Disk Staging, do you use it and is it good?

[Duran]

Hello,

I have been reading up on disk staging but was interested in a real world opinion.

Is there a massive advantage to using it or has it saved your skin anytime, or is it something that is more hassle than it is worth?
I am also wondering if there is any particularly useful types of configuration that are not well documented. It looks good on the surface.

Regards,
D.

I plug you in, dim the lights,
Electric Barbarella !

 

[hemps37]

I use it on all my jobs. It allows you to run multiple jobs at the same time in a smaller time frame than if each job was going to tape directly. Also it allows you to have a live backup on the backup system to do a restore based on your disk space available. (ie I keep the last full backup on disk and until the next one starts, allow for a quick and easy restore.)

 

[Duran]

Hello,

Thanks for getting back, so assuming you do a diff during the week and a full on the friday, you can specify staging just for the friday?

I take it that if you do not have a disk space for staging at the time you create the backup job, it can just be added in later?

Regards,
D.

I plug you in, dim the lights,
Electric Barbarella !

 

[notalinuxguru]

Here is my real world scenario:

Last night I backed up 29 servers to my staging area (10TB) in 31 minutes. The total staged was 196 Gig. I do diffs M-R and Full on Friday. Like hemps37 said above, I keep my live backups there. Since I do have 10TB, I currently keep about 3 weeks of data which allows me to do a restore without having to pull a tape within 3 weeks. (After my staging job I send data to tape, which then goes offsite.)

By no means do I consider myself an expert, and "most" of this was setup before I got here. To answer your question about staging documentation...When I go to devices, my staging device is in this list. Then, when you either create a new job or modify an existing job click the staging tab. It's pretty self explanatory. I can post some screen shots of my config if that will help any?

My 2 cents

ARCserve R11.5 SP3

 

[Duran]

Hello,

No thats cool, basically it sounds very handy and easy to use.

Thank you very much for your replys.

Regards,
D.

I plug you in, dim the lights,
Electric Barbarella !

 

[rlanders300]

Howdy all,

I'm wondering about this also. notalinuxguru, you mentioned that you had a 10TB staging area and backed up about 200GB. If you don't mind a few more questions.. What kind of setup do you have for your staging server and tape drive? The performance sounds great. Are all of your servers on-site or remote? Any special requirements you have for the backups (timing of the servers or just one job, all at once)?

Thanks to everyone for their questions and answers. I do enjoy reading the information passed here.

Richard

 

[notalinuxguru]

Here are my specs with links:

Dell PowerVault MD1000

http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/pvaul_md1000?c=us&cs=555&l=en&s=biz

Quantum’s Scalar i500

http://www.quantum.com/Products/TapeLibraries/Scalari500/Index.aspx

We have about 120 servers at my location. Several of our remote locations have their own backup server onsite, however not all locations do.

For the sites that don't have their own backup server, we use Robocopy (

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robocopy)

to backup files/folders to a site that has a backup server. Most of the time it is based upon geography (ie sites in Colorado may be backed up to California, but several come across the wire back to Texas).

Timing can be an issue for remote locations (out of state). You just have to make sure that you give your Robocopy jobs enough time to complete before the backup jobs kick off. Also, not to state the obvious, but when you are copying files across multiple time zones remember that 9 p.m. east coast is not the same as Central. Obviously we try not to back up during "normal" bussiness hours, so jobs on the east coast are kicking off before jobs on the west coast.

Also, we only use staging at my local site (and for others who read this posting; staging is where the data goes to disk *first* before being sent to tape). Remote sites only have one tape drive.

Another option we use here is "streaming". Again, because it is going to disk multiple jobs can be ran at once without issue. However, because I don't consider myself an ARCServe expert, streaming may not have anything to do with staging. It may just depend on having more than one tape drive available?

Hope this posting isn't to much of "stating the obvious", but I remember what it was like for me just starting in IT and trying to learn a new product.

Hope this helps,
guru

 

[rlanders300]

Wow. Thanks for the specs guru. That's a lot of data all over the place. We've got about 50 servers, but county wide, not displaced by time zones! I'm guessing that you're using a flavor of Windows server and Brightstor/Arcserve for the staging server. Do you like the Dell PV? We use Dell also and have had very few problems. I do appreciate the information. Maybe we'll be looking at something like what you have sooner than later.

And don't worry about 'stating the obvious', there might be someone out there that didn't want to bother someone with a question but your obvious answer might have helped them.

Thanks a bunch.

Richard