Bottleneck = source

[TommyTechy]

Dear all,

I am using ESXi 3.5 (Free version) and I am triailing Veeam Backup & Replication. The most I can get out of it is 5 - 6 Mb/s My VM is 570GB and the whole thing is taking 25 odd hours.

Is this a limitation to the free version or have I go something wrong??

[vmroyale]

Can you provide more detail about the phyiscal setup of the networking and storage?

[TommyTechy]

Yes,

I have tested this on two servers now:

HP Prolain ML150 G2 dual xeon, 8GB & HP XW4600. Network is just a 10/100 switch between (currently) the xw4600 and my win 7 64bit desktop. Veeam says the bottleneck is source 99%, Proxy 57%, Network 0%, Target 0%

Im just testing currently doing a low budget fesability test to try to get some funding releast. The thing is I don't know if its slow because im using the free version. I was under the impresion that vmware brought in limitations on V.4 esxi?? But Im only starting with this stuff so its all a little confusing?

Is this enough info?

Storage:

ML150 G2 dual xeon = Raid 5, controller is an adaptec 2610SA

the xw4600 is just silgle onboard Sata

Both seem to run exactly the same 5-6mb/s no higher

[ldelloca]

You are slow because you are using Veeam in network mode (stating your infrastructure design) across a 100 mbits line.

If you do some calculations, 100 mbits equals 12.5 MBs, this is your theoric maximum speed. But the management interface of ESXi hosts is known to be unreliable when it comes to file transfers, so 5-6 MBs is what is usually seen is such configuration.

Check with Veeam User Guide, is better to use SAN mode or Virtual Appliance mode, and upgrade your line to 1 gbits.

Luca.

[TommyTechy]

Thanks for this. I was stumped - Also thank you for the leads of what to possibly try next.

[TommyTechy]

Hi,

I've rebuild a svr 2003 and put veeam backup & replicate on it. this is now on the same ESXi3.5 as the VM im trying to backup. I have set up a repository drive on a physical win7 machine (removable USB) and connected a Gigabit switch between this and the ESXi3.5 machine. I find that when I set up the veeam proxy in SAN model get the following bottleneck values: Source=99%, Proxy=9% & the others are 0%.However the transfer rate never goes above 2MB/s.

If I use Virtual mode I get: Source=99%,Proxy=37% &* the others are 0%. The transfer shoots up to 14MB/s

This is good,but I'm still not understanding why there is such a high bottleneck on my source

Kind regards,

Oliver

[ldelloca]

The storage is local to the ESXi server? If yes, use virtual appliance mode and not SAN mode.

About the speed and bottleneck, 99% on source means the source storage is slow, or at least is the slowest part of the backup chain.

Luca.

[TommyTechy]

Its jumped up to 26MB/s now, I guess this is to do with the tcpip throttling up.

due

Because I cant attach a usb external to the ESXi (due to my current skill level) I have pointed the target/repository to an external machine. The machine running Veeam is on the ESXi but the target is not.

Although the SAN mode started off slow are you of the opinion that it would eventually transfer faster?

[ldelloca]

If the storage is physically inside the ESXi host (local storage) than you cannot use SAN mode. You are successful because Veeam has a failover to network mode in its default configuration, and you are probably ending up using this mode.

Go with Virtual Appliance mode.

Luca.

[TommyTechy]

Thank youfor your assistance, Bottle necks are now at about 50% and transfer time have been cut by a third.

[ldelloca]

You're welcome, glad it worked.

Luca.