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Considerations when backing up your deduplication store with VMware Data Recovery (vDR) (2031695)

Purpose

This article provides information on requirements for the successful backup of a deduplication store with VMware Data Recovery (vDR) 1.x and 2.x.

Resolution

VMware data recovery does not have native support for tape backup. You should ensure that none of your backup jobs are scheduled at the same time as your backup window.

Note: The backup window is the timeframe during which you copy the vDR deduplication data (while the appliance is off) to another location.

To backup the deduplication stores:
  1. Login to the vDR GUI using the vDR plugin.
  2. Click Reports > Running Tasks and ensure that there are no running tasks.
  3. Gracefully shut down the vDR appliance.
  4. Backup your deduplication store as required.
  5. Compare the MD5SUM of the source files and the destination files, ensure the files were transferred successfully using the MD5 values. If the values do not match you will need to transfer these files again.
If you are using a VMDK as your deduplication store: 
  1. Open a console session to the ESX host, hosting the vDR appliance.
  2. Go to the home directory of the vDR appliance.
  3. Run md5sum against the second and possibly 3rd disk.

    Note: The first disk is the OS, so there is no need to run it against that)

If you are using a network share (CIFS) as your deduplication store:

  1. Open a session to the server that is presenting the CIFS datastore.
  2. Run an md5sum against all files under the VMwareDataRecovery directory.
  3. Power on the vDR appliance.

If you are using vDR 2.x or newer. You should instruct vDR not to run maintenance on its dedupe stores during the time you plan to back up your deduplication store. In vDR 2.x, the feature is added to allow for granular control over the maintenance window. The process is as follows: 

  1. Log in to the vDR GUI using the vDR plugin.
  2. Click Configuration > Destinations.
  3. Click on the deduplication store.
  4. Click Maintenance Schedule.
  5. Set up the deduplication store so that it does not run maintenance during your backup window.
  6. Repeat steps 1 to 5 for each additional deduplication store throughout your vDR deployment.
Considerations when using CIFS

VMware data recovery assumes that it has exclusive access to its deduplicated stores at all times. If you choose to leverage network shares (CIFS), it allows the underlying OS to lock the files away from the vDR appliance causing unexpected behavior. This becomes especially important when you elect to backup your deduplication stores. You should ensure that all other processes (such as Indexing, or virus scanning) omit the vDR's deduplication store during normal operations, but especially during the backup window.

Considerations when planning to automate this process

You may elect to use vCenter to automate the shutdown and power on of the virtual machines. It is important to understand that as the deduplication store increases in size, it takes more time to back up. This means the backup window in which the vDR appliance is shut down for must also increase to allow the backup to complete. Proper care must be taken when deciding how long to make the backup window.

Related Education

For more information on Md5sum, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Md5sum.

Tags

 vdr,tape,backup,cifs

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