelerator every 5 minutes would result in a significant catalog size growth.

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RiaanBadenhorst
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You can run accelerated backups as quickly as you can finish one and start the next. The problem with this is that it has to be full backup, and running full backup so many times will inflate the catalog drastically. It might be a better idea to use a traditional inguest backup method given the RPO you require.

eduncan
Level 5
Employee
I would suggest running SQL backups separate from VMware backups based on your frequency needs. Even with Accelerator every 5 minutes would result in a significant catalog size growth.

CadenL
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Many thanks for the feedback - I will use an agent based backup for the log files.