backup copy in 3-2-1

[flibouille]

Hi,
It seems usual to use the backup copy for the second backup point.
But, unless I have misunderstood something, if the source is down, there will be no backup copy. In my opinion, this is not a good backup plan at all.
So in this case, is it possible to tell Veeam that if the source is not reachable, the copy will be normal and not backup?
Thanks.

[Mildur]

Hello

The main purpose for a backup copy job is to have a another copy of your backups without producing load on your production environment.

if the source is down, there will be no backup copy. In my opinion, this is not a good backup plan at all.

True.
That's why it's important to use a stable and working storage solution as the primary backup storage. We recommend general purpose server with battery backed enterprise raid controller. So the chance, that your primary backup repository (the source) gets offline is really small. Back when I was working for a managed backup service provider, we only had this scenario when the customer used some cheap NAS solutions which were already 4-5 years old as a primary backup repository. I still would recommend to use a backup copy job.

So in this case, is it possible to tell Veeam that if the source is not reachable, the copy will be normal and not backup?

Our product cannot do that today. We don't have an automatic failover to backup the data from a VM if the primary backup storage has failed. An option would be to create two backup jobs. If you do not want to rely on the first backup repository, you can always configure two backup jobs instead of a backup job and a backup copy job. But it will generate load on the production environment for both jobs.

Thanks
Fabian

#Updated by Mildur: Removed falls statement.

[flibouille]

Thank you.

If I suddenly switch from backup copy to "same backup as source" backup, will it work (will Veeam recognize and continue the incremental backup, for example) ?

[Mildur]

I'm sorry. Just tested it in my lab. You cannot map a backup job to a backup copy chain.
You can map a backup copy job to a backup job chain, but that will not help you for your request, because backup copy jobs cannot do backups from the hypervisor. So that will not work. I removed my statement in the previous answer.

So the only way is to have two backup jobs or a backup repository which you have enough trust in it.

[flibouille]

Ok, thank you for rectifying!