BE 8.5 SLOW-can't get good back up

[superjet]

All right.
Here is the deal. I have a Win 2K pro box (550Mhz, 256Mb Ram) dedicated to doing my back up. I have a Compaq 20/40Gb DLT tape drive with Veritas Back up Exec 8.5 rev 3571 installed. Exchange add on installed.
I can’t get the dumb thing to work correctly. Right now, it is backing up my Exchange server at a blistering 2Mb/Minute. The only way that works is if I do a quick erase and then launch the back up job.
I have sent the drive out for service, I have replaced the SCSI card and cables, I have reloaded Windows , I have reloaded Veritas.
Does any one have ideas for me?

Thanks in advance,
Jamie

 

[Zelandakh]

check termination. Doubly terminated with terminator and switch? passive / active?

 

[Grenage]

Hi, do you have the remote service installed on your machines ?

 

[superjet]

Sorry about the slow reply. Thanks for the help so far.
Termination- Hmmm. Might be. I will shut down the machine and try a passive/active terminator. My experience with SCSI (Disks) is if you have the incorrect terminator in place, the OS will not see the SCSI chain. I will try a different one.
Remote services- Can you explain? Do you mean Terminal Services or Net Meeting?

Thanks again for the replys. I am close to going out of my mind with this.


Jamie

 

[polymath5]

I think Grenage was referring to the remote backup agent. If you have BE on one box and you exchange is running on another, you need the remote agent. Basically, any time BE isn't installed locally on the server you are backing up, you need the remote agent installed on that box.

 

[richgill]

How are you backing up Exchange? Are you backing up the Exchange Mailboxes or the Information Store? (The latter being much quicker). How is the speed of the drive when backuping up normal files (eg from a file server)? Should be around 150MB/min.

 

[Grenage]

Sorry, aye polymath5 thats what I was on about - it's good someone knows

 

[superjet]

I am backing up Exchange by the mailbox.
At the moment, that is the only way I can get a backup done.
I do a,b,c then the next day d,e,f and so on.
If I try to back up the information store, it bombs out.
I am trying to run a backup on the back up server, but I get the dreaded perpetual "loading media".
Polymath5 and Grenage, I assume the remote backup agent is on the Veritas media and I will have to install that on my Exchange box?

Thanks a ton for the help out there.

Jamie

 

[superjet]

OK.
Backing up on locally on the Veritas box yields 107.9MB/ Minute.
So, next I am going to try the remote agent install on the exchange box.
Maybe I will come in Saturday and try it.

Thanks for all of the help so far on this deal. This thing was dropped in my lap.
Jamie

 

[superjet]

I have checked the BE remote service on the Exchange server and it is installed and started. The log on is the correct BE user and the password for that user is correct as well.
The backup is working, but it is only running at 1.2-1.5Mb.
I backed up a file on a completely different box and I get the same thing. 1.9Mb per sec.
Back-ups on the local machine yeild 107Mb.

Does anyone out there have any ideas?

Thanks,
Jamie

 

[richgill]

The only experience I had with backing up Exchange mail boxes individually (as opposed to the whole Information Store) was so painfully slow I gave up. I can't remember the exact copy speed though. Maybe I was doing something wrong too! Anyone out there managed to do this at speed??

 

[robfreiberger]

I had the same problem here on BE 8.6 rev3878. Turns out to be the Intel 1000TX Nic had a old driver that was slowing down the backup server. To test this copy a large file (100MB) from your back up server to another server. Time the transfer then follow the same steps but copy the file from another server. Also you can use Network Monitor to see the actual bandwidth being used in W2K.

Another idea is to reinstall the Remote Agent on the server being backed up. According to Veritas sometimes the agents don't work the first time they are installed. From your Veritas CD copy the \NTAA folder to the server. Open a command prompt and run setupaa.cmd, you should see a time/date stamp indicating the agent is installed.

rob

 

[superjet]

Thanks for everyones help on this.
robfreiberger, you hit the nail on the head, sort of.
I started the back up and looked at the switch (Cisco 2924). The port the back up was running through was alternating green and amber, so I checked the configuration of the box and the switch. The box was forced at full duplex and the switch was auto sensing half duplex. I set the port on the switch to full and my troubles were solved!
Thanks again for all of the help. I hope I can give some back soon.
Jamie