MS SQL Server VM backup takes so much space

[Ramalingam N]

i have configured ms sql vm backup using veeam backup for ahv.

By default veeam backup for ahv supports full backup and forever forward incremental for nutanix ahv vm's.

Due to that the forever forward incremental has taken more space on destination storage.

Any idea to over come the space savings.

[Mildur]

Analyze your daily change rate within the mssql vm. Is the change rate the same as your incremental backups with veeam?
Then everything is ok on veeam site.

You will need to buy more backup storage or reduce your retention settings in the backup job.

With forever incremental, you will have:
1* VBK File
Multiple VIB Files (changes sinces last backup)

The vbk file will get combined with the first vib in your backup chain, as soon the backup job reach it’s configured retention.

[Ramalingam N]

Hi Mildur,

Thanks for your reply.

Daily Change rate in mssql vm is very minimal.

For example the total vm is 900GB.

Daily incremental change is taking ablout 140-250 GB even the change will be very minimal.

Normally the backup job has Proceeded & transferred data size, for this sql vm alone whatever the processed byte is saved as transfered bytes.

I have configured file level backup with agent based & agent less vm level backup both scenarios the output will be same.

Anything I have to modify for space savings.

[Mildur]

There is nothing to modify on veeam site.
Are you doing backups inside the vm with native mssql tools of the databases?

Are you reorganizing data structure in the sql database every day with scripts/functions?

Are you using some type of database encryption inside your vm?

I have another backup software from a competitor.
I was doing backup of a sql vm with 500GB database data.
After 30 days, this server has used 2-3TB Backup Storage, because the data in the database was changing to much. The data was not getting bigger, it has only changed on a daily basis.
Second thing on this vm, the customer has done his own database exports on a additional drive. This exports were encrypted and filled my backup storage too after my backup software has done the daily backup.

Backuping database data can be a pain for your storage.

If you don‘t find anything from my list above in your vm, please open a service request with veeam support. They can help you better with the logs.
But I don’t think, there is a bug or a misconfigurstion in your veeam enviroment.
Just normal backup storage usage of a big database server.