SAN mode backup. Disks offline or online?

[hollow]

Dear community,

I am currently implementing Veeam BR 7.0 for one of my customers.

Imagine this scenario:
1 x IBM v7000 storage
1 x ESXi host
1 x Veeam backup server
1 x Veeam proxy server.

- The arrays in the v7000 storage is presented to the ESXi hosts as datastore.
- The same arrays in the v7000 storage is also presented to the Veeam proxy server.

However, in the proxy server, in the OS (Windows) "Disk managements", the disk is offline with a blue bar. I do not want to set them to "Online" and risk corrupting the datastores works.

In another backup software, the Disks are required to set to be "Online" but I am not sure for Veeam.

Question:
1.In order for SAN mode backup to work, in the proxy server, do I need to set the disks to "Online"?
2.By doing this, will it corrupt the disks? (This disks is the datastore for VMware)

Any advice is much appreciated!

[VladV]

1. Definitely NO!
2. YES!

They need to be offline and in case the are initialized they will be corrupted and not recognized by vsphere. Also, to be sure, wait for more members to pitch in with links where you can find the exact instructions.

[dellock6]

Vlad is correct, there is no need to initalize volumes in order for Veeam to read them, on the opposite if you try to do so VMFS filesystems will be corrupted and unavailable to ESXi. I'm curious about the other software that needs them to be online, disk signature causes problems to ESXi regardless the backup software involved...
I only worked once with a V7000, so I do not remember correctly, but if it allows for read-only permissions, please apply them to the Veeam server. Since VADP libraries do not allow for direct SAN writes but only for reads, your volumes will be more safe in this way. If you use FC and V7000 does not allow for read-only permissions, another possibility is to create read-only zoning on the FC switches (if the switches have this capability)

Luca.

[foggy]

Simply bringing the LUN online does not corrupt anything, but disk initialization does. Since Veeam B&R automatically sets SAN Policy to Offline/disables disk automount during installation of proxy server, this prevents disks from being initialized.

That said, there's no particular reason to make disks online as Veeam B&R requires read-only access to the LUN, which is provided when it is in offline mode.

[Peejay62]

V7000 doesn't have an option to present luns with read-only permissions. Once you map a volume to a host, in this case your proxy, the volume comes in as readwrite. So you have to do it with San Policy Offline and disabled automount. Works fine, I run it that way.

[hollow]

Thanks foggy and all for your replies. I am not going to initialize the disk. Just whether or not to bring it online which is as what foggy has mentioned.
I have already execute the automount scrub and automount disable prior to presenting the luns.

As of now, the disk is offline and VBR is backing up via SAN mode successfully.

Thanks all!