Veeam Storage Plugin for DataCore – Deepdive

Any questions, remarks or additions: melter[at]idicos.de

SANsymphony meets Veeam Backup and Replication – true love in the end!

In December 2019 the plugin for the popular DataCore SANsymphony SDS was finally released. And it is done in the only proper way: With full support and validation by Veeam.

In this article series we will cover several aspects of the plugin:

Continue reading “Veeam Storage Plugin for DataCore – Deepdive”

New Datacore Witness against Split-Brain scenario

DataCore SANsymphony offers software defined storage with transparent mirror in active/active mode.

Recently released version 10 PSP7 now supports a witness to avoid split-brain scenarios.

The Problem

In cases where both DataCore hosts (DC1, DC2) lose mirror (MIR) paths and LAN-connection, a split brain scenario occurs.

Both hosts remain functional and have a fully intact set of data on their storage. Both hosts can handle I/O from initiators in their (split) region. Both datastores receive writes that cannot be mirrored to the opposite site. Those changes cannot be synced if the mirror comes up again. Continue reading “New Datacore Witness against Split-Brain scenario”

How to leverage Veeam-Agent to protect physical servers from update failures

In a virtualized world, physical servers have become quite rare. However, some systems like hypervisors or storage-virtualizers need to be physical for obvious reasons.
If you have to upgrade or patch these systems, you’ll keep your fingers crossed and hope they will come up fully functional after the upgrade. You may wish to have a convenient backup or snapshot, like you’re used to in the virtualized world.

Veeam Agent

Actually there is already a solution for the Problem: Veeam Agent for Windows (aka “The Agent formerly known as Veeam-Endpoint”, or TAFKAV).  😉

This software does a very good job since it was released in April 2015. I’ve installed it on countless customers workstations so far. It protects my homelab, my notebook and also some difficult to replace installations on customer sites. The ability to use an existing Veeam-Backup repository makes it even more useful in an enterprise environment.

Veeam Agent 2.0 comes in three flavours: The free version, the Workstation version and the Server version. Workstation offers a similar set of features as the free version, but offers 24/7 support and centralized management. The server version offers application consistent backups including log-truncation. Continue reading “How to leverage Veeam-Agent to protect physical servers from update failures”