Best Practices for Maintaining your Data Protector Environment

John Oliver Technical Consultant

2010 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice

Agenda
Best practices for maintaining your data protector environment, including: Backup Architecture Sizing Internal Database Maintenance Performance Tuning Issue Management PSO Service Delivery Details on an exciting data health check offer Where to go for more information Simple ways to get going

 Subtitle goes here

Backup Architecture Sizing

Backup Architecture Sizing: Best Practices

Cell Manager and Media Servers CPU 4 processors minimum rds CPU bound; backup, copy, restore, IDB maintenance, media agent Memory 32 GB rds memory intensive; backup, copy, restore, IDB maintenance, media agent Network Dedicated backup network Separate application from backup traffic Media Agent on Dedicated Server Analyze backup demand: prevent bottleneck Number of media servers
4

Backup Architecture Sizing: Best Practices

Client Count Rule of thumb: 250 clients per cell manager Results vary; example factors include actual volumes backed up, window and SAN vs. network SAN clients High backup volume; rule of thumb: backup volume over 750 GB Do not share media agents placed on SAN clients Backup to Disk Deduplication and replication Longer retention on local storage Prevent redundant backup operations

Backup to Tape LTO-5: 3TB capacity at 280 MB/sec native write speed Leverage for long term retention
5

 Subtitle goes here

Internal Database Maintenance

IDB Maintenance: Best Practices

Daily Health Check Process Ensure daily runs Manual Purges Monitor IDB size and growth Schedule regular IDB purge maintenance

Periodic IDB Reorganization Perform reorganization at least annually to reclaim unused space Improved performance and stability Periodic IDB Archival Combine with IDB Reorganization Can be restored to standby cell manager to support restores of sessions already purged from the catalog Prevents long media import times for pre 6.1 media 1
7

 Subtitle goes here

Performance Tuning

Keys to Tuning the Backup Environment

The Point: All are equal possible causes of performance issues! 1. A Source of Data 2. A Backup ServerSystem 3. A Connection 4. A Connection 5. The Tape Drive
1 2

5 Level SAN Tuning Approach

1. Primary Storage Although this could reside on a local adapter
within the server, it is usually a large disk subsystem on the SAN network.

2. The Backup Server connects via the SWITCH to its Primary

storage and the backup target. It runs the backup application. It uses an HBA to link to the SAN

3. The Switch The glue that holds everything together, this box
permits systems and storage to be shared at high speeds.

4. The Interface Controller This device extracts the SCSI commands

out of the SAN Fibre Channel protocol and permits simple tape and disk drives to connect to the SAN.

5. The Tape or Disk Backup Target (Secondary Storage) System

SCSI devices that appear as locally connected SCSI to the Server, via the magic of Fibre Channel!
10

Primary Storage
What to expect

Average Data Extraction Rates Windows Servers UNIX and SAN systems 15-30 MB/sec 40-60 MB/sec

Data Extraction Rates on slower systems Under 10 MB/sec

Under 30 MB/sec

Data Extraction Rates on high end systems

Over 30 MB/sec Over 60 MB/sec

11

Primary Storage
Source Data: Best Case vs. Worst Case Data

Best Case

Worst Case

Low File Count

Large Files Simple File System Structure Short file names Compressible Data (2:1)

High File Count

Tiny Files (1k byte) Complex directory Structure Long File Names Non-Compressible Data (1:1)

12

Primary Storage
Mange Source to Target Speed for Streaming Tape Streaming

Todays tape devices faster native speed than source disk Drive should never be waiting for data
Prevent repositioning -> prematurely wears out tape drive heads and media

Requires higher source speed compared to target device speed Multiplexing

Tape

Multiplexing to feed a single Tape Drive

13

Backup Server
Sizing Considerations
Hardware Considerations
Number of Processors: min 2 processors, at least 1.5 GHz BEST PRACTICE: min 4 cores / CPUs Memory: min 1 GB RAM serving each processor BEST PRACTICE: 32 GB optimal (4 GB RAM serving each processor) Faster C: Drive can help OS and TAPE Software

SCSI HBA: Dedicated 64-bit or above PCI bus BEST PRACTICE: bus not shared with other HBAs
# SAN connections

Software Considerations Dont put the Backup app. database on a slow drive Use the largest block sizes for tape drivers BEST PRACTICE: 256KB as minimum for todays tape devices NOTE: Windows default blocksize is 64KB; may result in possible overhead on Windows systems

14

SAN Switch
Tips and Considerations
Tuning Considerations

Verify director and switch firmware versions Verify transfer rate speeds set as intended The SAN Fabric can consist of many switches that are interconnected via ISLs ( Inter Switch Links ). Backup tuning should always analyse the pathways from the source to the target (disk to tape) to determine if the paths through the switches are bottlenecked by insufficient ISLs.

15

SAN Switch
What Is WRONG with this Picture?

ISL IS TOO SMALL!

2 x Network Storage Routers Total Bandwidth unnecessarily constrained

16

Interface Controller: Performance

Ultra 2 I/F controllers have a total bandwidth of 140MB/sec, 2 SCSI U2 ports E1200/E2400 up to 2 x SDLT220/320 or 2 x Ultrium 230 per SCSI port

Ultra 3 Routers have a total bandwidth of 230MB/sec, 2 SCSI U3 ports

E2400-160, N1200-320 & M2402 1 Ultrium 460 per SCSI port - up to 2 x Ultrium, SDLT, DLT or AIT 230 per SCSI port

Dont exceed these values or the router will Become the bottleneck to backup performance.
17

Tape Backup Target

Todays High Performance Devices
Drive SDLT220 SDLT320 STK9940B AIT 100 S-AIT1 LTO 2 LTO 3 LTO 4 LTO 5 Capacity (native) GB 1 10 160 200 100 500 200 400 800 1500

Native Write Speed MB/Seconds 57 57 108 43 108 40 80 120 180

Interface(s) Ultra 2 SCSI Ultra 2 SCSI FC -2Gb/s Ultra 2 SCSI Ultra 3 SCSI Ultra 3 SCSI Ultra 3 SCSI Ultra 3 SCSI Ultra 3 SCSI

Factors to Consider in Backup Environment Design More storage on tape media means fewer media required than in the past Higher native speeds -> more difficult to stream Plan how to stream physical devices properly
18

Tape Backup Target

Streaming vs Repositioning
Ramp up speed Continue writing No data available from host

Reverse

Streaming Maintains tape operations at highest native speed Contributes to stability in backup environment Repositioning Frequent repositioning will prematurely wear out tape drive heads and media Contributes to instability in backup environment e.g. LTO-4 Ultrium 1840 running at 6200mm/sec requires 2.9 seconds to reposition
19

Tape Backup Target

Network Backup with Parallel Data Transfers
Data Source A
BACKUP OF DATA SOURCE A

AGENT

BACKUP ENGINE

Network Switch
AGENT

Backup Server

BACKUP OF DATA SOURCE B

Data Source B

Device Parallelism or Multiple Device Streams

Uses the Principle that data from a specific source system can be routed to a dedicated device in a one-to-one relationship Effective for D2D backup, or using older tape technologies

20

Tape Backup Target

Multiplexing / Interleaving -> Backup with Concurrency
Data Source A
Backup Session using 'Interleaving' AGENT SOURCE A SOURCE B SOURCE A BACKUP ENGINE SOURCE B SOURCE A

Network Switch
AGENT

Backup Server

SOURCE B

Data Source B

Combines data from multiple Data streams from multiple sources onto a single tape so we can maintain tape streaming

Increases backup performance but can reduce restore performance

Most ISVs now support up to 32 data streams onto a single tape

21

 Subtitle goes here

Issue Management

22

Issue Management: Best Practices

Review and Categorize all Backup Issues

Determine commonalities among issue categories Identify the root cause of groups of issues Resolve systemic issues in the backup environment to achieve stability Recommendations to resolve top priority issues

Work with HP Professional Services

Work with HP DP Support

Log DP issues with Support

Log enhancement requests

23

 Subtitle goes here

Professional Services Offering

24

HP Data Protector Health Check Offering

20 hours remote delivery One cell manager and up to two installation servers Review of up to four tape library configurations Review of up to 25 clients Review of up to four on-line integrations Review state of IDB Detailed information gathering and analysis of current backup environment

Documentation of the major issues in the backup environment

Recommendations that leverage standards and best practices

25

Next Steps
Download at www.hp.com/go/imhub/dataprotector Under Getting the best of it tab You can contact us at: info.hpdpsoftware@hp.com

26

Learn More
www.hp.com/go/dataprotector
Download Trial software HP Data Protector Release 6.1 Frequently Asked Questions 1

www.hp.com/go/imhub/dataprotector
HP Data Protector Operations Guide (2.2MB, PDF) White Paper: HP Data Protector 6.1 software VMware Integration Installation Best Practice (670KB, PDF) HP Data Protector Software Cell Manager Planning and Sizing White Paper (473KB, PDF)

www.hp.com/go/techdemos

HP Data Protector: automate high performance backup and recovery 1st and 3rd Tuesday of each month
27

Software Universe Data Protector Sessions

Date and Time
5:00, Tuesday 9:00, Wednesday 10:30, Wednesday 3:30, Wednesday Room National Harbor 7 National Harbor 6 National Harbor 7 National Harbor 3 Session Title Whats new for HP Data Protector software Best practices for maintaining your HP Data Protector environment Data protection in Wrigleys highly available mission-critical environment Backup and recovery for virtualized environments

5:00, Wednesday
10:30, Thursday
28

National Harbor 6
National Harbor 7

Cloud-based data protection: getting the best and avoiding risk

Protecting Microsoft 2010 applications

Q&A

29

To learn more on this topic, and to connect with your peers after the conference, visit the HP Software Solutions Community:

www.hp.com/go/swcommunity
30 2010 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.

31