When to run a SnapManager backup

You need to balance the frequency of backups against any overhead incurred by the database verification process. In addition, you must ensure that no SnapManager operations overlap with each other.

Observe the following recommendations for scheduling backups and verifications:

Do not schedule verifications on the Exchange server during peak usage hours.
The verification process is CPU-intensive and can degrade Exchange performance if you run it on the Exchange server during peak usage hours. To minimize the impact of backups on the client response time, run integrity verification during off-peak Exchange usage hours, or from a remote computer. Typical off-peak times are between 6:00 p.m and 7:00 a.m.
Balance the frequency of backups against any process of verification.
Do not schedule a backup when SnapManager performs database verification, even if you perform the verification on a remote verification computer.
This can result in a backup that you cannot delete easily.
You must schedule your backup operations such that they cannot be deleted before their SnapVault transfer to the secondary storage is complete.
For example, you configure a backup operation such that only two backup copies can be retained on the primary storage. You schedule them at 12 PM, 1 PM, 2 PM, and 3 PM. The backup operations take 3 hours before their SnapVault transfer to the secondary storage is complete. When the 3 PM backup operation is running, the 12 PM backup operation is still transferring. Hence SnapManager deletes the 1 PM backup, and the Protection Manager job fails as it fails to find the deleted 1 PM backup to transfer. You can avoid this by using number of days for local backup retention instead of using number of backup copies for local backup retention.
To upgrade the performance of your production server, run your database verification operations on a remote server.
More backup operations cause fewer transaction logs to be played forward during a restore operation.
Perform a minimum of one SnapManager full database backup every 24 hours.
Do not schedule any operation to overlap any other operation.
Only one SnapManager operation can be running on the same computer at the same time.
Back up the databases at the end of a migration process.
Any previous non-SnapManager backups are no longer valid after the migration process.
If you schedule backups in a cluster, schedule them on only one node.
If a virtual server fails over to another node, that performs the scheduled backup. If the entire node fails, reschedule the backups.
Be sure to reschedule the scheduled jobs that are affected by any changes you make in the configuration. Update the cmdlet parameters manually because they are hard coded in the scheduler.