Document 1785346

Lab Validation Report EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications Flexible, Scalable Data Protection and Archiving for NAS Environments By Kerry Dolan, Lab Analyst, and Vinny Choinski, Senior Lab Analyst January 2015 © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 2 Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................................ 3 Background .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 Challenges in Protecting NAS Environments ........................................................................................................... 3 EMC Data Protection Suite ...................................................................................................................................... 4 EMC Data Domain Systems ..................................................................................................................................... 5 ESG Lab Validation ...................................................................................................................................... 6 NAS Backups Using Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node ............................................................................................ 6 NetWorker Snapshot Management for NAS ........................................................................................................... 9 Efficient Platform for Backups and SourceOne Archiving ..................................................................................... 11 ESG Lab Validation Highlights .................................................................................................................... 14 Issues to Consider ..................................................................................................................................... 14 The Bigger Truth ........................................................................................................................................ 15 Appendix ................................................................................................................................................... 16 ESG Lab Reports The goal of ESG Lab reports is to educate IT professionals about data center technology products for companies of all types and sizes. ESG Lab reports are not meant to replace the evaluation process that should be conducted before making purchasing decisions, but rather to provide insight into these emerging technologies. Our objective is to go over some of the more valuable feature/functions of products, show how they can be used to solve real customer problems and identify any areas needing improvement. ESG Lab's expert third-­‐party perspective is based on our own hands-­‐on testing as well as on interviews with customers who use these products in production environments. This ESG Lab report was sponsored by EMC. All trademark names are property of their respective companies. Information contained in this publication has been obtained by sources The Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) considers to be reliable but is not warranted by ESG. This publication may contain opinions of ESG, which are subject to change from time to time. This publication is copyrighted by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. Any reproduction or redistribution of this publication, in whole or in part, whether in hard-­‐copy format, electronically, or otherwise to persons not authorized to receive it, without the express consent of The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc., is in violation of U.S. copyright law and will be subject to an action for civil damages and, if applicable, criminal prosecution. Should you have any questions, please contact ESG Client Relations at 508.482.0188. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 3 Introduction This ESG Lab Validation documents hands-­‐on testing of the EMC Data Protection Suite for protecting NAS environments. Testing focused on the ability to streamline the backup and archiving processes using a suite of consolidated EMC tools including NetWorker, Avamar, Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node, SourceOne, and Data Domain systems. Background According to ESG research, over the past four years, IT professionals have consistently identified improving data backup and recovery and managing data growth enough to get them into the top four most-­‐cited IT priorities. In ESG’s 2014 IT Spending Intentions Survey (see Figure 1) they were third and fourth most-­‐cited, behind other critical priorities regarding server virtualization and information security.1 Complicating matters, data growth has a big impact on data backup and recovery: ever-­‐expanding data volumes lengthen backup windows and recovery times, often to the point of interfering with production activities, while also demanding additional back-­‐end storage. Figure 1. Top Ten Most Important IT Priorities Top 10 most important IT prioriGes over the next 12 months. (Percent of respondents, N=562, ten responses accepted) Increase use of server virtualizafon 32% Informafon security inifafves 32% 29% Improve data backup and recovery 25% Manage data growth Desktop virtualizafon 24% Use cloud infrastructure services 23% Regulatory compliance inifafves 23% Major applicafon deployments or upgrades 23% Business intelligence/data analyfcs inifafves 23% Data center consolidafon 22% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% Source: Enterprise Strategy Group, 2014. Challenges in Protecting NAS Environments Ensuring optimal data protection for NAS environments is essential as these environments continue to expand to store unstructured data and support additional business applications. Traditional NDMP backups can be complex and slow, and require multi-­‐step recovery without the option for granular restores. Unstructured data such as files tend to have a lot of duplicate data—for example, consider the e-­‐mail attachments sent from HR to every employee in a company, or the multiple saved versions of a presentation with minor changes. In addition, the standard backup process of fulls and incrementals can result in massive volumes of duplicate data as IT works to protect NAS systems across multiple locations in the enterprise. As a result, many organizations struggle to get backups completed within the available window, interfering with employee productivity and leaving data vulnerable. For 1
Source: ESG Research Report, 2014 IT Spending Intentions Survey, February 2014. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 4 example, many organizations try to do full backups on weekends to minimize the disruption to production operations, but fail in that objective when the backup takes four days. During that overlap, the data is vulnerable. Snapshots are helpful for speeding recovery, but since snapshots are usually stored along with primary data, they provide no protection from hardware failure. For some, the ability to leverage NAS systems to their fullest is stymied only by the backup window problem, not by system capacity or performance. One key to improving the data protection process is with archiving. Many organizations don’t implement archiving until millions of files clog up networks and hinder the performance of operational processes. Archiving can relieve much of the backup burden. Adding archiving usually requires another platform to configure and manage, but ultimately the costs can be offset by storage and OpEx savings. EMC Data Protection Suite EMC offers a full suite of data protection software solutions that makes it simple to purchase and deploy EMC backup and archiving solutions. The suite is licensed by front-­‐end capacity, so organizations have the opportunity to leverage any and all solutions just by starting them up. The EMC Data Protection Suite includes Avamar (deduplicated backup), NetWorker (unified backup and recovery), Data Domain Boost for Enterprise Applications (deduplication), SourceOne (archiving), and Data Protection Advisor (unified data protection visibility and reporting). Additional options include MozyEnterprise cloud-­‐based backup and Syncplicity hybrid cloud sync/share and collaboration. While a complete description of the EMC Data Protection Suite is beyond the scope of this report, a high-­‐level overview of several NAS-­‐focused features that ESG Lab tested is provided. Avamar Avamar is fast, scalable backup/deduplication software that can send data to multiple targets, including the grid-­‐
based Avamar Data Store and Data Domain systems. Avamar global deduplication takes place at the client, minimizing the amount of data transferred and network bandwidth required. Data is then compressed and encrypted before transfer. A key feature for NAS backup is the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node, a focus of this report, which is integrated with Isilon and VNX and also supports NetApp NAS systems. It enables fast NDMP backups using existing network links, eliminating the need for a high-­‐speed NDMP backup network. Avamar identifies variable-­‐length, sub-­‐file data segments, enabling more granular deduplication and reducing data volumes and backup times. And because Avamar stores data segments using unique hash IDs and indices, no additional full backups are needed, and no “synthetic full backup” processing is required to create full images from daily incrementals. With the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node, the workflow starts with a full backup (level 0) only once; thereafter, only level-­‐1 incrementals are needed, and these are built into full backup images. The metadata architecture eliminates the need for periodic fulls. This is in stark contrast to the traditional NDMP backup workflow, which starts with a level 0 followed by daily level 1s, with another level 0 each week or so to provide easier recovery. •
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Using the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node reduces the backup time and impact on NAS environments and enables fast, single-­‐step, file-­‐level recovery. No additional level-­‐0 backups are required, saving time and minimizing disruption. Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node can support up to tens of millions of files per file system, and supports automated multi-­‐streaming to deliver maximum throughput (up to eight streams). Scaling is done by simply adding nodes. NetWorker NetWorker provides complete, centralized backup and recovery for legacy and modern applications. Known for its flexibility, NetWorker supports NAS, SAN, DAS, multiple operating systems, virtual and physical environments, business-­‐critical applications and databases, and many targets including disk, tape, VTL, dedupe storage, and cloud storage. NetWorker delivers high performance and security, and is integrated with block and file array-­‐based snapshots, continuous data protection, and VMware vStorage APIs for Data Protection. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 5 •
A key feature that ESG Lab tested is NetWorker’s snapshot management capability. Snapshots can provide point-­‐in-­‐time copies for fast recovery of corrupted or deleted data blocks as well as deliver more granular recovery time and recovery point objectives. NetWorker can create and manage snapshots for VNX, Isilon, and NetApp. It can also discover existing snapshots created by their native snapshot management tools and catalog them for full and granular recovery purposes. SourceOne Archiving EMC SourceOne is archiving software that provides flexible and highly scalable, policy-­‐based archiving of critical business information such as e-­‐mail, file, SharePoint, and social media content. By deploying archiving solutions, users can automatically move less valuable business data to less expensive storage tiers, saving on primary storage costs as well as improving server and network operational performance. SourceOne also enables users to perform efficient searches in a timely manner to meet compliance and e-­‐discovery needs and minimize legal risks. EMC Data Domain Systems Data Domain systems are highly scalable protection storage solutions that provide high-­‐speed deduplication for backup, archiving, and disaster recovery. Variable length deduplication minimizes backup and archive storage requirements, making Data Domain a cost-­‐effective, disk-­‐based tape alternative that keeps data more easily available. Data Domain systems are built with the Data Invulnerability Architecture for maximum reliability and data integrity, and the family of models can scale up to 55PB of logical capacity and one billion files in a namespace. They provide a wide range of backup options through support for NFS, CIFS, VTL, NDMP, and Data Domain Boost. In addition, Data Domain systems support both backup and archive data simultaneously, eliminating the need to buy and manage a separate archiving platform, as well as enabling global deduplication across both backup and archive data. Simple installation and easy management mean lower OpEx. Figure 2. Solution Overview: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 6 ESG Lab Validation ESG Lab performed hands-­‐on evaluation and testing of the EMC Data Protection Suite at EMC facilities in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. Testing was designed to demonstrate the flexibility and scalability the suite provides for protecting and archiving NAS environments using industry-­‐standard tools and methodologies. NAS Backups Using Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node is a network-­‐connected data protection appliance that sits between a NAS device and an Avamar server. It enables Avamar to communicate with the NAS device via the efficient network data management protocol (NDMP). The Accelerator Node receives NDMP data, deduplicates it, and sends it to the Avamar Data Store or to a Data Domain system for backup storage. ESG Lab Testing ESG Lab began exploring the capabilities of the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node by reviewing configuration elements and data protection processes with EMC subject matter experts. Figure 3 shows the details of the data protection workflow in an Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node configuration. The left side of Figure 3 shows the NAS appliance and its clients. In the middle of the figure is the network-­‐connected NDMP Accelerator, and to its right sits an Avamar server and Data Domain backup target. It should be noted that NDMP Accelerator configurations support a number of different NAS devices in its data protection schema including VNX and Isilon from EMC and the FAS series from NetApp. The solution also supports Avamar Data Stores and Data Domain systems as backup targets. Figure 3. Avamar Accelerator Node Architecture As shown on the left side of Figure 3, represented by the color-­‐coded block patterns just below the NAS appliance, the protection process starts with a full NDMP backup followed by perpetual incremental backups. Avamar only requires an initial full backup and uses subsequent incremental backups to create and store complete recovery points. On the Accelerator Node, with Avamar client code, the incoming NDMP data is deduplicated and sent in the required format to the components shown on the right side of Figure 3. The Avamar server receives and catalogs metadata for each backup and the Data Domain system receives and stores the actual backup data bits. It should be noted that the combination of the perpetual incremental backup schema and data deduplication offered in the solution helps to improve overall network efficiency by reducing the amount of data transferred during backups. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 7 Next, with the physical infrastructure in place, ESG Lab used the Avamar management interface to configure data protection jobs for each NAS device in our test environment: one Isilon and one VNX. Each device had two volumes populated with real-­‐world data. The data consisted of engineering and user home directory data copied from a production server. As shown in Figure 4, the Lab used the Avamar management interface to configure protection settings for each of the four volumes in the test environment. The layered screenshots in Figure 4 display dataset details for two backup jobs. The foreground screen shows backup information for the Isilon device including the volumes targeted for backup in the source data window, any exclusion or inclusions in the respective middle windows, and advanced settings displayed in the options window. The options window enables the configuration of more advanced settings such as selecting Data Domain systems as backup targets, setting the encryption level for DD-­‐Boost, and adjusting the number of backup streams. The background screenshots show similar data for the configured VNX backup job. Figure 4. Avamar Enterprise Manager Finally, ESG Lab used the defined Avamar NDMP configuration to run a number of backup jobs on our test dataset. The Lab then re-­‐ran the jobs using a traditional NDMP backup configuration. As shown in Figure 5, the results were used to compare the duration of traditional NDMP backups with Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node backups. Both test configurations leveraged a Data Domain system as the backup target. To start the performance testing, an initial level 0 full backup was run for all volumes on both the VNX and Isilon NAS devices using the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node and traditional NDMP configurations. Next, to simulate typical data change rates, new data was added to the test dataset. The new data was approximately 3% of the initial test dataset in size. After the new data was added to the test environment, level-­‐1 incremental backups were run on all volumes using both the Avamar accelerated and traditional NDMP configurations. To simulate a week’s worth of backups, the level-­‐1 process was repeated three more times for the traditional configuration and four more times for the Avamar configuration. For the traditional environment, the fourth incremental was replaced with a level-­‐0 full as would be the case in typical real-­‐world scheduling. Backup statistics including throughput, duration, and amount of data transferred were captured for a sample set of backup run. Figure 5 highlights the testing results for the Isilon NAS device in the test environment. ESG Lab recorded similar results for the VNX device. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 8 Figure 5. Traditional versus Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node Backup Duration What the Numbers Mean •
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The Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node configuration completed backups 2.55 times faster than the traditional configuration. The Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node configuration reduced backup times by 61%. With the Avamar incremental forever schema, backup windows improve over time as compared with traditional backups that require reoccurring full backups. A complete full backup image is created after each Avamar incremental backup for quick recovery. Why This Matters The continuing expansion of NAS data can put a huge strain on your infrastructure as well as your IT administrators. Traditional NDMP backups can take significantly longer than the available window, leaving data vulnerable and hindering production operations. Traditional solutions that use the “incremental forever” model are fine for the backup part, but can make restore difficult and slow. ESG Lab validated that the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node provided faster, consolidated, deduplicated backups for Isilon and VNX. The architecture enables full recovery points from incremental backups that are easy to restore and include granular recovery. In ESG Lab testing, using the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node resulted in 2.55 times faster backups and a 61% reduction in the time required to complete the backup jobs over traditional NDMP methods; this saves administrator time and frees up infrastructure, leading to cost reduction and minimizing network bandwidth consumption. Organizations with multiple file systems can achieve even greater performance with up to eight simultaneous streams. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 9 NetWorker Snapshot Management for NAS NetWorker snapshot management for NAS is the integration of the NAS snapshot process with the NetWorker management interface. It enables NetWorker to create and manage new snapshots or discover and leverage existing NAS snapshots for data protection. It supports EMC VNX and Isilon as well as NetApp FAS and connects these snapshot APIs to the NetWorker application. ESG Lab Testing ESG Lab started its testing of NetWorker Snapshot Management for NAS by reviewing the test bed configuration. As shown in Figure 6, NetWorker was configured in the environment with two NAS devices and a Data Domain system as the backup target. The left side of the figure shows the EMC Isilon and VNX NAS devices. The middle of the figure shows the NetWorker server and Storage Node. On the right side is the Data Domain system used as the backup storage target. The environment was designed to demonstrate the ability of the NetWorker application to manage Isilon and VNX snapshots as well as its ability to do LAN-­‐based NDMP backups to the consolidated Data Domain target. Figure 6. NetWorker Snapshot Management for NAS Architecture Figure 6 shows green and gray disk icons superimposed on each of the NAS appliances. The larger disk icons represent the production volumes set up for testing and populated with the test datasets. The three smaller disk icons represent snapshots of the production volumes. Two of the snapshots on each NAS appliance were created using the respective NAS management interface. The third snapshot was created by ESG Lab directly from the NetWorker management interface. Next, ESG Lab logged into the NetWorker version 8.2 server and navigated through the management interface to explore the new features. The Lab launched the Client Backup Configuration wizard to start the snapshot configuration process. For the client option, we selected one of the two existing NAS devices. Next, for client type, NAS Device was selected to configure a snapshot backup for a NAS device. The wizard intuitively directed us through the snapshot creation process. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 10 Next, as shown in Figure 7, ESG Lab used the NetWorker management interface to view device-­‐level environment details. The background screen capture in Figure 7 displays detailed information for three snapshots. Two of the snapshots are categorized as discovered, and the third is categorized as managed. The discovered snapshots were created through the Isilon management interface, while the VNX snapshot was created using NetWorker. All of the snapshots are cataloged in NetWorker and can be leveraged for data protection. As shown in the foreground Figure 7 screen capture, ESG Lab leveraged one of the discovered snapshots to run a recovery. The Lab launched the Recovery Configuration wizard and walked through the guided steps of a granular, file-­‐level restore. Figure 7. NetWorker Management Interface and Wizard Views Why This Matters Snapshots offer more granular RTOs and RPOs, enabling organizations to quickly recover from common problems such as accidental deletions. But if you have multiple NAS deployments—such as VNX, Isilon, and NetApp—all your snapshots must be managed separately. This is inefficient and ultimately drives up costs. NetWorker delivers a consolidated workflow for managing snapshots from various NAS deployments from a single console, enabling visibility and control for both storage and backup administrators. Administrators gain simple, wizard-­‐based configuration, a centralized catalog, policy-­‐based management and retention, consolidated monitoring and reporting, and granular restore of any snapshot created by NetWorker, Isilon, VNX, or NetApp. Backup admins can do file-­‐level recovery without assistance from the storage admin, ensuring better, faster business continuity. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 11 Efficient Platform for Backups and SourceOne Archiving Another benefit of the EMC solution is the opportunity to consolidate backup and archive data on a single platform using EMC SourceOne and Data Domain. Many organizations struggle to meet their NAS backup windows. SourceOne enables them to automatically move NAS data from production storage into an archive, reducing data volumes and shrinking backup windows, while maintaining seamless access when the data is needed. SourceOne is part of the EMC Data Protection Suite, and can send archive data to the same Data Domain disk target as backups. This enables not only simpler, more efficient management, but also greater storage efficiency through global deduplication. ESG Lab Testing ESG Lab tested this single platform using SourceOne for File Systems alongside the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node backups with the same Data Domain system. SourceOne leverages LAN-­‐connected “worker servers” that maintain a map of data residing on NAS and on Data Domain; these workers execute the data selection and movement to the disk target. Scaling is achieved by adding SourceOne servers. Archive data can be filtered by characteristics such as file type, and after, archiving data can be retained on the production storage, deleted, or replaced with shortcuts; data can also be augmented for automatic file tiering and stubbing. Figure 8 shows an overview of the test environment. The SourceOne application server and worker servers shared the network with the clients and NAS array. Isilon backups from the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node and SourceOne archive data were both sent to the Data Domain system, creating a consolidated platform with global deduplication. Figure 8. SourceOne Architecture Setting up SourceOne archiving was simple. First, ESG Lab created an archiving folder using the SourceOne GUI. We created a policy to archive all data, inserted the source data path names from the Isilon array, and mapped them to folders on the Data Domain system. Access to the Data Domain system was provide via CIFS share. Next, we created a new activity: File Archive Historical, which archived files located on the identified file shares. No data filtering was used. After creating an archive schedule and duration, the task was launched. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 12 Figure 9 shows the policy creation screen from the SourceOne File System Archiving management interface in the background. The foreground screenshot shows the File Archive activity selected, along with options for deleting, indexing, and file removal. Figure 9. SourceOne Management A key benefit of the single platform for backup and archive with Data Domain systems is the ability to globally deduplicate across both datasets within Data Domain. With Data Domain as a single deduplication pool, organizations gain the benefit of consolidated secondary storage with dramatically reduced capacity needs. Figure 10 shows the capacity reduction benefit with a typical workflow that includes a level-­‐0 backup, a level-­‐1 after 3% daily data change, and an archive. Production data is shown in blue, archive data in yellow, and daily changed data in green. The left-­‐most column represents 1.483TB that includes initial production data plus a 3% daily change. The middle column shows data under management: This includes the production and changed data, plus an archive run of 646GB.2 The column on the right shows how much actual capacity was used for all the data under management. 2
Note: The archive did not include certain large files such as ISO images. As a result, the archive included only 44% of the production data. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 13 Figure 10. Capacity Efficiency Environment Data UGlizaGon Summary (Reduced Protecfon Footprint with DataDomain) 2500 (GiB) 2000 1500 1000 500 0 Producfon Producfon Data Managed Archived Data Deduplicated Daily Changed Data What the Numbers Mean •
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Total production and changed data consumed: 1.483TB. Total data under management, including production data, changed data, and archive: 2.129TB. Total capacity used on the Data Domain system to store initial backup, incremental backups, and archive: 849.9GB, a capacity savings of 60%. Why This Matters ESG research indicates that primary storage is growing by 43% annually and secondary storage by 38% annually—
but your storage budget isn’t, and archiving can help.3 It’s not just for long-­‐term retention and discovery. It can help reduce storage needs by moving infrequently used data out of production volumes onto less expensive media; this also helps to speed backups. But many organizations don’t do it—some believe (mistakenly) that if they don’t have compliance requirements, they don't need to archive, while others don’t want another platform to buy and manage. ESG Lab validated the ability of the EMC Data Protection Suite to do NAS backups and SourceOne archiving to the same Data Domain target, consolidating backup and archive onto a single platform. This reduces the backup window by removing data from production; streamlines management; reduces the bandwidth need for replication and DR; and, using the highly scalable Data Domain with global deduplication, delivers additional capacity reduction benefits with combined (versus separate) deduplication of backups and archives. 3
Source: ESG Research Report, Backup and Archive Convergence Trends, April 2014. For additional information, view ESG Senior Analyst Jason Buffington’s video blog, Everyone Should Archive (period). © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 14 ESG Lab Validation Highlights þ ESG Lab was impressed with the efficiency and performance characteristics of the tested Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node configuration. The Lab observed the following metrics: o Level-­‐0 full backups delivered 130% more throughput over traditional NDMP backups. o Level-­‐1 incremental backups delivered 70% more throughput over traditional NDMP backups. þ Even though Avamar uses a perpetual incremental backup paradigm, complete recovery point images are created on the back-­‐end to facilitate quick restore. þ The Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node architecture offers significant design flexibility for network optimization via the perpetual incremental schema and its source-­‐side deduplication. þ ESG Lab believes the addition of the snapshot management capabilities for NAS will greatly improve NDMP backup efficiency for NetWorker customers. Now the efficiency of storage-­‐level snapshots can be seamlessly leveraged as part of the data protection schema, reducing the amount of data that needs to be moved across the network. þ ESG Lab believes that the all-­‐inclusive Data Protection Suite licensing model gives a customer the ability to choose the right components for their environment even if it lies outside of their current software solution. For example, a NetWorker customer can easily add an Avamar component into their environment to solve a problem, or vice versa. þ ESG Lab was impressed by the true global deduplication within the highly scalable Data Domain system. The ability to deduplicate in a single platform across datasets from multiple backup applications, as well as archive, delivers maximum capacity efficiency and cost reduction. Issues to Consider þ ESG Lab looks forward to seeing support for the snapshot management functionality covered in this validation expanded to include more NAS devices from more manufactures. þ The new front-­‐end capacity-­‐based licensing model helps bring a number of offerings together under one umbrella. However, ESG would like to see more integration at the software level, possibly even rolling up all the great protection features into a single enterprise backup application. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 15 The Bigger Truth It feels like we say this over and over again, but it remains true: Unstructured data volumes keep growing exponentially, with no sign of let up. It’s like the snow in Buffalo—you can’t imagine handling any more of it, but suddenly there it is. Most organizations are dealing with ever-­‐growing files and file systems made up of images, video, and everyday work files. As a result, NAS deployments proliferate and grow. Even business applications are increasingly using NAS instead of SAN storage. You know that protecting all this data is essential. That means backup/recovery software, servers, and disk targets also proliferate. Various types of backup software with different RTOs/RPOs and granularity are available to handle whatever use case you have, and as a result, some organizations end up with different protection platforms that they have to buy and manage. And when you add archiving into your protection plan, it means another platform and software application to manage. It’s inefficient, complicated, and cumbersome. But where the rubber really meets the road is when you need to expand your NAS deployment but cannot because of backup windows! If you can’t get your backups done in time to keep data from being vulnerable, then it’s way past time to find a solution that is easy to implement, doesn’t disrupt your current processes, reduces storage capacity needs, and improves performance. EMC makes this much easier with the Data Protection Suite, a consolidated set of backup/recovery/archiving solutions that is purchased in a bundle, with simple licensing based on front-­‐end capacity. You simply turn on whatever option you need. And the products within the suite are some of the best on the market. It includes NetWorker, the flagship protection application with massive flexibility to handle whatever data you have with whatever backup and restore requirements; Avamar deduplication backup software; SourceOne for archiving; Data Domain Boost for Enterprise Applications to offload some deduplication processing to the client; and Data Protection Advisor for unified visibility and reporting. Combine these with the Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node, which backs up faster than traditional NDMP and creates a daily full for restore, and you have a powerful solution for fast and efficient NAS backup and recovery. The EMC Data Protection Suite gives you access to whatever you need, and can be added to your existing protection schema. Equally important, the Data Domain deduplication storage system can be a consolidated target for your backup and archiving. It’s extremely scalable and deduplicates globally. The ability to consolidate backup and archiving on a single platform with a consolidated workflow delivers not just capacity efficiency, but management efficiency. Because you don’t have to buy and manage a separate platform for archiving, many organizations will find it much easier to finally implement archiving to reduce backup datasets, enabling faster backups and less disruption to production operations. NAS backup speed and capacity efficiency are essential. With the EMC Data Protection Suite, it’s all there at your fingertips, for whatever your NAS use case. The bundling and licensing make it easy—so, take a look at the additional EMC NAS backup solutions you might be missing for performance, capacity reduction, ease of use, and optimized restore. © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Lab Validation: EMC Data Protection Suite for File Applications 16 Appendix Table 1. ESG Lab Test Bed Data Protection and Archive Software Avamar NetWorker SourceOne for File Systems Version: 7.1 Version: 8.2 Version: 7.1 Data Protection and Archive Hardware Data Domain Avamar NDMP Accelerator Node Model: DD2500 Version 7.1 NAS Appliances VNX Isilon Model: 5400 Model: NL400 OneFS Version: 7.1 © 2015 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 20 Asylum Street | Milford, MA 01757 | Tel: 508.482.0188 Fax: 508.482.0218 | www.esg-­‐global.com