Can you back up XenServer with UEB
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@coliver I would think an Agent-based backup would be better in general.
Why would one use a Host-Level backup vs an Agent-based backup?
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@dafyre said:
@coliver I would think an Agent-based backup would be better in general.
Why would one use a Host-Level backup vs an Agent-based backup?
Why would you want to opposite? Being able to restore the entire VM and not just the file system is a much faster and safer processes. Especially if you can do it to different hardware.
Exchange, SQL, and application backup an agent makes sense. But if you are just backing up the file system, I don't see where an agent would make sense.
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@dafyre said:
@coliver I would think an Agent-based backup would be better in general.
Why would one use a Host-Level backup vs an Agent-based backup?
Host is taking an image of a complete block device. It is a block backup. Agent based is a filesystem backup, it is filesystem aware and can backup individual files, folders, etc. They are very different and one is better than another in different scenarios.
Agent backups are more efficient and better for granular restores, efficient backups, etc. Host level is great for bare metal and rapid restores.
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My thinking was more along @scottalanmiller's this time... But like everything "it depends" on what the server does. For a File Server, or an application server (Exchange, et al) that we previously mentioned, to me an agent would make more sense.
However, I thought that restoring to different hardware was actually a function of the restore process, and not necessarily part of the backup process. (I guess it depends on what backup software we are talking about).
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@dafyre said:
However, I thought that restoring to different hardware was actually a function of the restore process, and not necessarily part of the backup process. (I guess it depends on what backup software we are talking about).
Kind of, bare metal backups can be iffy if they aren't setup correctly, or in general depending on the backup software. If you do it at the host/hypervisor level you are basically taking a "snapshot" of the drive (ovf or vhd files) and metadata then storing them in a different location. When you go to deploy to a different machine you are placing the snapshot and metadata to that machine and it acts like it was originally deployed there. This is a much faster processes then trying to restore from the filesystem.
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@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
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@Dominica said:
@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
Yes, that is one of their claims to fame. They can directly backup nearly any OS (definitely any production OS) as well as hypervisors. So you can do whichever one makes the most sense for the particular workload. Mix and match as needed. You can do both for the same workload too, but rarely would you want to do that.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dominica said:
@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
Yes, that is one of their claims to fame. They can directly backup nearly any OS (definitely any production OS) as well as hypervisors. So you can do whichever one makes the most sense for the particular workload. Mix and match as needed. You can do both for the same workload too, but rarely would you want to do that.
Oh neat, so if you change your mind, or find that your needs have changed, UEB is flexible enough that you can just change the type without a lot of effort?
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@Dominica said:
Oh neat, so if you change your mind, or find that your needs have changed, UEB is flexible enough that you can just change the type without a lot of effort?
I wouldn't say without effort, it will completely change your backup scheme for that machine. Some planning and settings are required.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dominica said:
@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
Yes, that is one of their claims to fame. They can directly backup nearly any OS (definitely any production OS) as well as hypervisors. So you can do whichever one makes the most sense for the particular workload. Mix and match as needed. You can do both for the same workload too, but rarely would you want to do that.
This is the same for UEB with XenServer? If it is I will have to try it when I get home.
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@coliver said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dominica said:
@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
Yes, that is one of their claims to fame. They can directly backup nearly any OS (definitely any production OS) as well as hypervisors. So you can do whichever one makes the most sense for the particular workload. Mix and match as needed. You can do both for the same workload too, but rarely would you want to do that.
This is the same for UEB with XenServer? If it is I will have to try it when I get home.
No, XenServer has never had a hypervisor level backup available in UEB. That's in their other product only. I'm sure they plan to consolidate but have no idea when that would happen. For now, UEB is agent-only for XS.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@coliver said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dominica said:
@scottalanmiller So does UEB do both host and agent backups?
Yes, that is one of their claims to fame. They can directly backup nearly any OS (definitely any production OS) as well as hypervisors. So you can do whichever one makes the most sense for the particular workload. Mix and match as needed. You can do both for the same workload too, but rarely would you want to do that.
This is the same for UEB with XenServer? If it is I will have to try it when I get home.
No, XenServer has never had a hypervisor level backup available in UEB. That's in their other product only. I'm sure they plan to consolidate but have no idea when that would happen. For now, UEB is agent-only for XS.
Thanks, that was what I was wondering.
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To be clear, UEB is for VMware and Hyper-V. UVB is for Xen. You can back up any VM like a physical by adding the agent. If you want to back up VM's through the hypervisor, you have to stick to the above correlation.
Agent-based: all physicals use the agent and take flat-file backups. Agent-based is also recommended for taking granular application level backups (SQL, SP, Exchange).
Agentless: with VM's (on proper platforms, corresponding to the list above for UEB) can be protected via the hypervisor. (On a physical appliance, Xen Server can only be agent-based.) Agentless is an image snapshot backup. With VMware, DB's can use AppAware and take stable-state snapshots, as well.
Caveats: On a VM, you may choose to go agent or agentless (only agent for Xen, unless it's on UVB). You probably want the convenient machine restores associated with snaps for your VM's, therefore, agentless is advantageous. However, there are some cases that you might prefer to go with the agent on a VM. If you have a VM file server in excess of 1TB, the creation/mounting of restore images for single file restores (from snaps) can get cumbersome, so it's recommended to use the agent and take file-level backups that can simply be browsed and restored within the web UI. If you have VM's employing SQL/Exch/SP DB's, it's recommended that you install the agent for their backups. You can still take snaps for the VM (which do not include the DB's). Sometimes, if you insist on having your cake and eating it, too, you may choose to go both routes for the same VM. In the case of a large file server, this might be appetizing to you. You get easy file restores, and you take an occasional snapshot backup so you can restore the VM quickly, too. The downside is that you are creating 2 separate backups for the same data, so eating twice the storage space for backups.Questions? lol
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@art_of_shred said:
To be clear, UEB is for VMware and Hyper-V. UVB is for Xen.
And to be even more clear, UVB is for XenServer, not Xen in other circumstances as it leverages the XAPI that is from XS. Xen alone will not have everything that is needed. At least not necessarily. Although these days almost no one runs Xen standalone anymore so it rarely comes up.
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@art_of_shred said:
Questions? lol
Yes. What about deuplication? Would a system that handles storage deduplication see "Oh this full OS image, and that agent imaged share a bunch of data! Let's deduplicate!" ?
Or is that dependent on the storage back-end where the backups are actually stored?
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@dafyre said:
@art_of_shred said:
Questions? lol
Yes. What about deuplication? Would a system that handles storage deduplication see "Oh this full OS image, and that agent imaged share a bunch of data! Let's deduplicate!" ?
Or is that dependent on the storage back-end where the backups are actually stored?
Great question - also, is it file based dedup or block based? Or does it depend on the type of backup?
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Deduplication is block-level across the target storage.
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from the Unitrends Administrator Guide...
To increase retention, Unitrends systems utilize adaptive deduplication to remove
duplicate data blocks from backups. With deduplication, backup sizes decrease as
duplicate blocks are removed, thereby increasing the number of backups that can
be stored on the system, also referred to as onâsystem retention.
Native deduplication is enabled by default. An outside deduplication device can be
used for Unitrends Enterprise Backup, but physical systems must use native
deduplication. If you use an outside deduplication device, you can disable native
deduplication for backups stored on this device when you add it to the system. -
@dafyre said:
My thinking was more along @scottalanmiller's this time... But like everything "it depends" on what the server does. For a File Server, or an application server (Exchange, et al) that we previously mentioned, to me an agent would make more sense.
However, I thought that restoring to different hardware was actually a function of the restore process, and not necessarily part of the backup process. (I guess it depends on what backup software we are talking about).
Your first, and thus main, backup should always be the entire VM for anything.
If you then need some of the features a backup from inside the OS gives you, then make secondary backups there.
Veeam can be made application aware and issue commands inside the guest to ensure the specified application is in a state for a valid recovery. I would assume that Unitrends has similar functionality, but no idea.
