Redeploying Veeam

[stevecous]

Hi

I have inherited a Veeam configuration from an employee who has now left the business and want to make some changes to the way it all hangs together. We are also going through a Storage refresh which gives me the opertunity to do this.

The current setup is two different storage platforms streched across two datacentres that replicate asyncronosly. Active passive although there is a chunk of data that exists at both ends that doesn't move. I have four independant Veeam servers that each act as a proxy, two in each datacenter, one connected to each different storage array. Each of these servers holds it's own DB. We will be moving to a singular storage platform provitioned through virtual LUN's that operate in an active active senario.

My plan is to have a single Veeam backup server with four proxies, two at each datacenter. This configuration is dependant on the following questions.

1. If I run one Veeam Server with four separate proxies am I limited to the number of cores in relation to the number of active jobs that can be run on the Veeam central server or the cores on the proxies?

I.E veeam server has 4 cores limiting me to 4 active jobs or each proxy has four cores giving me 16 active jobs.

2. Is it possible to import the SQL data from the original four separate servers and point to new central Veeam server at that data and that server beable to reference it and be able carry out restores etc. Would the jobs and their configuration then be available to the new server? The paths to the backup data will still remain the same.

3. I presume it's easy to convert an active Veeam server into a proxy, Is a proxy purely just a Server with access to the LUN's required for backup, no software footprint?

4. Slightly unrelated question. The licensing is based on number of host sockets, is this the number of host sockets being used by the VM's at the time of backup or based on the hosts listed within the licensed hosts. Is it concurrent?

The more I read the questions the more I think I already kow the answers but worth checking anyway.

Thanks
Steve

[foggy]

Steve, please see the answers below.

1. If I run one Veeam Server with four separate proxies am I limited to the number of cores in relation to the number of active jobs that can be run on the Veeam central server or the cores on the proxies?

I.E veeam server has 4 cores limiting me to 4 active jobs or each proxy has four cores giving me 16 active jobs.

You are not limited to the number of cores on the backup server as all the heavy job is done by proxy servers. Note, that typically, 2 cores are saturated by a single backup job and there is a setting for the max number of concurrent jobs per proxy, which you can tune according to your hardware.

2. Is it possible to import the SQL data from the original four separate servers and point to new central Veeam server at that data and that server beable to reference it and be able carry out restores etc. Would the jobs and their configuration then be available to the new server? The paths to the backup data will still remain the same.
3. I presume it's easy to convert an active Veeam server into a proxy, Is a proxy purely just a Server with access to the LUN's required for backup, no software footprint?

To move to a "single backup server with multiple proxy servers" architecture and keep the existing backups, please follow this procedure:

1. Uninstall Veeam B&R from the servers you will be using as proxy servers only.
2. Create new backup repositories for existing backup targets using your main Veeam B&R installation. The process will "import" existing backups.
3. Create new proxy servers on these servers using your main Veeam B&R installation.
4. Re-create the rest of your backup jobs (that used to run on decommissioned backup servers) on the main backup server and map these jobs to your existing backups in new backup repositories.
5. Run the newly created backup jobs (full backup will be required).

4. Slightly unrelated question. The licensing is based on number of host sockets, is this the number of host sockets being used by the VM's at the time of backup or based on the hosts listed within the licensed hosts. Is it concurrent?

The number of physical sockets on the host you are backing up VMs on.

Thanks.

[stevecous]

Thanks foggy that has helped a great deal. Just an extra bit of clarification.

2. Create new backup repositories for existing backup targets using your main Veeam B&R installation. The process will "import" existing backups.

When we say Import are we essencially creating a catalogue in the new database of the data that exists in the repository path? This would mean I would not need to import the old databases? I am right in thinking this will not create the previous backup job configuration on the new backup server?

4. Re-create the rest of your backup jobs (that used to run on decommissioned backup servers) on the main backup server and map these jobs to your existing backups in new backup repositories.

Is this mapping the newly created Job to the current set of data in the repository paths?

so steps to follow

1. Create new B&R server and DB.
2. Create the repositories on new server. Current data will be cataloged in new DB.
3. Remove the B&R componants from the old B&R to be proxy servers.
4. Create all the jobs on the new B&R server and map these Jobs to the data in the repositories.
5. run the full jobs.

Thanks
Steve

[foggy]

When we say Import are we essencially creating a catalogue in the new database of the data that exists in the repository path? This would mean I would not need to import the old databases? I am right in thinking this will not create the previous backup job configuration on the new backup server?

You are correct in your assumptions.

4. Re-create the rest of your backup jobs (that used to run on decommissioned backup servers) on the main backup server and map these jobs to your existing backups in new backup repositories.

Is this mapping the newly created Job to the current set of data in the repository paths?

Yes.

1. Create new B&R server and DB.
2. Create the repositories on new server. Current data will be cataloged in new DB.
3. Remove the B&R componants from the old B&R to be proxy servers.
4. Create all the jobs on the new B&R server and map these Jobs to the data in the repositories.
5. run the full jobs.

I would add to 3. Remove the B&R components from the old B&R to be proxy servers and create new proxies on them using the new B&R. Otherwise, the new installation would not know about these new proxies.