Backup Exec Best Practices

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Product(s): Backup Exec (20.0)
  1. Backup Exec Best Practices
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Best practices for using Backup Exec Deduplication Option with the Central Admin Server Option

Best practices include tips and recommendations to help you effectively use the Backup Exec Deduplication Option with the Central Admin Server Option (CASO). For more information about the Deduplication Option or CASO, see the Backup Exec Administrator's Guide.

The following best practices apply to using the Deduplication Option with the Central Admin Server Option:

  • Create a deduplication disk storage device on managed Backup Exec servers in a CASO environment.

  • Do not run jobs that use a deduplication disk storage device on a central administration server. Instead, assign backup jobs to managed Backup Exec servers and select a Backup Exec server pool as a setting for the destination device.

  • Share the deduplication disk storage devices that are on multiple managed Backup Exec servers with the Backup Exec server that is the replication target. This provides the best use of optimized duplication. For example, the main office site that has a managed Backup Exec server deployment shares the deduplication disk storage device with the central administration server at a remote site for disaster recovery purposes.

  • Use the following recommendations for optimal catalog placement:

    • For local LAN deployments, use replicated catalogs.

    • For site-to-site optimized duplication, use distributed catalogs.

  • Do not use Backup Exec server pools as device targets in standalone backups. This prevents duplicate data from being hosted on multiple managed Backup Exec servers.

  • Subdivide the remote computers that are enabled for direct access sharing among the servers that host the deduplication disk storage folders to best optimize several managed Backup Exec servers at a single site. For example, a large site with two managed Backup Exec servers and 10 remote computers should split the remote computers evenly between the managed Backup Exec servers.

  • Limit the sharing of remote computers that are enabled for direct access sharing with other Backup Exec servers that use deduplication disk storage. This prevents duplicate data from being hosted on multiple backup servers.

  • To perform optimized duplication between a central administration server and a managed Backup Exec server, the following WAN requirements must be met:

    • Less than one percent packet loss during transmissions

    • Less than 250 milliseconds network latency (round trip)

  • Computer disk speeds have the following effects on deduplication performance:

    • Computers with disk speeds greater than 200 MB per second have optimal read and write performance for deduplication.

    • Computers with disk speeds between 150-200 MB per second have sufficient read and write speed for deduplication.

    • Computers with disk speeds between 100-150 MB per second have some operations with degraded performance.

    • Computers with disk speeds less than 100 MB per second experience poor performance. You should improve disk reads and writes before you install and run deduplication.

  • Connection storage area network (Fibre Channel or iSCSI), direct-attached storage (DAS), iSCSI, or internal disks are supported. Removable disks including USB, eSATA, and FireWire devices are not supported.

  • The Backup Exec server should have redundant connectivity to the deduplication disk storage.

  • The storage network must be a dedicated, low-latency network with a maximum of 1-millisecond latency per round trip.

  • The storage network must have enough bandwidth to meet your throughput objectives. Veritas supports the following storage network bandwidths:

    • iSCSI SANs with a bandwidth of at least 10 Gb per second.

    • Fibre Channel SANs with a bandwidth of at least 4 Gb per second.

  • Veritas requires a minimum bandwidth of 130 MB per second for read and write performance. Bandwidth that is less than 130 MB per second may be used in smaller, less resource-intensive environments. However, as usage increases, deduplication requires more bandwidth to ensure adequate throughput for deduplication processes and backups. Otherwise, performance and stability are negatively affected.