Setting Up the Dell™ DR Series System on Veeam Dell Engineering April 2016 A Dell Technical White Paper
Revisions Date Description January 2014 Initial release May 2014 Updated to add note to explain purpose of enabling dedupe on Veeam side. July 2014 Updated to add workflow specific best practices. April 2015 Updated with Veeam 8.0 screenshots. June 2015 Updated cleaner recommendations. November 2015 Updated with information about Instant Recovery with DR Series. April 2016 Updated with Veeam 9.0 screenshots and features.
Table of contents Executive summary ................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 1 Installing and configuring the DR Series system ....................................................................................................................... 5 2 Setting up Veeam.....................................................................................................
Executive summary This paper provides information about how to set up the Dell DR Series system as a backup target for ® Veeam Backup & Replication™ software. For additional information, see the DR Series system documentation and other data management application best practices whitepapers for your specific DR Series system at: http://www.dell.
1 Installing and configuring the DR Series system 1. Rack and cable the DR Series system, and power it on. In the Dell DR Series System Administrator Guide, refer to the sections, “iDRAC Connection”, “Logging in and Initializing the DR Series System”, and “Accessing IDRAC6/Idrac7 Using RACADM” for information about using iDRAC connection and initializing the appliance. 2. Log on to iDRAC by using the default address 192.168.0.120, or the IP address that is assigned to the iDRAC interface.
4. Set the user-defined networking preferences as needed. 5. View the summary of preferences and confirm that it is correct.
6. Log on to the DR Series System administrator console with the IP address you just provided for the DR Series system, with the username administrator and password St0r@ge! (The “0” in the password is the numeral zero.). 7. Join the DR Series system into the Active Directory domain. Note: if you do not want to add the DR Series System to Active Directory, see the DR Series System Owner’s Manual for guest logon instructions. a.
. To create the container, in the left navigation area, click Containers and then click the Create link at the top of the page. 9. Enter a Container Name, and click Next.
10. Select the access protocol (NAS (NFS, CIFS)). 11. For CIFS, select the CIFS check box, set the marker type as None, and then click Next.
For NFS, select the NFS check box and then click Next. 12.
For NFS, set the following preferred client access credentials and then click Next 13. Check the configuration summary, and then click Create a New Container.
14. Confirm that the container is successfully added.
2 Setting up Veeam Notes: To maximize the DR Series system and Veeam deduplication savings, Dell recommends to use the exact settings in this guide for all the data being backed up. The backup data will change format completely when backup settings are changed. Hence, to get accurate savings numbers, all the data should be backed up with same settings. 1. Open the Veeam Backup & Replication console. 2. In the Backup Infrastructure section, right-click Backup Repositories, and select Add Backup Repository.
3. Enter a name for the DR Series system container repository, and click Next. 4. For a CIFS container, do the following: a. Select Shared folder as the type of backup repository, and click Next.
b. In the Shared folder field, enter the DR Series system container share UNC path (or TCP/IP address to replace hostname), select the Gateway Server, and click Next.
5. For an NFS repository (for a Linux server), do the following: Note: The Veeam Server is supported on a Windows platform only; therefore, to configure an NFS container from a DR Series system as a backup repository, you must add the Linux server where the NFS container would be mounted. a. Select Linux Server (recommended) as the type of Backup Repository, and then click Next. b. Add the New Repository server (Linux), or select a server from the list if one has been added already.
c. Mount the DR Series system NFS container on this Linux server, and enter the container mount path as the Backup Repository. 6. To customize the repository settings, click Advanced.
Note: Refer to the latest Dell DR Series System Interoperability Guide for the maximum concurrent jobs supported for CIFS/NFS based on the DR Series system model. The maximum concurrent jobs setting also depends on the number of CPU cores in the Veeam server. To run more tasks in parallel, you can add more Backup proxy servers to the Veeam server as needed. 7. Select the option, Decompress backup data blocks before storing.
8. To create separate backup files for VMs in the job, select the option, Use Per-VM Backup Files Chains. This setting makes any backup job that is writing to a repository store each VM’s restore point in a dedicated backup file. If you decide to create separate backup files for VMs in the job, make sure that you also enable parallel data processing. Note: This setting enables multiple write streams within a single job with parallel processing enabled.
10. For Instant Recovery to work, select the option, Enable vPower NFS Server.
11. On the review page, verify the settings, and click Next to apply changes. For a CIFS Container Repository, the Review page will appear similar to the following example.
For an NFS Container Repository, the Review page will appear similar to the following example.
12. Click Finish. 13. On the Backup & Replication menu, go to Jobs > Backup, and right-click Backup to create a new backup job.
14. Enter the name for the backup job, and click Next. 15. For the backup, select one or more virtual machines, data stores, resource pools, vApps, SCVMM clusters, and so on, as needed, and then click Add.
16. Select the DR Series system container share as the Backup Repository for this job, and click Advanced. 17. On the Backup tab, ensure Incremental is selected.
Note: Dell recommends that you enable Active Full backups once a week. The active full backup produces a full backup of a VM just as if you are running the backup job for the first time. The active full backup resets the chain of increments: all subsequent increments use the latest active full backup as a new starting point. A previously used full backup file remains on disk until it is automatically deleted according to the backup retention policy. 18. On the Storage tab, do the following: a.
19. Click Next. 20. Schedule the backup and click Create.
21. Click Finish. 22. To run the backup manually, right-click the configured backup job, and select Start.
3 Setting up DR Series native replication and restore from a replication target container 3.1 Building a replication relationship between DR Series systems 23. Create a target container on the target DR Series system. 24. On the source DR Series system, in the left navigation area, go to Storage > Replication, and then click the Create link at the top of the page.
25. Select a local container as the source container. Then, select Container from remote system, enter the target DR Series system related information, click Retrieve Containers, select a populated target container from the list, and click Create Replication. 26. Verify that the replication is created successfully, and make sure the Status checkbox is marked for the replication session.
3.2 - Make sure the replication is in an INSYNC state from Replication Statistics menu, and Stop or Delete the replication. - Make sure the replication target has CIFS/NFS connection(s) enabled when restoring from it. Restoring data from a target DR Series system Note: Before restoring from a target DR Series system, make sure that the replication session state is INSYNC on the DR Series system GUI Replication Statistics menu.
4. Click Add VM and select “From backup”. Select the VM to be restored and click Add.
5. Select the Restore Mode and click Next. 6. Provide the Host details as needed, and click Next.
7. Select the resource Pool and click Next. 8. Select the datastore and disk type, and click Next.
9. Enter the new name for the restored VM and click Next. 10. Select the network location and click Next.
11. Enter text that describes the reason for the restore and click Next. 12. Click Finish.
13. After the restore job has been created, you can run the job and monitor it from the Backup & Replication menu.
4 Using Veeam Instant VM Recovery with the DR Series system Veeam’s Instant VM Recovery immediately restores a virtual machine (VM) back into your production environment by running it directly from the backup file. Instant VM Recovery uses patented vPower® technology to mount a VM image to a production VMware vSphere or Microsoft Hyper-V host directly from a compressed and deduplicated backup file.
2. To perform the instant recovery, click the Restore Wizard option. Select the VMware option and then select Instant VM recovery. 3. Select the Virtual Machine to be recovered and click Next.
4. At the Restore point step, select the point to which you want to restore the VM and then click Next. 5. At the Restore Mode step, select the option, Restore to a new location, or with different settings, and then click Next.
6. At the Destination step, do the following: a. Select the ESX(i) host on which the VM should be restored instantly. b. In the Resource pool box, select the resource pool to which the restored VM should belong. c. In the Restored VM name field, add the _restored suffix to the VM name. d. Click Next.
7. On the Datastore tab, ensure the Redirect virtual disk updates check box is not selected, and click Next. This will let you use Storage vMotion to migrate the VM to production after the VM is recovered from the backup. 8. Select the checkboxes Connect VM to network and Power on VM automatically, and then click Next.
9. Click Finish to start the Instant VM Recovery 10. Open the vSphere client and make sure that the restored VM is started on the ESX host you selected.
11. In Veeam Backup & Replication, open the Backup & Replication view, select the Instant Recovery node in the inventory pane, and make sure that the Instant VM Recovery session is available and mounted. 4.2 Instant Recovery with Hyper-V Server 1. To enable Instant Recovery for HyperV VM backups, do the following: a. Create a backup job for the required VM as described previously in Section 3 with the only difference being to set the vPower NFS Datastore option in the “vPower NFS” tab. b.
2. To perform Instant Recovery, on the Veeam console, click the Restore Wizard option, select Hyper-V and then select Instant VM recovery.
3. Select the Virtual Machine to be recovered. 4. Add the VM which need to be recovered.
5. At the Restore Mode step, select Restore to a new location, or with different settings, and then click Next. 6. Select the Host to which to recover the VM.
7. At the Datastore step, provide the details of cache data that need to be stored. 8. Enter the details of the path where VM cache data is stored.
9. Select the Virtual Networks that map to each other between the original and new VM locations. 10. In the Restored VM name field, add the _restored suffix to the VM name.
11. Click Finish to start the recovery. 12. Open the Hyper-v Client and make sure that the restored VM is started on the host you selected.
13. In Veeam Backup & Replication, open the Backup & Replication view, select the Instant Recovery node in the inventory pane and make sure that the Instant VM Recovery session is available and mounted. 4.3 Finalizing Instant VM Recovery After Instant VM recovery is successfully completed, you can do one of the following: • • 4.3.1 Migrate VM to production – Use this scenario if you have recovered a failed VM to the production ESX(i) host and want to permanently move the VM files to production storage.
4.3.2 Terminating an Instant VM Recovery session When you terminate an Instant VM Recovery session, the VM is unpublished from the ESX(i) host and redo logs are cleared from the vPower NFS datastore. To terminate the current Instant VM recovery session, follow these steps: 1. Open the Backup & Replication view in Veeam Backup & Replication. 2. In the Inventory pane, select Instant Recovery. 3. In the working area, right-click the name of the recovered VM and select Stop publishing.
5 Creating a backup copy The main purpose of a backup is to protect your data against disasters and VM failures. However, having just one backup does not provide the necessary level of safety. Your primary backup may get destroyed along with your production data, leaving you with no backup to restore from. The backup copy job is a separate task that needs to be set apart from the backup job. Veeam Backup Copy allows users to copy backup data to secondary storage.
2. Add the Virtual Machine from the backup Jobs.
3. Select the backup repository, click Advanced, and then do the following: a. Select the Storage tab. b. Select the Compression level as None. c. Click OK.
4. Select the type of data transfer and click Next. 5. Schedule the job as needed.
6. Click Finish.
7. 58 Select the backup, right-click and select one the following operations as needed: • Sync Now - Traditional Veeam backup copy job in which the restore points are sync’ed from source storage to target. • Active Full - This added feature in Veeam 9.
6 Setting up the DR Series system cleaner Performing scheduled disk space reclamation operations are recommended as a method for recovering disk space from system containers in which files were deleted as a result of deduplication. The cleaner runs during idle time. If your workflow does not have a sufficient amount of idle time on a daily basis, then you should consider scheduling the cleaner to force it to run during a scheduled time.
7 Monitoring deduplication, compression, and performance After backup jobs have run, the DR Series system tracks capacity, storage savings, and throughput on the DR Series system dashboard. This information is valuable in understanding the benefits of the DR Series system. Note: Deduplication ratios increase over time. It is not uncommon to see a 2-4x reduction (25-50% total savings) on the initial backup. As additional full backup jobs are completed, the ratios will increase.
