Dell Replay Manager Version 7.8 Administrator’s Guide

General Guidelines for Microsoft SQL Server

For all versions of Microsoft SQL Server, follow these general guidelines for backing up and restoring data.

• Use the Replay Manager SQL Databases backup extension—do not use the Local Volumes backup extension

  The Local Volumes Extension allows an administrator to select entire volumes when defining a backup set. Each database stored on the selected volumes wait for the current process to finish before temporarily halting further operations, if all volumes used by the database are included in the backup set. However, you should use the SQL Databases backup extension for volumes containing SQL Server databases because it provides an enhanced backup and recovery process for the administrator. Some recovery features are only available through the SQL Databases backup extension.

• Determine optimal selections for database backup sets

  The administrator must determine the optimal configuration of backup sets, and backup job schedules based on the site environment. Replay Manager allows multiple databases within one backup set. However, for databases with high IO traffic, Dell recommends that an administrator include only one database per backup set. Microsoft recommends that an administrator create a backup set of fewer than 35 databases to prevent problems with VSS timeouts and other related errors. For more information, see support.microsoft.com/kb/943471.

  NOTE:A backup includes all files on the volume (or volumes) used by the selected databases, including database files for databases that are not selected. However, unselected databases are not quiesced by VSS before the snapshot is taken. If backup sets are consistently excluding databases on a given set of volumes, consider moving the excluded databases onto a separate set of volumes to reduce the size of the Replays.
• Back up the system databases

  If you need to recover an entire SQL Server instance, you must have access to the system databases. The standard system databases include master, model, and msdb. Each of these databases plays an important role in the operation of a SQL Server instance. All system databases are created under the SQL Server installation path, which by default is the boot volume. System databases should reside on a SAN volume so they can be included as part of a regular backup set in Replay Manager. Use snapshots of the system databases to perform a full SQL Server instance recovery.