Sun Fire X4500TM as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.

5
Ryan Arneson April 2008 Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Copyright 2008 Sun Microsystems, Inc., 4150 Network Circle, Santa Clara, California 95054, U.S.A. All rights reserved.

U.S. Government Rights - Commercial software. Government users are subject to the Sun Microsystems, Inc. standard license agreement and applicable provisions of the FAR and its supplements. Use is subject to license terms. This distribution may include materials developed by third parties.

Parts of the product may be derived from Berkeley BSD systems, licensed from the University of California. UNIX is a registered trademark in the U.S. and in other countries, exclusively licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd. X/Open is a registered trademark of X/Open Company, Ltd.

Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Solaris, and Sun Fire are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries.

This product is covered and controlled by U.S. Export Control laws and may be subject to the export or import laws in other countries. Nuclear, missile, chemical biological weapons or nuclear maritime end uses or end users, whether direct or indirect, are strictly prohibited. Export or reexport to countries subject to U.S. embargo or to entities identified on U.S. export exclusion lists, including, but not limited to, the denied persons and specially designated nationals lists is strictly prohibited.

DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS, REPRESENTATIONS AND WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE DISCLAIMED, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT THAT SUCH DISCLAIMERS ARE HELD TO BE LEGALLY INVALID.

Table of Contents

Summary............................................................................................................................................3 Introduction........................................................................................................................................3 Configuration......................................................................................................................................5 Configuring the Disks.....................................................................................................................5 Creating zpools..............................................................................................................................5 Configuring ZFS..............................................................................................................................6 Configuring Symantec Veritas NetBackup .....................................................................................7 Completing the Configuration........................................................................................................9 Setting Up Storage.......................................................................................................................10 Creating a New Storage Group.....................................................................................................13 Frequently Asked Questions..............................................................................................................16 For More Information.......................................................................................................................17

Summary
This guide is an introduction to configuring the Sun FireTM X4500 server as a disk-cache media server for the Symantec Veritas NetBackup application. It provides an example of configuring the ZFS file system on the SolarisTM 10 08/07 Operating System and configuring the NetBackup 6.5 application to utilize the Sun Fire X4500 server as its media server. Using this guide, backup throughput rates of over 1TB per hour are achievable.

Introduction
The Sun Fire X4500 server can deliver massive storage capacity and remarkable throughput making it an optimal nearline storage platform for backup and restore applications. Combining the power of the Solaris 10 OS with the data integrity and simplified administration of ZFS, the Sun Fire X4500 server can be an ideal candidate for streamlining and improving backup and restore operations. Figure 1 shows a NetBackup configuration using a Sun Fire X4500 server as a media server. The default NIC configuration in the Sun Fire X4500 server allows up to four physical Gigabit Ethernet connections to be attached. The four connections can back up four separate subnets, or the connections can be aggregated into a single subnet for improved throughput using dladm(1M).

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Figure 1: Example Configuration of Sun Fire X4500 Server as Media Server

The Sun Fire X4500 server can also be connected to a tape library for image duplication or archiving purposes (using Fibre Channel or SCSI connections). In addition, the Sun Fire X4500 server can be used as the primary data cache for staging a tape library for long-term storage. Data is moved to tape after certain file system utilization or time-based thresholds are reached. As an alternative, the tape library can be attached to a separate media server.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Configuration
The minimum operating system for this configuration is the Solaris 10 08/07 OS, because this version includes ZFS improvements. To configure the Sun Fire X4500 server for this architecture, use the following general procedure: 1. Configure the Sun Fire X4500 server's disks. 2. Create the zpools. 3. Configure the ZFS file system. 4. Install the NetBackup 6.5 application and media server option. 5. Configure the NetBackup master server and media server.

Configuring the Disks

The Sun Fire X4500 server has 48 500GB SATA drives. Use Solaris Volume Manager to mirror the boot drives, c5t0d0 and c5t4d0. The remaining drives are available for backup.

Creating zpools
The configuration must balance the competing needs of a particular site. Gather the following requirements: What is the required performance needed (IOPS/throughput)? What is the required data protection level needed (RAIDZ, RAIDZ2, mirror)? What is the required capacity? Do not configure the entire architecture (encompassing backup clients and network infrastructure) to optimize disk performance at the expense of space or data protection if the architecture is not able to send data at adequate levels. Likewise, do not optimize for space at the expense of performance or data protection. When configuring network backups, the ability of the Sun Fire X4500 server to receive data over the network is also a factor. For example, a 450MB/s backup speed requirement cannot be met solely by using the four onboard Gigabit Network ports. Add network cards to meet this requirement. In this guide, the Sun Fire X4500 server is configured as one zpool consisting of 8 x 5 disk RAIDZ vdevs. Additionally, six hot spare disks are configured for reliability. This gives the Sun Fire X4500 server sufficient disk performance to handle 300350MB/s of backup traffic over the network.
#!/bin/bash zpool create -f nbupool raidz c0t0d0 c1t0d0 c4t0d0 c6t0d0 c7t0d0 \ raidz c0t1d0 c1t1d0 c4t1d0 c5t1d0 c7t1d0 \ raidz c0t2d0 c1t2d0 c5t2d0 c6t2d0 c7t2d0 \ raidz c0t3d0 c1t3d0 c4t3d0 c6t3d0 c7t3d0 \ raidz c0t4d0 c1t4d0 c4t4d0 c6t4d0 c7t4d0 \ raidz c0t5d0 c4t5d0 c5t5d0 c6t5d0 c7t5d0 \ raidz c0t6d0 c1t6d0 c4t6d0 c5t6d0 c6t6d0 \ raidz c1t7d0 c4t7d0 c5t7d0 c6t7d0 c7t7d0 \ spare c6t1d0 c5t3d0 c4t2d0 c1t5d0 c7t6d0 c0t7d0

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

To see the result, use the zfs list command:

# zpool list NAME nbupool SIZE 18.1T USED 58.6G AVAIL 18.1T CAP HEALTH 0% ONLINE ALTROOT -

The SIZE column shows the actual physical space in the pool. This might differ from the actual space that the data occupies because various RAIDZ methods and configurations are not taken into account. See the zpool(1M) man page for more details.

Configuring ZFS
As a media server, the Sun Fire X4500 server is configured to write to storage units. Each storage unit is created from a ZFS file system mountpoint. A single ZFS file system for all backup streams is a bottleneck that limits throughput to 200250MB/s. Using multiple file systems in parallel eliminates that bottleneck. The number of file systems needed is a case-by-case decision, depending on the following factors: Number of backup and recover streams needed Number of duplication or stage operations needed Number of tape drives configured for duplication or stage operations In the following example, four backup file systems are created: /backup1, /backup2, /backup3, and /backup4.
#!/bin/bash for fs in 1 2 3 4 do zfs create -o mountpoint=/backup$fs nbupool/backup$fs done

To see the result, use the zfs list command:

# zfs list NAME nbupool nbupool/backup1 nbupool/backup2 nbupool/backup3 nbupool/backup4

USED 46.8G 14.8G 10.8G 5.38G 15.8G

AVAIL 14.2T 14.2T 14.2T 14.2T 14.2T

REFER 39.1K 14.8G 10.8G 5.38G 15.8G

MOUNTPOINT /nbupool /backup1 /backup2 /backup3 /backup4

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Configuring Symantec Veritas NetBackup

In this sample configuration, the Sun Fire X4500 server, thumper1, is the NetBackup media server and a separate system, sol-230, is already running as the NetBackup master server. Configuring the NetBackup Media Server 1. On the Sun Fire X4500 server, install the Symantec Veritas NetBackup software and Media Manager package from the installation media.

# /nfs/nbu-new/DVD2/install Symantec Installation Script Copyright 1993 - 2007 Symantec Corporation, All Rights Reserved. Installing Veritas NetBackup Server Software NOTE: To install only Veritas NetBackup Client software locally on this machine or to load additional UNIX client software on this server, insert the Veritas NetBackup UNIX Clients cdrom. Do you wish to continue? [y,n] (y) y Veritas NetBackup installs to the running root environment, by default. Are you installing to the running root environment? [y,n] (y) y Processing package instance <SYMCnetbp> from </nfs/nbu-new/DVD2/solaris_x86> ...

2.

Continue the installation. After you enter the license key, the installation confirms the name of the system. At this point, you also specify that a different system, sol-230, is the NetBackup master server:

Would you like to use "thumper1" as the configured name of the Veritas NetBackup server? [y,n] (y) y Is thumper1 the master server? [y,n] (y) n What is the fully qualified name of the master server? sol-230

3.

After the installation, edit the bp.conf file to follow this example:

SERVER = sol-230 SERVER = thumper1 CLIENT_NAME = thumper1 EMMSERVER = sol-230

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Configuring the NetBackup Master Server On the system that acts as the master server, make the following changes: 1. Edit the bp.conf file to follow this example:
SERVER = sol-230 SERVER = thumper1 CLIENT_NAME = sol-230 EMMSERVER = sol-230 VXDBMS_NB_DATA = /usr/openv/db/data

2.

Update the EMM database with the new media server information. The following command specifies that thumper1 is the media server and sol-230 is the master server:

# /usr/openv/Veritas NetBackup/bin/admincmd/nbemmcmd -addhost -machinename thumper1 -machinetype media -masterserver sol-230 \ -Veritas NetBackupversion 6.5 -operating system solaris NBEMMCMD, Version:6.5 Command completed successfully.

3.

Verify the changes using the NetBackup command:

# nbemmcmd -listhost NBEMMCMD, Version:6.5 The following hosts were found: media thumper1 master sol-230 server sol-230 Command completed successfully.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Completing the Configuration

1. On any client that uses media server resources, edit its bp.conf file to add the media server. In this example configuration, each client's bp.conf file contains the following line: SERVER=thumper1

2. 3. 4.

Restart the Veritas NetBackup processes on the master server and media server to cause the changes to be recognized. On the master server (in this case, sol-230), open the NetBackup Administration Console. Verify that the master server recognizes the media server. Navigate to NetBackup Management > Host Properties > Media Servers. Then click the name of the Sun Fire X4500 server to ensure the media server's status is Connected. The status of the master server is also listed.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

Setting Up Storage
Creating Storage Units 1. Navigate to NetBackup Management >Storage > Storage Unit. 2. Right-click to display the popup menu and select New Storage Unit.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

10

3.

On the New Storage Unit dialog, enter the following specifications: For Type, select Basic Disk. For Media Server, verify that it is the name of the Sun Fire X4500 server. For the Absolute pathname to directory, enter the name of one of the ZFS file systems.

4.

Repeat the procedure for each ZFS file system.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

11

When you are finished, the list of Storage Units includes all four ZFS file systems.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

12

Creating a New Storage Group

An individual storage unit can be used as a backup destination; however, configuring a storage group allows several storage units to be allocated to backup operations. 1. Navigate to NetBackup Management >Storage > Storage Unit Groups. 2. Right-click to display the popup menu and select New Storage Unit Group.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

13

3.

In the New Storage Unit Group, specify a name for the group and then add the storage units to the group. For the type of storage unit selection, click Round-Robin. This ensures that backup streams are allocated to each storage unit.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

14

Setting the Policies for the Backup 1. Navigate to NetBackup Management > Policies > Change Policy. 2. On the Change Policy dialog, click Attributes. 3. Click Policy Storage list and select the name of the storage unit group.

Now the Sun Fire X4500 server, acting as the NetBackup media server, can back up data from all clients efficiently.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

15

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1: Does the Sun Fire X4500 server scale as the workload increases? A1: Tests to measure scalability saturated each onboard GigE port in turn. Three zpool configurations were tested: The RAIDZ1-6Spares (14.3TB of usable space) configuration is the example used in this guide. The RAIDZ1-NoSpares (16.9TB of usable space) configuration is based on the default zpool configuration. The Mirror-NoSpares (10.3TB of usable space) configuration is a single zpool consisting of 22 mirrored pairs. Sufficient client load was generated to ensure each GigE interface was saturated at 1 Gigabit/s. The test data consisted of 32GB of files on each client. As shown in the following graph, the Sun Fire X4500 server can deliver close to 350 MB/s using the four onboard GigE ports. Also, the tests show that at these data rates, zpool configuration is not a driving factor for performance. The network/CPU load becomes the bottleneck before the zpool.

X4500 NBU Scalability

400 350 300 250 MB/Sec RAIDZ1-6Spares 200 150 100 50 0 1 2 3 4 GigE Ports RAIDZ1-NoSpares Mirror-NoSpares

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

16

Q2: Has the configuration been tested with 10GB Ethernet? A2: Yes. Using a Neterion Xframe II and the xge driver, eight clients capable of delivering 100MB/s each were configured to back up a Sun Fire X4500 server. Jumbo frames were enabled on all components. Throughput rates of 500550 MB/s were achieved. Image duplication between two Sun Fire X4500 media servers was measured at 350 MB/s. Q3. How can I achieve even higher aggregate backup speeds? A3. By configuring additional Sun Fire X4500 media servers and placing all the storage units from all media servers into a single storage unit group, NetBackup can allocate backup operations in a round-robin manner across multiple servers for even higher aggregate throughput rates.

For More Information

Here are additional resources:

Sun storage download page:

http://www.sun.com/download/index.jsp?cat=Hardware%20Drivers&tab=3&subcat=Storage

These and other Sun training courses at http://www.sun.com/training/:

Sun Fire X4500 Server Administration (WET-5060) Designing Storage Area Networks (NWS-4940)

Storage and Information Lifecycle Management course catalog: http://www.sun.com/training/catalog/storage/index.xml Support:

Register your Sun gear: https://inventory.sun.com/inventory/ Services: http://www.sun.com/service/index.jsp SunSolve Online: http://sunsolve.sun.com

Discussions such as the Storage Forums: http://forum.java.sun.com/category.jspa?categoryID=66 The following documents at http://docs.sun.com:

Sun Fire X4500 Document Collection: http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/prod/f4bbfa5fe6e5-11da-ac3d-080020a9ed93 Solaris 10 System Administrator Collection: Solaris ZFS Administration Guide: http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/819-5461 System Administration Guide: IP Services: http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/816-4554

Sun wikis at http://wikis.sun.com/dashboard.action, for example:

Sun Storage Administration Wiki: http://wikis.sun.com/display/StorageAdmin/Home Storage Developers' Wiki: http://wikis.sun.com/display/StorageDev/Home Storage System Patterns Wiki: http://wikis.sun.com/display/StorageSystemPatterns/Storage+System+Pat terns Storage BluePrints Wiki: http://wikis.sun.com/display/BluePrints/Storage+BluePrints BigAdmin Storage Tech Tips Wiki: http://wikis.sun.com/display/BigAdmin/Storage+Tech+Tips

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

17

Related sites: ZFS Best Practices Guide on the Solaris Internals web site:
http://www.solarisinternals.com/wiki/index.php/ZFS_Best_Practices_Guide

Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5 Documentation:

http://seer.entsupport.symantec.com/search_forms/doc_list.asp?DocType=Comp&CL SUB=NBUESVRSUB11682&MSUB=NBUESVRSUB11686&SearchArea=ALL&el=%2C+1&ddProduct=NB UESVR&pid=&width=&SearchTerm=&subject=NBUESVRSUB11686&ProductVersion=NBUESVRP VER24910&language=English

BigAdmin Storage Resource Collection: http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/collections/storage.html Sun Storage web site: http://www.sun.com/storagetek/index.jsp Storage Stop Blog: http://blogs.sun.com/storage

Events of interest to users of Sun products: Worldwide developer events: http://developers.sun.com/events/ Current events: http://www.sun.com/events/index.jsp

Licensing Information
Unless otherwise specified, the use of this software is authorized pursuant to the terms of the license found at http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/common/berkeley_license.html.

Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5

18