Licensing Syamatec Netbackup Client (7.x) for Virtualized Environment

1. Using Symantec Netbackup 7.x for Virtualized environment.

With the Symantec Netbackup 7.x release, it provides better virtual machine protection. Utilizing VMware‟s new vStorage API for Data Protection, NetBackup 7.x can perform a clientless backup that truly provides all the capabilities that normally require client software installed inside the system to be backed up (Windows). Efficient block level incrementals are now possible and there is no longer any requirement for a Backup Proxy or additional staging storage

2. Underlying Principles – Symantec Netbackup 7.x

Virtual Infrastructure 3 provided a “quasi” backup API called VMware Consolidated Backup (VCB). It was not a true API in the traditional sense but it did provide for off-host virtual machine backups. With the vSphere 4 release, VMware made considerable modifications and renamed it the “vStorage API for Data Protection”. These new features worked well with existing NetBackup virtual machine protection technologies giving NetBackup significant and unique feature enhancements are as follows.

· Staging area no longer required. The vStorage API has the ability to directly access virtual machine data and then copy that data directly to the backup destination. Virtual machine data no longer needs to be temporarily sent to or staged to a disk based holding tank. Because this intermediary staging process is no longer required, backup performance can be improved by as much as 100%, shrinking the backup window by as much as half or more.

· Block Level Incremental Backups. Block level incremental backups are implemented via a new vStorage API for Data Protection feature called Change Block Tracking (CBT). In real time, CBT keeps track of every vmdk block that changes as part of normal operating system I/O processes. CBT Tracking is implemented independently for each virtual machine. Incremental backups can be based off of the block change information collected by CBT. This greatly increases incremental backup speeds for following two reasons.

(a) only data blocks that have changed are backed up. By reducing at the block level the amount of data being backed up, overall backup processing is more efficient because only small amounts of changed data is transferred to the backup host.

(b) the virtual machine does not have to be scanned to find the blocks that have changed since the previous full. Any blocks that change between backups are tracked in real time eliminating the need to scan the entire virtual machine every time a backup is performed. Besides providing extremely efficient incremental backups, the entire virtual machine can be restored from any type of backup – block level incremental or full. Easy, single step disaster recovery for the entire virtual machine is now feasible.

· Single file restores. Block level incrementals provide a valuable method for efficiently protecting virtual machines for disaster recover scenarios, but the most common type of restore request is a single file restore. In many backup environments, it is not uncommon for 80% or more of restore requests to be for individual or single files. NetBackup solves this issue by extending the Granular File Restore technology to include block level incremental backups. This means single file restores are possible from either a full virtual machine backup or a block level incremental. Every individual file is indexed, searchable and can be immediately restored without ever having to recreate the virtual machine on disk before a restore.

· Virtual machine optimization. Within every virtual machine there are file system blocks that are occupied but unused. The vStorage API has no way of determining if these blocks are actively in use or represent worthless data. With most backup applications, you backup these blocks every time a full backup is performed. NetBackup significantly reduces the amount of data being backed up by eliminating these worthless blocks from the backup process. NetBackup can determine if these blocks represent real data and can subsequently skip any unused and unnecessary blocks. This optimization process can significantly reduce the amount of worthless data that the vStorage API would normally flag for backup.

The larger the virtual machine environment, the more this optimization feature can reduce backup system storage requirements.

· De-duplicate everything. De-duplication technologies typically look at files and try to find blocks or segments within those files that have previously been backed up. These same de-duplication technologies take the same approach when de-duplicating virtual machine vmdk files. They treat these typically very large files like any other file and simply try to find blocks that match other blocks that have already been backed up. But these vmdk files are not just simple files. They are virtual machine containers that hold OS files such as Word docs or Excel spreadsheets. The key is understanding exactly what is inside these vmdk container files. NetBackup uses its patent pending Granular File Restore technology to look inside these vmdk files. NetBackup then takes this information and de-duplicates files that exist inside a vmdk file against files that exist on a physical system. This means that NetBackup can effectively deduplicate data from the virtual world to the physical world.

3. NetBackup 7.x support for Virtualization.

Granular File Restore NetBackup 7.x’s unique Granular File Restore capability is only currently supported on Windows virtual machines. The following list of features that are provided via the Granular File Restore functionality are also only available with Windows based virtual machines:

· NetBackup optimization

· Single file restore from block level incremental backup

· Enhanced deduplication featuring virtual to physical deduplication

This list of features is supported with any virtual machine running on vSphere 4 or later (including Windows):

· Block level incremental backups (restore entire virtual machine only – no single file restore)

· No staging area (holding tank) requirement

4. Backup Client Licensing

NetBackup for VMware licensing has been simplified. As of the NetBackup 7.x release, only one Enterprise Client license will be required for each (physical) ESX/ESXi server regardless of the OS type and number of virtual machines running on that ESX/ESXi server.

NetBackup for VMware requires an Enterprise Client license for each ESX/ESXi Server. Enterprise Client is purely based on the Physical Processors installed on Virtualization Host.

For information on Enterprise Client tier classifications, it differs for OS flavors and as follows.

UNIX: Based on populated processor sockets		Linux / Windows / Solaris x64: Based on populated processor sockets
Tier 1	1 to 2 processor sockets	Tier 1	1 processor socket
Tier 2	3 to 4 processor sockets	Tier 2	2 to 3 processor socket
Tier 3	5 to 12 processor sockets	Tier 3	4 to 7 processor socket
Tier 4	13 or more processor sockets	Tier 4	8 or more processor socket

For more information Please refer URLs below

http://eval.symantec.com/mktginfo/enterprise/fact_sheets/b-nbu_7_whats_new_version_matrix_DS_20971020.en-us.pdf

http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/symantec-netbackup-licensing-information-and-details

About Chetan Pisal

15+ years of IT experience, MCP, MCTS, MCSA (Win 2012), MCT, PMP, ITIL, Cisco Unity Support, VCP 3/4/5, VCAP-DCD, VCAP-DCA Certified

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