jriggin Posted August 18, 2008 Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 I have a problem with a specific server backing up very slowly. It's currently running Exchange & AD. If I reboot the server the Exchange store and the drives will backup fairly quickly, however as the week goes on the backup becomes VERY slow. For example, today I started a backup of the D:\ drive (44GB) and 7~ hours later it's still running and it's only half way done. The Exchange store after a fresh reboot will take only 40 minutes - 1 hour to back up, but last night it took 3 1/2 hours. Any ideas on what could be causing it to gradually slow down? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 18, 2008 Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 What version of Retrospect? What operating System? How much physical RAM do you have? How much free space do you have on the CL disk? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 18, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 (edited) What version of Retrospect? What operating System? How much physical RAM do you have? How much free space do you have on the CL disk? Retrospect Version 7.6, the client is still at 7.5~ Windows 2003 Server On the server being backed up, C:\ 2.5GB Free, D: 63.1GB Free Physical Ram: 3.87GB (4) total, 1.6GB Free, /3GB enabled Edited August 18, 2008 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 18, 2008 Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 Retrospect requires between 5 and 10 GB of free disk space on the C: drive for each execution unit you are running. Only have 2.5GB free on the C: disk is going to have a direct impact on performance. If you can't free up space on the disk, the you should move the default Windows temporary directory to the D: disk. I am amazed you don't have tons of other problems with only 2.5 free on the C disk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 18, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 (edited) Retrospect requires between 5 and 10 GB of free disk space on the C: drive for each execution unit you are running. Only have 2.5GB free on the C: disk is going to have a direct impact on performance. If you can't free up space on the disk, the you should move the default Windows temporary directory to the D: disk. I am amazed you don't have tons of other problems with only 2.5 free on the C disk. Misunderstood what you're saying. So when I'm doing a Retrospect backup of the D:\ on the source server, it's utilizing the temp directory on the C:\ of the source server? Edited August 18, 2008 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 18, 2008 Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 (edited) When you backup ANYTHING it uses temp space on the C: disk. It uses the temp space for scanning, matching, copying, comparing, compressing catalogs, client backup, grooming. Anything that needs more then a small out of memory. The temp space is used on the BACKUP SERVER not on the client or any other computer. Edited August 18, 2008 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 18, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 Why then would a reboot fix it temporarily? The disk space available isn't changing after a reboot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 18, 2008 Report Share Posted August 18, 2008 When you restart the computer it clears out memory caches and might even temporarily give you a little more disk space. Restart will give you more contiguous RAM availability too. Over time RAM will get fragmented and the virtual memory files will take up more disk space. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 29, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 When you restart the computer it clears out memory caches and might even temporarily give you a little more disk space. Restart will give you more contiguous RAM availability too. Over time RAM will get fragmented and the virtual memory files will take up more disk space. I moved the log files over to the D:\ which has over 50GB free space. Monday it backed up the exchange store and C:\ D:\ on the Exchange server in 40 minutes, the next day it was 1 hour and 40 minutes, Wednesday/Thursday it was around 2 hours and 40 minutes, and then today it took around 4:40 for the exchange store, and it's extremely slow on the C:\ and D:\ drive backups. I'm at a total loss. By next week it will most likely take around 10 hours to backup the exchange store alone. What could be causing this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 29, 2008 Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 Are you still under 5GB of free space on the C: disk, if so, that is part of the problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 29, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 Yes, we're under 5GB of free space, but this was never a problem until recently. The amount of free space on that server has always been within 1.7-2.5GB free space, and backups were fine until we started getting some transaction already complete errors, and very long backup times. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 29, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 Are you still under 5GB of free space on the C: disk, if so, that is part of the problem. I think I misunderstood and didn't read one part of your post. There is plenty of free space on the backup server. I've been referring to free disk space on the Exchange server. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted August 29, 2008 Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 If restarting the exchange server makes the backup go faster, then you are probably having some type of caching issue on the exchange server. I can't imagine a busy exchange server could be happy with less then 5 GB free on the C: disk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jriggin Posted August 29, 2008 Author Report Share Posted August 29, 2008 Wouldn't that depend on how you have the server configured? We don't have trans logs or anything stored on the C:\ drive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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