Retrospect 7.7; very slow backup on Windows 7, x64: only 30 MB/sec!

[StaffanC]

Hi!

 

Having a work station on a corporate network together with two client computers; used to run retrospect 7.6 Pro on XP SP2; Average backup speed roughly 300 MB/sec.

 

Bougth a new workstation, Dell Precision T7500 having Windows 7 Professional (x64). Upgraded to Retrospect 7.7 using the same backup configuration as before (Retrospect 7.6).

 

Started my first dackup when I left the office yesterday afternoon. I was very surpriced this morning since the average overnigth backup speeed was some 30 MB/sec.

 

My "Logged In User Account" have administrative priviliges on the corporate network as well as on the workstation itself; I've tried to run retrospect using a specified network account as well as the logged in user; same depressing result: 30 MB/sec.

 

The Dell Workstation is using two SAS discs configured as Raid 0. What can I do to get back to the "normal" backup speed I'm used to?

 

Some additional info:

 

I installed the Retrospect 7.7 x32 onto my old workstation and a Retrospect Client onto my new 64-bit workstation; a backup of my new workstation was performed at roughly 250 - 300 MB/sec! Explain that if you can

 

Cheers,

 

Staffan Carlsson

Solsta Design AB

Edited April 15, 2010 by Guest

[davie_chen]

How many files are backed up? What about backing up to a new disk media set?

[StaffanC]

Im backing up everything there is to backup on my three computers; were talking about 400 GB of information.

[derringer]

I'd like to clarify a few points:

 

300MB/sec is not really possible, so we need to figure out exactly what you are talking about. This would be 18000MB/min (which is what Retrospect quotes in its performance statistics,) and that is far from possible for a single workstation backup.

 

I have done extensive testing on extremely high end hardware and I am able to get somewhere around 10000 MB/min with 8 threads running to 6-10000 RPM disks in a high-end RAID0 array and using 4 Gigabit server ports incoming to the server, all close to saturated. But 18000 simply is not possible in Retrospect, and I say that regardless of what hardware you could possibly string together.

 

In fact, this test performance setup is running a Core i970 chip and has 6GB of DDR3-1850 memory with an Areca 1600 series Raid card. With that, I see sustained data transfers (FROM 8 SIMULTANEOUS EXECUTIONS,) of around 200 MB/s with spike of around 450MB/s, but it still doesn't reach what you've quoted.

 

To expound further, my testing shows that a single backup client, even running extremely fast SSD drives on the client end and backing up to the monster server I have described above, cannot crack 45MB/s (2600MB/min,) at its peak on a single large file. Do you mean MB/min, perchance?

[StaffanC]

Hi there!

 

And thanks for your efforts.

 

I meant 300 MB/min, of course. Sorry about that.

 

I must, however, forward an apology. There is nothing wrong with the 64-bit Retrospect 7.7 The whole issue is related to a problem with our local network. The 64-bit workstation is on a different segment than the other two Retrospect clients. The workstation segment seam to be having a bandwidth problem.

 

I attached my externel backup drive rack (Stardom) directly onto the USB-port on the 64-bit computor and, WOW, reached a 1400 MB/s backup speed. And, 1400 MB/min is quite enough for me, thank you

 

Sorry for the trouble I have caused you.

 

Kind regards,

 

Staffan Carlsson