TSM for VE upgrade considerations

[lightness]

Hi all,

Our current VMWare environment is at version 5.5 and we are planning to upgrade to version 6.5. We are running TSM server on Windows at version 7.1.5.0 and use TDP for VMWare version 7.1.6.2. I don't plan on upgrading the TSM server level at this time, but I assume I will need to upgrade the TDP for VMWare to a higher level (version 8.1.X??) to be compatible with VMWare 6.5. Could anyone give me some advice on the best level to go to, and any known issues to look out for?? Any information would be greatly appreciated.

 

[RecoveryOne]

Take a peek at http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21672351
Pay attention to your datamover OS level. You could run a 7.1.8.x
That said, I'm actually down level with my tdp4ve. I'm at 8.1.0 on VMWare 6.5 (upgraded from 6.0). My VM team got change approval before I've been able to get approval to upgrade the TDP side...

Anyhow, with the mismatch I've not seen any show stopping issues. VM's backup, full or file level restore works. Obviously your mileage may vary.

I believe your server and client level's won't matter. See http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21053218

Good luck!

 

[lightness]

Hi RecoveryOne,

Thanks for the reply. The datamover OS level is Windows 2012 R2. So your VM team upgraded first then you upgraded the TDP side?? Did you see any performance improvements with restores after upgrading??? Thanks again for the info.

 

[RecoveryOne]

My VM team upgraded to 6.5 yes, however my TDP side is still 8.1.0 on w2k12 r2, and TSM 7.1.7 on AIX.

Anyhow,
From my point of view, I can't say that I've seen any improvements (Performance or Success rates) as far as backups/restores go with a higher VMWare version.

On the flip side of things, I've been chasing after performance by modifying the vmmaxbackupsessions, VMMaxVirtualDisks, VMMAXParallel options of the dsm.opt file, and mucking with the schedule of all my clients (TDP and thick) to help streamline when things are backed up. I have enough freedom with schedules as my boxes are expected to backup between x and y times. And as long as I meet that, means I can shuffle when schedules run.

Not sure if your datamovers are physical or virtual but mine are virtual and my VM team did let me have an extra cpu for the datamovers after the upgrade. I think they are happier with the performance/auto migrations of VM's within the datacenter so there's likely behind the scene's goodness going on that has benefited.

I also do client side deduplication and compression and then ship all that to a directory container storage pool. Performing the work on the client side does have some performance tradeoff's, but I'm able to meet the obligations. Now, since my VM's (and datamovers) are all SSD backed, I found having a large dedupcachesize of 2GB beneficial.

In short, my metrics at this point in time are all made up, and I'm flying on intuition (shameless link: http://ibmsystemsmag.com/aix/administrator/performance/art-science-intuition-instinct/)! (That and my actlog history doesn't go back far enough to when we upgraded to VMWare 6.5)

Sorry, I know lot of fluff, no real substance.

 

[lightness]

Thank you very much for the information. Greatly appreciated.

 

[lightness]

My VM team upgraded to 6.5 yes, however my TDP side is still 8.1.0 on w2k12 r2, and TSM 7.1.7 on AIX.

Anyhow,
From my point of view, I can't say that I've seen any improvements (Performance or Success rates) as far as backups/restores go with a higher VMWare version.

On the flip side of things, I've been chasing after performance by modifying the vmmaxbackupsessions, VMMaxVirtualDisks, VMMAXParallel options of the dsm.opt file, and mucking with the schedule of all my clients (TDP and thick) to help streamline when things are backed up. I have enough freedom with schedules as my boxes are expected to backup between x and y times. And as long as I meet that, means I can shuffle when schedules run.

Not sure if your datamovers are physical or virtual but mine are virtual and my VM team did let me have an extra cpu for the datamovers after the upgrade. I think they are happier with the performance/auto migrations of VM's within the datacenter so there's likely behind the scene's goodness going on that has benefited.

I also do client side deduplication and compression and then ship all that to a directory container storage pool. Performing the work on the client side does have some performance tradeoff's, but I'm able to meet the obligations. Now, since my VM's (and datamovers) are all SSD backed, I found having a large dedupcachesize of 2GB beneficial.

In short, my metrics at this point in time are all made up, and I'm flying on intuition (shameless link: http://ibmsystemsmag.com/aix/administrator/performance/art-science-intuition-instinct/)! (That and my actlog history doesn't go back far enough to when we upgraded to VMWare 6.5)

Sorry, I know lot of fluff, no real substance.

What would you suggest as an upgrade strategy? Should I upgrade the TDP first, or wait until the VMWare version has been upgraded first then do the TSM upgrade???