Re: Homebuilt server (NAS/SAN) vs the prefab ones? Peformance differences? SAN vs NAS vs Homebuilt Server

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I was backing up about 72 GB to Exabyte VXA tape in 3 hours (6 with verify).
When I switched to using Arcserve installed on the storage server, with
backup agent installed on the production box, the same backup took just over
2.5 hours (again double for verify). I would guess, but I don't know, that
your experience with BE will be similar. I believe you can get a trial of
BE before spending $2200, and if you're testing, I'd encourage you to do the
SP trial as well. It's full featured, with a 30 day time out.

ShadowProtect runs on the production server, with no software running on the
storage box - it just uses a mapped drive on the storage server as the
backup target. SP won't back up to tape, so I'm still using Arcserve on the
storage server to back up to tape for offsite. It's $699, and since it uses
the VSS writers you've already got, there are no extra-cost agents. It does
SQL and Exchange with VSS as well. I've blown away a whole WS03 box with
live SQL 2005 databases and restored from SP backup - the OS, databases, and
everything else just come right back up like nothing ever happened.

My most recent SP backup of that 72 GB took 1:35. My most recent
incremental backup, which just ran at 2 PM, took 34 seconds (obviously
depends on how much data was added or modified). To restore from
incrementals, you just select the most recent one (or any other one if you
want to restore to a specific point in time), and SP automates rolling them
back into the full backup. It'll keep prior backups if you wish - I keep
the current and two prior backup sets, so this week and the two prior weeks.

(On SBS, the Exchange VSS writer is disabled by default. If you use SP to
back up an SBS box, you need to re-enable that writer. There's a KB - post
back if you can't find it).


"markm75" <markm75c@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1169662540.184943.271810@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


On Jan 24, 11:59 am, "Dave Nickason [SBS MVP]"
<gwdib...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
IMO you need to be careful of terminology when selecting devices.
Typically
a NAS device would do storage only, without the ability to run
applications.
If you're going to run BE on your storage device, you need something like
Windows Storage Server.

I'm using a Dell PE830 that runs Windows Storage Server. I got it
specifically because it would run backup applications (in my case
Arcserve).
I configured this with Arcserve on the Storage Server, with an agent on
the
production Windows server, backing up the production server to the
Storage
Server over gigabit ethernet. What I found was that the performance was
similar to backup to an external SCSI tape drive (Exabyte). Since my
issue
was backup window, using the Storage Server in this way did not improve
my
situation over tape.

I ended up using ShadowProtect Server instead of Arcserve, which has
improved my situation significantly in several ways. For one thing, it's
much faster - a full backup of my primary member server takes an hour and
a
half, instead of close to three hours. More importantly, ShadowProtect
does
frequent incremental backups that are very small and fast - less than a
minute. http://www.storagecraft.com/products/ShadowProtectServer/.

Another cool option is DPM, but the version you'd want for this (IMO) is
still in betahttp://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/dpm/default.mspx.

"markm75" <markm...@xxxxxxx> wrote in
messagenews:1169584955.284901.9450@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx



I'm working on building a new server to basically be the backup server
for all of our 800GB or so of data.

IE: Symantec BackupExec will run on this server.. communicating with
remote agents on 4 other servers. Those 4 servers total 800gb of data
in a full backup via gigabit ethernet.

I'm still not sure I see the difference between a NAS, SAN, or a server
with lots of harddrive capacity and dual gigabit ports?

For instance.. here is what we are considering doing:

Building the server piece by piece for a total of $3200, inclusive of
drives and controller cards etc, using either of these 2U rackmount
systems:

http://www.rackmountpro.com/productpage.php?prodid=2918 (I can get a
combination of all needed hardware with a 3 year warranty on the whole
deal for around $3700 instead of $3200)

http://www.acmemicro.com/estore/merchant.ihtml?pid=3246&lastcatid=233...

That $3200 included a Woodcrest 2.0GHZ cpu with virtualization ability
(not really needed for the backup server though). We've already got
server 2003 storage edition. This would include a 4x PCI-e 3ware
9590SE-8ML card and 2GB of 667 DDR2 ram.

I'm assuming that with a NAS or SAN you can install 2003 onto it and
use it just the same as any other server?

The other option appears to be going with a system like this:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?...

The price is alittle more and the CPU type is not a Woodcrest, but
there are 2 of them now.

I've also seen these units without DVD/floppy drives, I'm assuming with
one like that you would have to use a usb dvd rom drive to install the
OS?

Any thoughts on all this?

Differences between server designated as storage vs a NAS vs a SAN..
and perfomance differences in say my homebuilt model and the ones that
come already to go.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?...

Thanks for any input.- Hide quoted text -- Show quoted text -

I had seen references to ShadowProtect, in fact I have a demo which i
havent tried as of yet.

We do have storage server, so I will be putting that version on the
backup server (I'm not sure what all it adds, feature wise, compared to
regular 2003)..

Have you used Symantec BE.. curious if SP is faster than BE or not...

Also.. for 1 exchange license and 4 cals (4 remote servers), it is
about $2200 in upgrade pricing for BE, not sure how SP compares price
wise...

Curious on your backup times.. how many GB's were you backing up (full
backup)..

My hope is that to do a full backup of 800 GB (450 over ethernet), that
the backup time should be around 8-10 hours or a max of 60 MB/s.. I
think in BE I was getting values of about 2200 mB/min (no where near 60
MB/s, but for some reason a 305gb backup finished in 4 hours)...

We will be attaching the Exebyte Magnum 224 via SCSI in the next 5
months, this unit is capable of 400 GB tape size native, and is
upgradable to LTO4 and has the ability to add a second drive (Which
Exebyte unit have you used?).. I'm guessing for a an end of month (if
doing monthly fulls) we are in need of about 1.1TB of tape space, so
about 2-3 tapes for that.

Lastly, NAS/SAN etc.. I have seen prefab NAS's listed as NAS with
storage server being the OS. I guess SANs are more of a clustering
solution for shared disk access.

At this point I've decided to build the homebrew $3250 storage server
(Xeon Woodcrest 2.0GHZ, dual capable, 2gb ram, 2TB HD) vs spending
$4000 on a prefab system with Dempsey (non virtualization capable )
dual 3.0GHZ CPU type system.

So if you have any comments on the size you were backing up and BE vs
SP that would be great.

Thanks,

Mark



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