Techno Button Master

I have been using DPM 2007 for a few months now and here are a collection of thoughts and annoyances.

Automaticly resolve alerts

Basically, when you get an alert such as “Replica Inconsistant” due to any number of issues you will be sent an alert and also one is logged in the Alerts tab, This is fine and very useful although if the issue is fixed (server back online, service running again etc) the alert will just sit there, gathering dust. Should it not just go away into some other (closed/repaired) area or filter? I mean its getting silly. (see image)

Windows 2003 System States

This has been the biggest problem for me, I have yet to workout what is going on (fully) but it seems that if for any reason you get an error/warning related to the backup of system_state (in event log) it will cause a failed backup. In my case the error is related to Certificate Services, its a warning and using NTbackup it will backup fine, but with DPM all I get is errors and failures. I will it would just do a Competed backup (dirty mabey)

Agent Installation

The agent installation is seamless and quick, but it would be good if it enabled firewall exceptions on install.

On a good note, It is miles better than anything else. I feel very confident with the backups and so far have had no issues that require a large recovery or a loss of critical data. I highly recommend this for admins that do not have endless time to manage backups and monitor for issues. It is a simple but very effective solution to a nessicary requirement.

J

I was getting some annoying errors for a server.

ERROR ID 31214 & 30135

After trying ALOT of solutions I check the Shadow Copy Status (right click C and choose properties) It seems I had disabled the VSS for C: and this in turn was the cause of the failure.

Not that DPM or Eventlog told me. hah

I like DPM but the logging is limited and a problem

Here are the solutions so far

• Enable VSS
• Delete VSS Copies (C)
• Re-Run consistancy check
• … not sure, more to come I assume

Install SP1 & Rollup Update, Fixes all

I have started testing out Data Protection Manager 2007 R2 in my learning enviroment. I had previously tested it last year but found it to be horribly slow and inconsistant.

This time I have good hardware to work with and I am getting really sick of Backup exec and the failures (tape control etc)

The server consists of

• Quad Core 2.5
• 4GB RAM
• 1x80GB System Drive
• 4x1TB Sata2 on a hardware RAID controller (RAID0)
• 1x1GB NIC (2 soon)

Money is an issue so the server needs to be cheap, It will server no other use except backups, My plan was to use the 4TB array for short term disk/staged backups then Tape for long term backups. There are some risks in working this method as RAID0 has no redundancy and a loss of a disk will cause a loss of the array (ouch) so I plan to use my slow NAS (raid5) for daily mirrored backups. Something likethis

Exchange—>4TB raid0 (daily+incremental+recovery etc)—>1tb Raid5(daily)—>tape (weekly)

I will connect my 2tb nas via gigabit crossover to remove the overhead from my network and increase speed. I expect to get around 10-20MB/s compared with 300MB/s on the local raid0.  This should give me some redundancy and if all goes well I will migrate to local RAID5/6 and remove the NAS all together.

The install and config was very easy, Much faster and better than before. In general the UI is smooth and clean (too clean, See later). Microsoft seems to have taken all the choices out of backing up. Really you just choose the server and the service and you are done. Its simple and works as advertised.

My problems are:

• Errors are hard to diagnose and there seems to be no logging of agents (see prev post).
• Detailed info, Current activitys are hardly detailed. I prefer the advanced info from Backup Exec
• No support for Windows 2000 ( I know its old )

But compared to the now Symantec Bcakup Exec, its better. Not crazy better.. but better. I will stick to the testing over the next few weeks and see how it pans out.

J

I have been testing out Data Protection Manager 2007 as a replacement to Symantec (Veritas) Backup Exec

I came accross a wierd error. I had two servers that have teaming enabled, but one of the team member adaptors are disconnected (physically) this was causing DPM Agent to fail to connect to the DPM server, It seems that Qos is not working under a failed team? I need to check that out.

Error (one of them)

A DPM agent failed to communicate with the DPM service on xxxx.yyyy.com because of a communication error. Make sure that xxxx.yyyy.com is remotely accessible from the computer running the DPM agent. If a firewall is enabled on xxxx.yyyyy.com, make sure that it is not blocking requests from the computer running the DPM agent (Error code: 0x800706ba, full name: xxxx.yyyy.com).

So if you are getting strange connectivity errors, or failed jobs for no other reason.. Check your teams/qos and general network.

Good luck