USB drive copy

[Gunnersaurus]

I currently backup my machine to a local hard disk daily. I then copy the backups to a USB drive once a week via a robocopy. As VEB performs reverse incremental backups, I am having to remove the existing backups on the USB drive and copy the entire chain onto the drive each week. Is there any way around this to prevent me having to copy the entire backup set each time?

[Dima P.]

Hi,

Is there any way around this to prevent me having to copy the entire backup set each time?

Unfortunately, there is no way to work around this. May ask why you are copying to the USB instead of using it as a primary target?

[dheijl]

If you use Fastcopy instead of robocopy you can "sync" the drives so that any backups not on the source drive will be automatically removed from the destination drive, and only new and changed files will be copied.

http://ipmsg.org/tools/fastcopy.html.en

[Gunnersaurus]

dheijl - The problem with syncing the drives is that the newest backup is injected into the vbk so the entire full backup needs copying each time.

Dima P - I backup to local storage daily then to USB once a week which is stored off site. Backing up directly to the USB means plugging it in daily for a backup. A local backup first means that I don't need to remember to plug it in each day. Having the option to utilise incremental backups would resolve my problem. Is this a possibility in the next version of VEB?

[Dima P.]

Backing up directly to the USB means plugging it in daily for a backup. A local backup first means that I don't need to remember to plug it in each day.

What if you leave the connected USB storage and don’t disconnect it on a daily basis?

[Gunnersaurus]

I have just upgrade to VEB 1.5 and noticed that there is still no option to backup using forward incremental. The reason I don't want to leave the USB storage always connected is because I want to have a copy of my backup off site.

This is my backup schedule:
- My home PC performs a backup once a day to a dedicated local hard disk and keeps the last 14 days
- Then once a week I plug in my USB drive and run a script which deletes all the VEB backups currently on it then copies the entire contents of the chain to the USB (here lies the problem - I have to delete all backups on the USB drive just to copy most of them back to the USB drive due to the latest changes being rolled into the vbk)
- The USB drive is then stored off site for the week while my PC continues to backup to local disk daily
- The process is repeated once a week

If there is an option to backup to disk using forward incremental (with the option to create a new full once in a while) I won't need to delete the entire backup chain on USB - I would instead be able to copy over any incremental files since the previous time the USB drive was plugged in. Does this make sense?

I know that forward incremental is an option in Veeam B&R. It would be great to see if in VEB.

[mp37c4]

@Gunnersaurus: your are not alone! We are using exact the same technique for the same reasons: having 1-2 external USB disks at a fire-proof location. The used merging of datablocks into older files forces always large amount of data to be copied.
Request to VEEAM: please allow the standard full-inc-inc-full-inc-inc.... scheme to be used. Best would be to have the full run on a dedicated day-of-week and inc-bus only on the rest of the week.

[Dima P.]

Gunnersaurus,
Makes sense. Forever incremental with periodic full backups is planned.

mp37c4,
If you are using multiple USB drives as a backup target, kindly check the Rotated Drives feature. It allows keeping multiple backup chains on different USB devices. This might be the option you are looking for.

[mp37c4]

Dima: rotated drive feature is not what I am looking for. My problem is the endless (?) growing first full backup: now after about 10 days of operation with 1 daily backup, the full has grown to 36 GB, while a todays fresh full backup needs only 24 GB. And due to the cont-inc technique the full backup is change every day plus growing, this giving a large daily copy-job to copy the backups to the external USB discs.
A "normal" inc backup with one full, a number of incs (e.g. 6) then another full without the merge process would reduce the size.

Is there a way to "break" the forever-incl scheme? I mean, let him forget the last forever-inc chain and just start a new one?

[Dima P.]

My bad - I thought it might help when you said about 2 USB drives. Anyway, I got your point, thanks!

Is there a way to "break" the forever-incl scheme? I mean, let him forget the last forever-inc chain and just start a new one?

To start a new backup chain, you can either delete/move the old one or set a new backup location in job properties.