TL2000 LTO4 and Backup Exec 11d

I guess this forum is useless!!!!! 

local backup 1800 - 2200 MB/Min

remote backup  500 - 600 MB/Min

Both those numbers are with hardware compression.    Dell ran there Arm test on the drive and came up with 70 MB per sec but that I believe was copying 4 gigs of the same character which is not a very good test.

Spent 3 hours on the line with Symantec (this was a joke) They could not get 11d to work with anything but the Symantec tape driver and put the blame on IBM.

I am about ready to send the TL2000 back and get something that works well.

I am using the latest Symantec driver for the tape drive.   Symantec was only trying to use the IBM driver to see if it was any faster.

Are you able to confirm if the Firmware/drivers are the latest for the list components?

SAS 5/e     Driver: 1.26.5.0

            Firmware: 00.10.51.00.06.12.05.00

PERC 6/e    Driver: 2.14.00.32

            Firmware: 6.0.1-0080

I will test backup to disk and to tape today without compression.

Does the throuput # for the local backup increase when you use the Symantec driver?  You should not be using IBM drivers for the drive if you are using BEWS software.

If you haven't already try running a LOCAL backup using NO COMPRESSION and the symantec tape drivers. Be sure the backup is atleast a 10minute job to insure the drives have ample time to get to top speed and sustain that rate for a bit. The reason I stress NO COMPRESSION is that the compression is dependant on the compressability of the files..since you do not know the true compresability of your data set you will never be able to determine what a true speed should be thus never being able to pin point the bottleneck. Using NO COMPRESSION insures you that the top speed of the drive is 120MB/sec.. take 10-15% off that # for OS overhead and you now have a target speed that should be achievable with any data set.

If your #'s are still sitting in the 36MB/Sec range you need to determine if the data coming from the source is capable of delivering at this rate... from your previous post to me it sounds like you have plenty of horsepower but you may want to create a backup to disk job and eliminate the tape drive and the 5/e controller from the picture. Run the same job as above but send the data from the disk array to a backup disk folder that is local to the server. The drives should have absolutely no problem hitting above 36MB/sec. This will give you the "from disk array to server" rate. If this # is low I would start looking at drivers for the MD and the controller it is attached to.

Before you start any of this be sure you have the latest drivers/firmware installed for the 5e card.

Be sure you are using LTO4 media.

I have run this configuration numerous times and can assure you 100+MB/sec is achievable with the setup you have.

The remote backup is dependant on too many factors. When you figure out your local problem  you can begin to tackle the remote issue. For that I would begin by getting a system plugged into an isolated switch with the server... network traffic will always kill good performance and in my experience is usually the problem.

Not how you want to begin with new h/w I understand but I believe you can get this running as it should and you will be pleased with the TL product.

Interesting...

The PERC card is up to date w/ both drivers/firmware.

The 5/e however has a "newer" rev than what has been posted on support.dell.com as of 12/07... not sure what that rev is from I will need to do some asking about that one. I would go ahead and run the one that is posted 1.24.4.0. The pckg # is R170398.... hopefully you can pull it from this link : http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/format.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&deviceid=9840&libid=45&releaseid=R170398&vercnt=6&formatcnt=0&SystemID=PWE_2950&servicetag=&os=WNET&osl=en&catid=-1&impid=-1 

The f/w on the 5e card is good.

I will try to track down this 1.26.5.0 driver and run a quick backup with it to see the perf #'s I see. 

Bob

The best I can tell the 1.26.5.0 is a Windows Longhorn driver (windows 2008).

Is that the driver version that was loaded with the server when you got it?

Bob

The link I sent you was for the x32 version of the driver here is the x64 version: http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&releaseid=R170404&SystemID=PWE_2950&servicetag=&os=WX64&osl=en&deviceid=9840&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=6&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=3&libid=45&fileid=232118 

Yes this is Windows 2003 Standard R2     I must have downloaded the wrong driver while looking for the lastest for the PERC and SAS

I am getting ready to run the driver (1.26..) now...

Just to be clear... this is Windows 2003 correct?

If this is the driver that came factory loaded on your server I need to find out how it is getting there... can you please confirm where the driver came from?

I must have downloaded the wrong driver while looking for the most recent for the PERC and SAS.

Thanks Bob

We are running 32bit   I am just waiting for a restore to finish before I change drivers.   I will test it this evening and post in the morning.

I don't know of any tweaks for the MD.. you may want to start a new thread specifiaclly asking that...

What is the throughput from the local RAID to the tape? 

          Comp        Tape/Disk    Size     Time     Speed          

Test1   none        Tape          32GB     0:30:00  1,063 MB/min

Test2  Hardware   Tape          32GB    0:25:38  1,314 MB/min

Test3   none        disk           32GB      0:21:55 1,470 MB/min 

5/e Driver   6/e Driver   6/I Driver   SymantecDriver

1.24.4.40      2.14.0.32     2.14.0.32   5.1.25

To tape is slower with this driver than with the previous.

I move a 9gig AVI from the MD1000 to the local raid on the server   It took 3mins 36secs     Its looking like the MD1000 is the bottleneck

Are there any tweaks?  What should I be looking at here?  Starting to get a bit frustrated here.

Well I am completely frustrated. 

I have BE 10d running on the old fileserver with LTO2 backing up a remote share to tape at 1578 MB/min

I have BE 11d running on the new fileserver with LTO4 backing up the same share at 500 MB/min

I copied the contents of the share to the new fileserver and it only backs it up @1836 MB/min.  Only 300 MB/min faster than the 10d backs up over the network.

If all my drivers and firmware are up to date, what could the problem be?   Shall I reburn the OS?  It still has the install from Dell.

I am half tempted to send it all back. 

"We spent $50,000 on a new server, MD1000, and TL2000 and backups are taking longer?"  Not sure how I shall respond to this.