Quarterly Tape Backup questions

[bhagen]

We want to get all our backup copy jobs copied to tape once a quarter, and want each quarter on it's own set of tapes.

For instance, Q1 goes on 8 tapes, then I remove the tapes and physically move them to our off-site vault. Q2 get's a fresh set of 8 tapes. Etc.

Currently, I have 4 "backup to tape" jobs created for this year; once every 3 months. It's time to start thinking about creating another 4 jobs for 2021.

4 individual jobs per year seems pretty "manual". Is there a better way? Maybe just create a single job, and schedule it for once every 3 months? Can you do that and *not* schedule incrementals? We just want the latest full backup chain once a quarter.

Thoughts? Thanks!

[soncscy]

Heya bhagen,

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=100

Isn't this the point of GFS? Just give the tapes you want to the that media set in the pool and forget about it. I found it pretty easy to see exactly what tapes are required.

[bhagen]

Well, we don't want GFS; we simply want to archive the latest full backup chain of all our backups once a quarter...subtly different than GFS.

So I've simply created a regular media pool that I'll keep filled with more than enough tapes to do the job.
Then I've created a Backup to Tape job, backing up a specific repository.
Although I'm still trying to wrap my head around the virtual full backup schedule, since I can't disable it, I've set that schedule for the last Saturday of each month just before each quarter (March, for example).
I've unchecked 'incrementals'
I've set my options
And I've set the job schedule to the first Saturday of each quarter. (I don't know how long the virtual full backup will take, but I want it to be complete before the actual backup to tape job runs.)

Seems like at this point I'll be able to set myself a reminder to eject the tapes that were consumed during the job (and put them in the offsite vault), and replace them with fresh tapes (that I then import into the media pool), without having to have multiple jobs.

I'll give this a shot and see how it works!

[soncscy]

Ah, gotcha. I really did just read "quarterly" and assume a singular full backup. mea culpa

I still ask the benefit of the chain, but your call I suppose

Why not just a scheduled File to Tape Job of the directory with scheduled fulls? Seems like it saves you space on tape (no virtual full) and does exactly what you want.

[Dima P.]

bhagen,

You can stick with one regular backup to tape job:

- target media pool should have a media set creation option set to 'create media set per job run' to ensure that every job run will pick new portion of tapes.
- as for job schedule you set it to run monthly at the specific day of the month while for months you just have to pick month per quarter.

Hope it helps. Cheers!