Planning SnapVault

Supported primary storage platforms

Supported NetApp filer-based SnapVault primary storage platforms include:

Filer platforms: Models F8x, F7xx, F8xx, F9xx running Data ONTAP 6.2 or later and with SnapVault license purchased.

Supported primary Open Systems platforms

Supported SnapVault Open Systems primary storage platforms include:

Windows 2000 with the Open Systems SnapVault module installed
Windows NT with the Open Systems SnapVault module installed
Solaris 2.6 or later with the Open Systems SnapVault module installed
HP-UX 10.20/11 or later with the Open Systems SnapVault module installed

Supported secondary storage platforms

SnapVault secondary storage platforms that support the all the features described in this chapter include:

NetApp NearStore R100 running Data ONTAP 6.4 and with a SnapVault secondary license purchased. This is the recommended platform.
NetApp filer platforms: Models F8xx, and F9xx running Data ONTAP 6.4 and with a SnapVault secondary license purchased

Planning primary and secondary qtree locations

Some planning of your primary system qtrees or Open Systems directories and their corresponding secondary system qtrees is helpful. Multiple primary system qtrees from multiple volumes and multiple Open Systems directories can all be backed up to corresponding secondary system qtrees in a single volume. The maximum number of secondary system qtrees per volume is 255.

Primary system qtree or directory location example

Corresponding Secondary system qtree location example

filerA:/vol/vol1/qtreeAA

sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeAA

filerA:/vol/vol1/qtreeAB

sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeAB

filerB:/vol/vol1/qtreeBB

sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeBB

winsrvrA:c:\melzdir

sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/melzdir

ux_srvrB:/usrs/moz_acct

sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/moz_acct

Primary system qtree or directory location example	Corresponding Secondary system qtree location example
filerA:/vol/vol1/qtreeAA	sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeAA
filerA:/vol/vol1/qtreeAB	sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeAB
filerB:/vol/vol1/qtreeBB	sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/qtreeBB
winsrvrA:c:\melzdir	sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/melzdir
ux_srvrB:/usrs/moz_acct	sv_secondary:/vol/sv_vol/moz_acct

Planning SnapVault backup schedule and snapshot retention

On the filer-based primary systems and the SnapVault secondary storage system, the data to be backed up is captured and preserved in snapshots.

On your filer-based primary storage systems, plan at what intervals to create SnapVault snapshots of your primary system qtrees.
Note
On Open Systems primary storage platforms, snapshot planning and creation does not apply.
On your SnapVault secondary system, plan at what intervals you want to update your secondary system qtrees with data transferred from filer and Open Systems primary storage platforms, and create SnapVault snapshots to retain that information.
Plan how to limit the combined total of snapshots retained on any one volume of the SnapVault secondary system to 251 or fewer.
Caution
The combined total of snapshots retained on each volume of the SnapVault secondary storage system cannot exceed 251. If the number of snapshots per volume limit is reached and the old snapshots are not deleted, SnapVault will not create new snapshots on that volume.

Before you start SnapVault configuration, use a table like the one below to plan how many snapshots you want per volume, when you want them updated, and how many of each you want to keep. For example:

Hourly (periodically throughout the day)
Does the data change often enough throughout the day to make it worthwhile to create a snapshot every hour or every two hours or every four hours?
Nightly
Do you want to create a snapshot every night or just workday nights?
Weekly
How many weekly snapshots is it useful to keep?

Snapshot intervals	Filer primary storage: when created	Filer primary storage: snapshots retained	Secondary storage: when created	Secondary storage: snapshots retained
weekly	sat @19	4	sat @ 21	8
nightly	mon-fri @19	10	mon-fri @20	60
hourly	@7-18	11	@8-19	120
Total	n/a	21	n/a	188

In the preceding example, the user is assumed to have 12 qtrees on the secondary storage system volume. On the secondary storage system, the user schedules

A weekly update every Saturday at 9:00 p.m. and keeps 8 of them
A daily update every Monday through Friday at 8:00 p.m and keeps 60 of them
An hourly update every hour from 8:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. and keeps 120 of them

The result in this example is that 188 snapshots are being kept in the SnapVault secondary storage system volume.

The limit on snapshots per volume is 251, so the 188 snapshots scheduled in this example do not exceed the volume limit.

If you need to retain more than 251 snapshots

If you determine that you need to retain more than 251 SnapVault snapshots on the SnapVault secondary storage system, you can configure additional volumes on the secondary storage system. Each additional volume can support 251 additional snapshots.

Estimating the initial backup time

The backup time required for the initial transfer of data from the primary storage system to the secondary storage system depends on the inode count of the primary data to be backed up. SnapVault can carry out initial backup at an approximate rate of 7 million inodes per hour (110,000 inodes per minute).