Any Veeam people in here?

Si. · 1 May 2018 at 08:09

HI.

Just setting up a Veeam solution for a client and wondered what peoples thoughts are on the storage. I'm using an ESX 6.5 cluster where the Veeam servers will be hosted, and a 100TB NAS that's being used for storage but I'm not sure if it's better connect the storage to the VMs via ESX, or direct connect them to the VMs vis iSCSI.

Any thoughts? Googling isn't bringing back a definitive solution. My current thought is to use ESX to present them to the VMs to make it easier to manage. (network is a pair of 10gb ports dedicated for storage traffic so LAN speed isn't a concern)

LizardKing · 1 May 2018 at 10:31

from a performance point of view i doubt there will be any difference, personally i'd go iscsi so the storage can easily be remapped/shared without to much hassle should anything happen to the VM.
Dont hold me to this but securing iscsi should be easier as well.

Lanz · 1 May 2018 at 10:44

What NAS is it?

Most issues that come through support are from NAS (CIFS) based repositories. If you can connect it directly via iscsi to the proxy servers that would be much better. Better still is not to use a NAS and just a chunky x86 server full of disks.

Si. · 1 May 2018 at 23:45

Maybe i wasn't clear.

I'm going to be using iSCSI, but is it best to connect iSCSI to the ESX Hosts, or iSCSI direct to the VM.

Caged · 2 May 2018 at 00:55

Add the NAS as an SMB target. If your VM environment goes down you don't want your backups to only be accessible with an iSCSI initiator or that but also inside a VMDK file.

glenimp617 · 2 May 2018 at 08:09

Si. said:
Maybe i wasn't clear.

I'm going to be using iSCSI, but is it best to connect iSCSI to the ESX Hosts, or iSCSI direct to the VM.

I was told by a consultant a couple of years ago to always use iscsi to the host, and never direct to the vm. Can't remember his reasons for it now......sorry not much help lol

Lanz · 2 May 2018 at 14:19

Caged said:
Add the NAS as an SMB target. If your VM environment goes down you don't want your backups to only be accessible with an iSCSI initiator or that but also inside a VMDK file.

Normally that would be wise, but Veeam proxy to NAS/SMB can be troublesome, its probably the biggest support issue they deal with.

Having your backups on VMFS is another barrier when all hell breaks loose and you're having to restore - your primary Veeam backups should be on the simplest storage/infra possible, copy jobs and archives can go on different platforms, but the primaries really need easy access.

in-guest iscsi has its own issues - vmotions/snapshots etc

The ideal solution would be to get physical server header for your NAS. Have VM proxies etc for hotadd, but keep your primary backups well away from your virtual infrastructure.