I have an ASUS RT-N66U that I have been running DDWRT on since I got it, about 2 years ago. The wireless started flaking out on me last summer and so I hardwired everything in my place that had an Ethernet NIC. Problem solved for those devices but still isn't great for my phone and laptops.

I would like to replace it with something better. I have seen lots of praise for ubiquiti. If I went that route, I would have to get at least 1 AP. What router and AP models would be good for home/home lab use that won't break the bank?

@scottalanmiller What are you thinking of replacing them with?

@scottalanmiller Ah... bummer.

@scottalanmiller I see you said changing DNS is a pain to deal with on the FireTV. Is that a regional/international problem? I have a FireTV (1st gen) and I like it. The only problems I have with it are that Hulu has stuttering problems on it, whereas my Roku 2 works fine. (both are hard-wired Gb) Also, spotify is not the full version, which I think is due to the fact that they are promoting their prime music, which isn't all that bad. Also, it hasn't received any updates since August. What are you thinking of replacing your FireTVs with?

My Rokus started having problems in November of last year, requiring me to power-cycle them every other day. Huge pain.

@JaredBusch Interesting. I don't know much about Hyper-V yet.

@Dashrender said:

@JaredBusch said:

@Dashrender said:

You create a local backup with Veeam - which of course creates a snap.... and then you do a replication with Veeam from one hypervisor to another? why are you using Veeam to do that instead of the built in hypervisor tools? But that's really beside the point.

Because VMWare.

Doing that clearly makes the server run a snap twice (unless it can be run in a single job). and put strain on the VM host while replicating to the remote site.

1. Backups run nightly.
2. Not all servers are replicated
3. Replication gives you more restore points throughout the day in addition to the failover capability

How do you get number 3?

It creates replication points? That's not how I've ever understood how replication works.

Veeam 9 offers multiple restore points on replicas -
https://www.veeam.com/vm-advanced-replication.html
under failover and failback section.

@Dashrender I bet it was during the initial full backup...

This is how Veeam replication works - https://www.veeam.com/university-course/backup-replication-how-it-works.html

This is for v7 but I am pretty sure that it is still the same in v9

Edit: you will have to click through several slides to get to the actual replication section.

@Dashrender said:

@JaredBusch said:

@Dashrender said:

Replication itself doesn't need to involve snap shots though.

You can have Veeam take a backup of the VM to local NAS. Then you can have Veeam, as a different job, replicate that backup over the WAN. That replication won't touch the VM or make a snapshot.

It is completely impossible to not involve a snapshot.

How do you think the backup was made? With a snapshot. And that information is how the replication job would know what needed replicated.

correct, but it's a two step process.

1. create backup - a) create snap b) copy data to backup repository c) delete snap
2. replicate data from repository to remote location

As long as step 1 is done completely locally, you shouldn't have a problem with your snaps.

What we still don't know - and really is important before providing any advice of real value, is why the snaps caused the server to crash - if it even was really the snap that cause it.

i.e. did it run out of disk space? out of RAM(though that doesn't make sense) CPU overload, etc, etc, etc....

One possible story behind the crash - the snap was taken - the copy process starts but takes forever, the local VM host runs out of disk space - VM Host crashes.

But this is only one of many possible situations. In this situation local NAS for repository would solve the problem.

I would agree that the snapshot issue would be the first thing to tackle. I would avoid backupexec like the plague and can't recommend Veeam enough. I would also upgrade the connection at the remote site. Then decide how you want to get the data over there- whether you are using replication or backup copy job (both are features in Veeam).

@Sparkum It seems the easiest thing to do would be to upgrade the retail site's wan link. If you aren't already using tape, it seems like you should just stay away from it.

So, the main problem here is your WAN connection's bandwidth. There is no chance you can get something better?

@Sparkum I have been using Veeam since version 6.5 and now on version 9. I absolutely love it. I would still take a look at the reason you ran out of resources. It seems really odd that that you would have that problem on newer hardware.

I also have a large file server. About 2 TB is used and with version 9 and vSphere 6, the full backup only takes about 16.25 hours. On version 8 it took twice that long.

Did you ever talk to veeam about why snapshots were crashing your server? Do you have really old/under-powered hardware with super slow hard drives?

@BRRABill said:

@MattSpeller said:

Nice people in a van came by each week to get the tapes.

How do you know they were nice? Did you actually speak to them?

10 years ago when I was using tape, we had Iron Mountain come by twice a week and swap boxes of tapes in a rotation. That guy was nice. Now I have a better system where I copy backups offsite to Amazon S3 and Glacier.

@JaredBusch LOL I really don't get why you think that. I can read and I never said I refuse to use it; I said that I have had better experience with my PRI (that was in place prior to me arriving) than with VOIP across the Internet. I may not have used tons of providers like you have but that's why I come here. To learn from other people's experiences. Get a lay of the land and see what people are up to and implementing. I say what my experiences have shown me and you tell me yours.

Just because you have had fantastic experiences doesn't mean I have. Nor does it mean I'm some dishonest idiot that has some reason to screw my employer out of money and quality voice service.

@JaredBusch So how does any of what I wrote show I "screw people over" and "sell proprietary systems"?

Are you having a stroke or something?

@JaredBusch WTF is your deal? I'm not screwing anybody over. I'm not a provider and I don't sell PBX or SIP service. I don't sell anything. Seriously, WTF?

@scottalanmiller I don't doubt it.

@scottalanmiller I thought you said latency wasn't really a thing

@scottalanmiller Holy cow! Geez. So you just love to travel or is this all work-related, both? And Romania is crazy.