Hi Cheryl,

Have the Network Admins lock the switch port speed to 100Mbit and Full
Duplex and make sure the client NIC is set exactly the same on ALL the
servers.  The Unix boxes will need setting explicitly as Mark says, and a
file added to ensure they stay that way after a reboot.  (Your sysadmins
should know this....)

Most network switches always auto-negotiate to the lowest possible speed so
it's essential to lock this down.  Any decent network admin should know
this....

Are you running on a dedicated backup LAN? If there's no impact on other
systems there's absolutely no reason not to max out the ports and NICs.  

I'm not aware of any specific documentation that states that 100/Full should
be used but if performance sucks under autoneg and it flies under 100/Full
then there's your argument.  What tape drives are you using?  Are you using
SSO?

Cheers - Tim


Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2004 12:03:10 -0700
From: "King, Cheryl" <cheryl.king AT intrado DOT com>
To: "Veritas-Bu \(E-mail\)" <veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu>
Subject: [Veritas-bu] Is there an official document of client and server NIC
and switch settings

Over and over again we have problems with poor performance with new client
backups and restores.  Is there a document that says what the NIC settings
should be for each client type?  For example we have highest speed possible
for all of them, half duplex for HP, and full duplex for everything else, I
think (I haven't checked every system and wasn't here when some were
implemented).  Setting Auto detect on the switch seems to not work correctly
(causes slow performance).   I think the switches are set to match the
server, but have no way to verify that.  I'd like to be able to present an
official document to the System Administrators and the Network Engineers
that states the correct configuration requirements.  Does Veritas have such
a document or statement?

Is this a problem in other environments?  Is this just an issue in Veritas
Backup environments?  Are my SAs and Network Engineers not following some
industry, standard, best-practices?    I've been in IT for many years but
working with Veritas NBU for 1 year.  I don't recall ever having network
issues like this before.

NBU 4.5 FP5 Solaris 8 Master/Media
Clients OSF1_V5, HP-UX 11.00, HP-UX10.20, Windows2000, WindowsNT, RedHat2.4,
RedHat 2.2, Solaris8, Solaris7.

Thanks in advance.

Cheryl King


From: "Donaldson, Mark" <Mark.Donaldson AT experianems DOT com>
To: "'King, Cheryl'" <cheryl.king AT intrado DOT com>,
   "Veritas-Bu (E-mail)"
         <veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu>
Subject: RE: [Veritas-bu] Is there an official document of client and serv
        er NIC and switch settings
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2004 12:31:48 -0700

The network settings are outside Netbackup control.  

You should always set to your highest possible speeds.  For many
server/switch combinations, auto-negotiation fails to negotiate the highest
settings and they must often be forced to the best setting using ndd or
similar utilities.

Half-duplex performance stinks - are you sure that's what only what HP can
do?

Your network person should be able to query a smart-enough switch for the
switch port settings, the SA should be able to query the ethernet port for
the same settings.  


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