Display white space in VBK backup file?

[zoltank]

Is there an easy way to find how much white space there is in a VBK?

[Vitaliy S.]

Do you mean the amount of blocks that were marked as unused? Don't know any easy way to check that, except for running an active full backup and then comparing the results

[zoltank]

Yes, exactly. I'd like to know how much space I could save by running an active full.

[veremin]

As mentioned, it’s not possible to display this data, unless you run a new active full backup and compare its size with the size of previous .vbk. Thanks.

[averylarry]

Please consider this an enhancement request. I have a client running a little low on space and we just have no idea if the .vbk (reverse incrementals running for a year) is bloated -- which would help us decide if the effort of clearing enough space to do a new full backup is warranted.

[Vitaliy S.]

Thanks for the feedback. Anyway, I would definitely schedule a full backup job run in your case, just to have a fresh full backup at least once a year.

[HJAdams123]

Well, isn't it a fact that white space can be used again inside the vbk? I thought I saw somewhere that Veeam does not waste the whitespace already within the vbk, that is before it increases the size the of vbk, it will use the white space it already has?

[Vitaliy S.]

Harold, yes, your assumption is correct. Veeam backup server doesn't waste this space, it re-uses these blocks when new VM data arrives.

[yizhar]

Hi.

Please consider this an enhancement request. I have a client running a little low on space and we just have no idea if the .vbk (reverse incrementals running for a year) is bloated -- which would help us decide if the effort of clearing enough space to do a new full backup is warranted.

This situation is one of the reasons that I favor using several jobs vs a single large one.

If you have several jobs for the same amount of space, you get some benefits of having smaller VBK files.
One of them is the ability to run ad hoc active full needing less time and disk space compared to backup of the whole datacenter.

Yizhar

[averylarry]

. . . at the expense of reduced deduplication.

[yizhar]

Not necessarily.
The total size of VBK files would be similar for several jobs as for single one, expected to be only about 50-100gb larger depending on several factors, but easier and more flexible to manage and maintain.

I don't mean that 1VM per 1JOB - but something else:

Several very large VMs (file/mail servers) will have separated jobs. Only OS files would loose some deduplication, but data itself is mostly unique to that server.

Other common small VMs (terminal servers, DC, etc) are joined in few jobs.

So, assuming that OS drive C in windows consumes about 40gb and after compression + dedup takes about 10-20gb,
if you have 5 jobs vs single one, you will need something like 100gb more, BUT...

If you need to run active full, need to copy one of the VBK files, or do some troubleshooting, you will need LESS time and space for that action.

Yizhar

[yizhar]

I also suggest reading here:
Optimizing backups for dedup

Yizhar

[zoltank]

Two and a half years later, is there a way to tell me how much white space a VBK file has? It would be very useful information to have in planning an upcoming migration.

[foggy]

There's no way to tell that, however there's now a simple way to reclaim this space.