Daughters of Charity Health Systems Removes Virtualization Backup Bottlenecks with Data Domain
On the surface, the idea of transitioning from tape-based to disk-based backup sounds relatively straightforward. But managing backups across multiple sites takes on a life of its own with virtualized machine (VM) backup adding yet another level of complexity to the mix. It is when the Daughters of Charity Health Systems (DCHS) considered this mix of variables and who was in the best position to ensure success that it opted to roll out Data Domain in its environment.
In a previous blog entry, I discussed with DCHS IT Director, Michael Day, the unique challenges that DCHS faced and how it established what its new criteria were for its new backup solution. Having evaluated that data, DCHS came to the determination that Data Domain was the right choice so it began its Data Domain system roll-out began in June 2010.
DCHS deployed a DD630 (logical capacity of 420 TB) at each of its four remote sites. It then deployed a DD690 (logical capacity of up to 1.7 PB) at its two primary data centers in San Jose and Los Angeles, CA, as well as at a data center in Plano, TX.
To make the transition to Data Domain as seamless as possible, the DD630 and DD690 systems were configured as virtual tape libraries (VTLs). Since DCHS was using NetWorker to first cache data to disk before de-staging it to tape, it only had to connect the Data Domain systems to its local Fibre Channel SAN and then configure NetWorker to use the native VTL services offered by the Data Domain solution. Once that was completed, NetWorker could begin to direct the flow of backup data to Data Domain.
DCHS immediately saw the benefits of using deduplication in its environment. The remote Data Domain systems achieve nearly 20:1 deduplication ratios across protected applications with two of the remote sites able to store 96 TB of raw backup data on just 5.4 TB of usable storage.
Introducing deduplication also enabled DCHS to completely eliminate its tape problems as well as significantly reduce the replication overhead on its WAN links. As Data Domain systems replicate only changed blocks of data as data is backed up, DCHS no longer has to stagger replication jobs.
This has reduced the amount of data replicated weekly over its WAN links from about 9 TBs to less than 400 GB. Further, all backup data is now kept online on disk which eliminated its concerns about tape library failures.
But just as importantly Data Domain has enabled DCHS to move ahead with its virtualization initiatives as its prior solution backup had become a bottleneck. Using Data Domain DCHS has gained new flexibility in backing up its growing virtual environment as well as moving virtual machines (VMs) from one site to another.
While DCHS could move VMs, it still had to worry about moving all of the data attached to each VM. Now, DCHS IT staff simply creates a backup of each VM and migrate its data from one site to another without saturating the WAN link resulting in DCHS accelerating its DR initiatives.
Second, DCHS has greatly improved the quality of service it offers to its internal customers. Since all data now remains on disk, restores take only minutes instead of hours plus administrators can easily do these restores from home by recovering data from deduplicated disk.
Finally, DCHS improved the quality of life of its IT staff. Since implementing Data Domain systems and managing backups through NetWorker, they have moved out of "fire fighting mode" into a proactive mode.
This ultimately gave DCHS what it originally set out to accomplish technically: more time to tackle DR and security initiatives and less time dealing with tactical issues such as failed backups, replication jobs or faulty tape libraries. But using Data Domain Day was also able to help DCHS better fulfill its mission of providing health care services to anyone regardless of their income level. In the case of DCHS, this may have been the most important objective of all.
The first blog entry in this two-part series discussed how DCHS's backup to tape troubles started it down the deduplicationi path.
In a previous blog entry, I discussed with DCHS IT Director, Michael Day, the unique challenges that DCHS faced and how it established what its new criteria were for its new backup solution. Having evaluated that data, DCHS came to the determination that Data Domain was the right choice so it began its Data Domain system roll-out began in June 2010.
DCHS deployed a DD630 (logical capacity of 420 TB) at each of its four remote sites. It then deployed a DD690 (logical capacity of up to 1.7 PB) at its two primary data centers in San Jose and Los Angeles, CA, as well as at a data center in Plano, TX.
To make the transition to Data Domain as seamless as possible, the DD630 and DD690 systems were configured as virtual tape libraries (VTLs). Since DCHS was using NetWorker to first cache data to disk before de-staging it to tape, it only had to connect the Data Domain systems to its local Fibre Channel SAN and then configure NetWorker to use the native VTL services offered by the Data Domain solution. Once that was completed, NetWorker could begin to direct the flow of backup data to Data Domain.
DCHS immediately saw the benefits of using deduplication in its environment. The remote Data Domain systems achieve nearly 20:1 deduplication ratios across protected applications with two of the remote sites able to store 96 TB of raw backup data on just 5.4 TB of usable storage.
Introducing deduplication also enabled DCHS to completely eliminate its tape problems as well as significantly reduce the replication overhead on its WAN links. As Data Domain systems replicate only changed blocks of data as data is backed up, DCHS no longer has to stagger replication jobs.
This has reduced the amount of data replicated weekly over its WAN links from about 9 TBs to less than 400 GB. Further, all backup data is now kept online on disk which eliminated its concerns about tape library failures.
But just as importantly Data Domain has enabled DCHS to move ahead with its virtualization initiatives as its prior solution backup had become a bottleneck. Using Data Domain DCHS has gained new flexibility in backing up its growing virtual environment as well as moving virtual machines (VMs) from one site to another.
While DCHS could move VMs, it still had to worry about moving all of the data attached to each VM. Now, DCHS IT staff simply creates a backup of each VM and migrate its data from one site to another without saturating the WAN link resulting in DCHS accelerating its DR initiatives.
Second, DCHS has greatly improved the quality of service it offers to its internal customers. Since all data now remains on disk, restores take only minutes instead of hours plus administrators can easily do these restores from home by recovering data from deduplicated disk.
Finally, DCHS improved the quality of life of its IT staff. Since implementing Data Domain systems and managing backups through NetWorker, they have moved out of "fire fighting mode" into a proactive mode.
This ultimately gave DCHS what it originally set out to accomplish technically: more time to tackle DR and security initiatives and less time dealing with tactical issues such as failed backups, replication jobs or faulty tape libraries. But using Data Domain Day was also able to help DCHS better fulfill its mission of providing health care services to anyone regardless of their income level. In the case of DCHS, this may have been the most important objective of all.
The first blog entry in this two-part series discussed how DCHS's backup to tape troubles started it down the deduplicationi path.
Data Domain has enabled DCHS to move ahead with its virtualization initiatives as its prior solution backup had become a bottleneck.