Standalone backup agent for Microsoft Windows servers and workstations (formerly Veeam Endpoint Backup FREE)
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pstoric83
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Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by pstoric83 »

Hey guys, new to Veeam products but like what I see so far. I've been using Veeam Agent free for some workstations and I'm thinking about trying it out on some servers to replace Windows Server Backup but I had a question about how it works. I see the default settings keep 14 days worth if incremental but what happens after those 14 days? Does it inject the incremental into the initial backup to bring it up to date? I know there is an option under advanced to create a new full backup every x days but wanted to see how the default settings work before messing with the advanced options.

In my head, if I leave it default and the first full backup is let's say 60 days old but it's only keeping 14 days worth of incremental, wouldn't' that full backup be way out of date?
Mike Resseler
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Mike Resseler »

Hi Paul,

So the 14 days is calculated on the last 14 successful backups on a different day. (Because of vacation/ travel/ ... you can miss backups on a workstation so it will keep 14 days at all times.). What happens is it will have 1 full (the oldest) and 13 incrementals (taking into account that you take 1 backup a day). When the job kicks off the 15 th time, it will take an incremental again and save it on your backup location. But then it realizes that it has 1 too much so it will merge the oldest (the full) with the second oldest (an incremental) to make another full so you remain with 1 full and 13 incrementals.

Makes sense?

Mike
pstoric83
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by pstoric83 »

Perfect, now I understand how it works. What's the point of creating the manual full snapshot periodically under advanced options? Wouldn't that be the same thing?
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Mike Resseler »

There are two types of "full". One is synthetic and the other is active full. Active full will go to the computer again and does a full backup. This obviously "costs" resources. Synthetic full will create a full backup based on a merge of the full that you already have with the incrementals. Less resources on the "host" but that merge also will have some overhead on IO.

The advantage is that you will have multiple fulls in your chain and if something gets corrupted, you can choose between fulls. Otherwise, you only have 1 full and if somewhere in the chain there is an issue...

Mike
Anguel
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Anguel »

@pstoric83
Note that synthetic full backup functionality is available only in the paid Workstation and Server editions of Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows.

With synthetic of course you have to trust Veeam that all incrementals will be merged into it without any issues. To me it looks like it is the best to use it with ReFS where you benefit from higher speed (fast clone) and saved space.
Unfortunately, from what I have read so far ReFS with integrity streams on seems to be very slow and almost unusable when used on a single server with storage spaces classic :-(
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Mike Resseler »

@anguel,

MSFT is coming with fixes for the ReFS issues. They are fixed in RS4, but if you have issues today, then either get a private fix by MSFT support or wait until they come in one of the next CU's

Mike
pstoric83
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by pstoric83 »

So if the free version doesn't use "full synthetic" but it does merge, what's it called? A bit confusing.
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Dima P. »

Paul,

Synthetic full provides you an option to create a full backup from your existing backup chain. Simply put you can replace the existing incremental restore point with a full restore point. Active full backup makes a full read of your source files and is not related to your existing incrementals. Take a look at these Help Center articles for more details and let me know if it helps.
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by simcomit »

Dima or Mike,
I'm in a similar situation and like pstoric83 am still confused by your last replies. Was Anguel incorrect about the free Agent version not doing Synthetic merges? If so, what happens in that free product on the 15th day of incremental backups if it can't do a synthetic full?
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Dima P. »

Hi Jason,

There is a synthetic full option which generates the full backup based on your existing backup chain. Merge is another technology used by forever incremental backup mode (basically it injects the oldest increment into retied full backup).
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by simcomit »

Dima,
Thank you for the reply, but I'm still a little confused. To avoid confusion I'd like to keep the answer limited to whatever the free Veeam Agent 9.5 U3 does, specifically what exactly happens on the 15th day of scheduled incremental backups?
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Dima P. »

Hi nitramd,

Oldest incremental backup should be merged into full backup.
simcomit
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by simcomit »

Ok, thanks for confirming. I also ended up talking to a Veeam sales tech and he said the same.

I do have a follow up question. I suspect your answer will require a paid Agent license (which is fine), but what happens after the 15th day if I have a copy-to-tape (or cloud repository) script set up for the repository I put a free Veeam Agent's incremental backups in?

A) Will it copy both the 15th day's incremental file ALONG WITH the "merged" full backup file (because merging the first incremental backup changed the file)?
or
B) Will it copy only the 15th day's incremental file leaving the merged Full file only in the original repository?

Or is it possible to choose either option?

Either way, Option A would reduce the complexity of restores, but after the 15th day would consume a LOT of tape space every day (since the Full is likely 10's of gigabytes in size but incrementals are likely only a gigabyte or two). Over time having to write 10's of 'extra' gigabytes (the new merged full along with that day's incremental) to tape every day will eat through tape faster than...

Option B would reduce the size of data on the tape, but restores would require every file written to tape and possibly take a long time to replay the incrementals to turn it into a 'current version' of the backup (assuming it can even read all the files before finding a corruption).

I'm just trying to figure out how best to design and deploy this beast...
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Dima P. »

Jason,
simcomit wrote:I do have a follow up question. I suspect your answer will require a paid Agent license (which is fine)
It’s not limited to free edition. This is how default forever forward incremental backup mode. However, if you want to avoid merged you can stick with periodic active full backup option (which is also available in Free edition).
simcomit wrote:Ok, thanks for confirming. I also ended up talking to a Veeam sales tech and he said the same.
what happens after the 15th day if I have a copy-to-tape (or cloud repository) script set up for the repository I put a free Veeam Agent's incremental backups in?
Backup to tape job with forever forward incremental backup as a source won’t write full backup after merge is performed. Instead, it creates a periodic virtual full backup to split up the forever forward incremental backup chain on disk. Thanks!
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by simcomit »

It's great to hear using the free version won't make a difference. I do like the idea of a merged backup, I just don't want to write a 50gb file to tape every day in addition to that days' incremental backup file (because the merge caused the full to look like a "new file"). This may not be the case for all situations, but for what I'm trying to plan (our tape strategy) out I needed to know how it would work.

Per the second item, oh yea, I was just starting to look into the virtual full backup on tape last week and forgot about that today. So can you confirm this is how it works (I don't mean for you to give specific examples, just that I have the general concept right):

* A copy-to-tape job of a forever incremental backup that is stored in a disk repository (from a free or paid Agent, or CPU based license) will use a Virtual Full Backup when writing on the tape to simulate the "merged full file" and will NOT write the whole full file that is modified in the disk repository every day after the 14th day.

In other words, if the initial Full backup file is 50gb and each day it creates a 1gb incremental file, on the 15th day (and thereafter until the next regular full backup) it will only write roughly the 1gb of incremental data and NOT 51gb (the virtual full along with an incremental) to the tape?
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by Dima P. »

simcomit wrote: * A copy-to-tape job of a forever incremental backup that is stored in a disk repository (from a free or paid Agent, or CPU based license) will use a Virtual Full Backup when writing on the tape to simulate the "merged full file" and will NOT write the whole full file that is modified in the disk repository every day after the 14th day.
Yes. Lets say you have a forever forward incremental backup chain for your agent job and you plan to use backup to tape daily with periodic virtual full backup.

Day 1 – entire backup chain is written to tape:

Disk: F + I (1) + I (2) + I (3) + I (4)
Tape: F + I (1) + I (2) + I (3) + I (4)

Day 2 – new incremental restore point is created (5) and oldest incremental is merged into full on disk (1). Tape backup will write only incremental backup 5:

Disk: F(1) + I (2) + I (3) + I (4) + I (5)
Tape: F + I (1) + I (2) + I (3) + I (4) + I (5)

Day 3 – new incremental restore point is created (6) and oldest incremental is merged into full on disk (2). Virtual full is scheduled for tape job:

Disk: F(2) + I (3) + I (4) + I (5) + I (6)
Tape: F + I (1) + I (2) + I (3) + I (4) + I (5) + F (6)

Makes sence?
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Re: Agent for Windows free edition initial snapshot question

Post by simcomit »

Almost, but I'm still a little unsure how much data will be in that last write to tape for the Virtual Full (the one listed as "F (6)" in your example). Let's say the initial F was 50gb and each I is 1gb. On day 3 does that Virtual Full data set (going to tape) include 51gb, or 1gb (plus maybe some overhead)?

Ultimately I'm trying to figure out how much this strategy will use on tape so I know if I should even put these backups on tape (it's not a necessity but if it doesn't write ~51gb for each virtual full we may do it). FYI these are for our workstaion backups, and I assume there isn't de-duping for tape (I plan to use that for the disk repositories, but don't think it works for tape?). In my example if we back up 50 computers at 50gb for each real Full that would burn through tape pretty quickly (thus why I need to know how the tape copy job works)...
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