Performance: Forward Incr. with Transform

[markp]

Setup:
Veeam B&R 7 Enterprise Plus
Windows 8 Pro
OS on SSD
SQLServer on same machine on SSD
Repository on same machine (Externally connected Powervault)
RAM: 24GB
CPU: 3.6GHz Xeon 6core

Backup Type:
Forward Incr. With Synth and Transform

Backup Chain:
4 Restore points ~ 40GB each
1 Full ~ 1.2TB

Performance:
Repository Disk Processing Rate: 30-40%
OS Disk Processing Rate: 0-2%
CPU: 16-18%
RAM: 18-20%
Transform time: ~ 2.5 hrs

Questions
Why is Veeam not using more resources?
If the transform was run on a supercomputer would it go faster?
If so, why?
What is the bottleneck here?

[foggy]

Mark, may I ask you what is the bottleneck according to the job statistics window?

[markp]

The Bottleneck statistics are not updated during the transform process.

[tsightler]

What is the bottleneck here?

Target storage random I/O performance most likely. You didn't tell us anything about the characteristics of the repository (number/type of drives, RAID type), nor the size of your backups, both full and incremental. With this information it's generally pretty easy to estimate the time.

That being said, 2.5 hours for a week worth of transform is actually quite good. How long does your full backup take?

[tsightler]

Oh, I see you did mention the size of the restore points, 4 x 40GB, so that's 160GB of data to be transformed. Since you are using the term "tranform" does that mean you have the "transform forward incremental into rollbacks" option selected, or just a synthetic full? Details on the number and type of disks in the Powervault are also useful.

[markp]

I didn't think the repository information was needed as the disk was only active 30-40% of the time. This meant to me that the physical array could not be the bottleneck because it was not being pushed to 100% active time. I added another incremental and reran the transform. As I would have expected on the previous run the disk activity went to 100% this time. I knew that the bottleneck should be the physical array due to low random IOPS of SATA disks (even if there are 14). I am able to give the server as much RAM as needed though its a pity that it cannot be used in some way to help with the transform process. Mark this as resolved.