New Environment Recommendations.

[robc.yk]

Good Day folks,

We are currently in the midst of a transition to a new Data Center with the current one becoming the DR site.
In both enviornments will have migrated to the latest vSphere and ESXi.

My questions is in the design of the new Veeam enviornment. Physical vs. virtual server backup server. Number of proxies etc.

Essentially we want the best possible preformance for the backups. Wherever possible the data move should be done over fibre.

Below is some background.

OLD Enviornment: (Building B)

Physical Veeam server running v 5. fibre connected. Backups to disk on HP EVA 8100. (4 GB Fibre)
This enviornment will remain for some time to host some VM's due to network configuration incompatabilities.
It will also serve as the DR site.

New enviornment: (Building A)

Main vSphere enviornment. Most VM's and all net new maintined here. Connected to an HP EVA 8400. (8GB Fibre)


The two buildings are connected through multiple dark fibre strands.
I am thinking that the main backups will be done in building 'A'. Then a copy of the backups sent to building 'B' for DR purposes.

** EDIT ** I should note we currently have about 450 VM servers spread across 16 Hosts. ***
Any insight you provide would be fantastic.

Thanks in advance.

[Gostev]

Hi Rob, best possible performance per proxy would require physical proxy servers directly attached into the SAN fabric. However, you can meet the same backup window with virtual proxies as well, you will just need more proxies. I agree that you should try to place your proxies close to the data protected. As for your backup targets, it might be better to place in another building - especially given good connectivity already in place ("offsite" targets are good against fire or natural disasters).

The number of proxies will depend on many environment-specific factors though - physical or virtual proxy, data change rate, backup window, backup mode, backup schedule, target storage performance etc. (10 plus factors overall) - so it is impossible to give you recommendation based just on the total number of VMs protected.

Thanks.

[dellock6]

Hi Rob,
as Anton said, there are so many variables to consider in this kind of project. There is also some thought about the storage target: are you going to place backups inside the EVA 8400, or into another storage? What if the whole EVA stops?

Maybe one thing you can probably decide is having backup jobs at the production site, and some replica jobs towards the DR site. But from here, every decision is open,and every single element Anton listed could potentially be a full thread lasting weeks. Try to have some fixed point to start.

Regards,
Luca.

[cswaters1]

[merged]

Can anyone recommend a method to calculate how many proxies we require in our environment?

Is there any way to measure the utilization / allocation of existing proxies to determine this?

Do Veeam have any reference papers or guidelines for good practice on proxy deployment?

Any suggestions would be gratefully recieved.

Thanks,

Craig.