Copy Data Management is not a Replacement for Backup
Copy Data Management (CDM) is a very hot topic in both the backup and recovery and storage management markets today. Technology startups are coming out of stealth mode, investors are funding new ventures, and established hardware and software vendors are entering the market.
NetBackup 7.6.0.2 (NetBackup 7.6 Maintenance Release 2) is now available!
(Crossposted from the Netting Out NetBackup blog) I’m extremely happy to announce that NetBackup 7.6.0.2 is now Generally Available! NetBackup 7.6.0.2 is our first maintenance release for the NetBackup 7.6 line ("7.6.0.1" was our "7.6 GA" release). This release contains fixes to 568 issues including resolutions for most commonly downloaded EEBs, customer escalations, and critical internally found defects. 7.6.0.2 also provides several critical security fixes and many high-demand proliferations to our customers. The significant content of this release is: Almost 200 customer-related defect fixes, including 12 issues highlighted in the 7.6 Late Breaking News Security fixes - most notably, removal/update of all components making use of an OpenSSL version potentially affected by "Heartbleed" Parity with 7.5.0.7 - if you were still waiting for a 7.5.0.7 fix to make it into the 7.6 line, here's your update! Proliferations: Oracle 12c Hyper-V 2012 R2 w/File level GRT VDDK 5.5 (I understand that some of you are interested in this one!) FT Media Server SLES 11 SP3 BMR Proliferations (Solaris 11.1, Suse 11 SP2/SP3, Windows 2012/8, RHEL6 XEN) Features Amazon Cloud Non-US Regions Support (7.5 line parity) To download 7.6.0.2, please visit the following page: NetBackup 7.6.0.2 Download Links http://symantec.com/docs/TECH214999 This is a MAINTENANCE Release for NetBackup (as opposed to a Release Update) - it can ONLY be applied on top of NetBackup 7.6 GA. (If you are currently running 7.0, 7.0.1, 7.1, 7.1.0.x, 7.5 OR 7.5.0.x, you will need to upgrade to 7.6 GA before you can apply 7.6.0.2.) To check to see if your particular Etrack is resolved in NetBackup 7.6.0.2, please refer to these Release Notes and our updated EEB guide: NetBackup 7.6.0.2 Release Notes http://symantec.com/docs/DOC6840 Symantec NetBackup 7.6 Emergency Engineering Binary Guide http://symantec.com/docs/DOC6085 The NetBackup 7.6 Late Breaking News has also been updated to reflect newly released fixes in 7.6.0.2 for some of our highest visibility issues: NetBackup 7.6 Late Breaking News http://symantec.com/docs/TECH199999 Bookmark the NetBackup Product Landing Page to have these links and many more useful links handy: http://go.symantec.com/nb --
NetBackup Accelerator questions the value of storage-based snapshot integration from Competitor ‘C’
Data protection is to meet recovery point objectives (RPOs) and recovery time objectives (RTOs) of an organization’s information. Traditional wisdom states that mission critical applications require data protection methods delivering superior RPO (the less is the amount of data lost during recovery) and RTO (the faster to recover). A data protection solution may provide one of more methods to deliver different tiers of RPOs and RTOs. In general, methods for establishing RPOs and RTOs improve in the following order… Streaming backups < storage snapshots < continuous data protection This is the story of a vendor promoting themselves as the advocates of storage snapshots. Symantec’s social media policy teaches me to be discreet and respectful of the competition. Hence let me refer to this vendor as Competitor ‘C’. This Competitor ‘C’ had been scoring brownie points from some leading analysts by telling the story of storage snapshot based data protection. The story is primarily enhanced by a broad list of storage vendors they are currently supporting for storage-based snapshot management. NetBackup had been supporting storage snapshots for over a decade. It had been available since the release of NetBackup 4.0V when ServerFree Agent and Array Integration Option (later absorbed into NetBackup Snapshot Client) were introduced. The second generation of storage snapshot management started with NetBackup 7.5 when NetBackup Replication Director was brought to the market. Obviously, we position NetBackup Replication Director to protect environments requiring superior RPOs and RTOs. Recently Symantec commissioned Principled Technologies to put NetBackup and three other competitors to the test. The goal was to evaluate all four backup solutions for scalability and performance in meeting RPOs and RTOs. The first official report for NetBackup vs. Competitor ‘C’ for the battle of kingdom for scalability and performance is already published here. NetBackup Replication Director outperforms the storage snapshot solution from Competitor ‘C’ by a wide margin. While this is great news for us, we were rewarded with even better, somewhat earthshaking news! Are you ready? Let us consider a VMware vSphere environment with 1000 virtual machines. 400 of those virtual machines are hot with business critical applications like Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft SharePoint running. Principled Technologies is simulating real world workloads by loading these applications with programs designed to induce heavy activity. The remaining 600 virtual machines are hosting web applications with programs simulating real world web traffic. We want to create application consistent recovery points for the entire virtual environment. Let me list the results and some key observations. NetBackup Accelerator questions Storage Snapshots from Competitor 'C' Storage snapshots managed by Competitor ‘C’ Storage snapshots managed by NetBackup Replication Director NetBackup Accelerator based streaming backup Time required for backup (The best RPO possible for the environment) 1000 VMs in 2 hours 50 minutes 21 seconds 1000 VMs in just 38 minutes and 22 seconds 1000 VMs in 2 hours 51 minutes 33 seconds Compatibility Storage array vendor dependent snapshot Storage array vendor dependent snapshot Works with any production storage including DAS. NAS, SAN and converged infrastructure Implementation Requires professional services Professional services not required, but storage array knowledge recommended Single Click on backup policy user interface! Maintainance cost Training recommended. Always make sure to verify the compatibility of storage array, array firmware, array management software, backup software plugin etc. before implementing changes Training recommended. Always make sure to verify the compatibility of storage array, array firmware, array management software, backup software plugin etc. before implementing changes This is as simple as it gets! No dependence on storage hardware. Protection against array loss Need to create backup copies from snapshots, additional time and resources needed. Need to create backup copies from snapshots, additional time and resources needed. Full protection against array failures as full recovery points are available in backup storage Protection against site loss Need to maintain similar storage systems offsite Need to maintain similar storage systems offsite Any storage can be used offsite, including commodity storage So what is the earthshaking news here? NetBackup Accelerator provides the same level of RPO for your business applications for which Competitor ‘C’ would have required storage vendor dependent, expensive, high maintenance array snapshots! It is time for industry analysts with withdraw brownie points truly based on how many arrays a data protection vendor supports, but rather look at how a vendor supports business needs of customers with simplicity, agility and performance. Other blogs in this series Comparing apples to apples: All that glisters is not goldFrequently Asked Questions on NetBackup Accelerator Part II
Thanks to everyone who supported my earlier blog on Frequently Asked Questions on NetBackup Accelerator. I have received a number of follow up questions (as comments) in that blog and I had been answering them as time permits. Two recent questions needed some elaboration.
What Really Makes a Market Leader?
What is “market leadership? There is no shortage of vendors claiming to be #1 in something. Such a simple question but so often misinterpreted. Many customers and vendors believe that the vendor placed in the highest and farthest to the right position of the Gartner Magic Quadrant report is the “leader” of that market. But that's only one data point .Nuts and bolts in NetBackup for VMware: What is new in NetBackup 7.6?
It had been a while since I added something new to this series on Nuts and Bolts in NetBackup for VMware. The dawn of NetBackup 7.6 is here. It is one of the biggest releases in NetBackup for VMware vSphere and vCloud. This release prepares for your journey to Software Defined Data Center. Are you ready? Fasten your seat belts! First and foremost, let us put some perspective on the adoption of virtualization in data centers. Symantec and VMware have been guiding you in reaping the benefits of virtualization. It is happening in three phases. You are likely to be in one of the three phases in this exciting journey. IT Production: In this phase, you are looking save on capital expenses through server consolidation for general-purpose workloads. The key advantage here is to pool and abstract hardware resources for optimal utilization. NetBackup prepared you for this phase since NetBackup 6.5 in 2007, the very first official release of NetBackup with VMware specific features. VMworld judges awarded NetBackup with Best of VMworld in Data Protection and Business Continuity category. NetBackup was the first product to ever get this recognition. NetBackup is still the only product that has won or became the finalist in that category the most number of times. Business Production: This phase is about virtualizing business critical applications and reducing operational expenses. Automation is the mantra at this stage. NetBackup prepared you for this phase since NetBackup 7.1/NetBackup 5220 release in 2011-12. Symantec V-Ray, VMware Intelligent Policies, SAN based offhost backups and integrated VMware Ready backup appliances mitigated the operational costs of virtualized workloads through simplification and automation. NetBackup 5220 and Symantec V-Ray got the attention from both VMworld and Microsoft TechEd judges bagging several awards. Software Defined Data Centers: This is the nirvana for virtualization where compute, network and storage is virtualized and managed as a service model. This phase is all about agility and efficiency for data centers. Now NetBackup 7.6 is preparing you for SDDC in 2013-14. So how exactly is NetBackup 7.6 preparing for this third phase in virtualization so as to reach software defined data centers? Let me give you an overview here. You are zero miles away from these features once you enter the 7.6 freeway to Software Defined Data Center NetBackup Accelerator for VMware workloads: Super fast backups for workloads in VMware vSphere and vCloud are here! NetBackup Accelerator for VMware combines three key technologies to deliver fast and resource efficient backups for virtual machines and applications. NetBackup Replication Director for VMware workloads: Storage array level snapshots and replicas can meet high RPO/RTO required for business critical workloads. However the lack of content awareness limits their use cases. NetBackup Replication Director for VMware vSphere and vCloud workloads enables you to make use of storage level snapshots and replicas without losing end-to-end content visibility, granular recoverability and data life cycle manageability. NetBackup Instant Recovery for VMware: This capability enables you to bring up enterprise grade virtual machines and workloads right from the backup storage even before restoring data back to production storage. NetBackup for VMware vCloud: NetBackup 7.6 brings unmatched support for VMware vCloud Suite, starting with end-to-end support for vCloud Director based environments. As you guys know, vCloud Director is the current foundation for building an SDDC for VMware customers. You get to protect the “DNA” of such SDDCs through NetBackup 7.6. Almost all features in NetBackup for VMware vSphere now seamlessly work for vCloud Director based environments. NetBackup Blue Sky Recovery: NetBackup now automates the migration and disaster recovery of physical machines into virtual machines in VMware vSphere and vCloud environments from the backups. NetBackup Auto Image Replication works in conjunction with this capability to take systems anytime to remote locations or to the cloud. This feature is designed to accelerate your journey to virtualization. Well, this is just an overview. We will get into the nuts and bolts of each of these features in upcoming blogs in this series. The first one in this series is already live. Here is the blog on technical deep dive into NetBackup Accelerator for VMware. Got a question NetBackup 7.6 for VMware features? Ask me using the comments section below. I shall answer them directly or through subsequent blogs. We have a lot to talk about in NetBackup 7.6! Related blogs: Eliminating CBT penalty with NetBackup Accelerator Earlier blogs in Nuts and bolts series
Media host override for SAP restores on Data Domain storage server
Hi, We are required to run a very large restore (~12TB) of a SAP database. The backup image is stored on a Data Doamin storage server. We would like to force the restore to use a specific media server that is not the server used for the oirignal backup. The storage server has 6 DD Boost enabled media servers accessing it for both backups and duplications between data centers. Each time we initiate the restore a different media server is used. We have used the "media host override" settings but these do not seem to be honored for OST storgae servers according to this artilce - http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/how-use-media-host-override Has anyone else experinced this problem?