The document discusses the 3-2-1 backup rule and strategies for implementing it using tiered storage approaches. The 3-2-1 rule recommends having 3 copies of your data, stored on 2 different media types, with 1 copy stored offsite. The document then outlines a tiered approach using storage snapshots (Tier 0), a small fast local disk system (Tier 1), a larger cheaper disk system (Tier 2), and offsite archival (Tier 3) to provide redundancy, fast restores, extended retention, and offsite protection in line with the 3-2-1 rule.

1. The 3-2-1 rule
Mike Resseler
Product Strategist
| @mikeresseler | @veeamMike.Resseler@Veeam.com

2. Agenda

3. Why?

4. Why are we talking about this?
© 2015 Veeam Software. All rights reserved. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

5. Business Requirements
More
applications and
services faster
Lower
IT cost
Enable the
Always-On business
Modern Data Center
Virtualization Modern
storage
Cloud
Access from any place
any device
More and
better IT
services
Lower IT costs
1

6. Enable the
Always-On business
Modern Data Center
Lower operational
costs
Provision IT
services faster
Strengthen security
and control

7. More
applications and
services faster
Lower
IT cost
Enable the
Always-On business
Modern Data Center
Virtualization Modern storage Cloud
Lower operational
costs
Provision IT
services faster
Strengthen security
and control

8. More
applications and
services faster
Lower
IT cost
Enable the
Always-On business
Modern Data Center
Virtualization Modern storage Cloud
24/7 operations
No patience for
downtime and data loss
Growing amount
of data
Enable the Always-On BusinessTM
The 3-2-1 Rule

9. What is it?

10. History
• As far as we know it...
• Invented by Peter Krogh (photographer: dpbestflow.org/node/262)
There are two kinds of people in the world –
those who have had a hard drive failure,
and those who will

11. The 3-2-1 Rule
*Yes, technically “the cloud” is probably using a harddisk too
Three copies
One copy offsite
Two media types*

12. The 3-2-1 Rule

13. 3 Copies
You need (at least) 3 copies of your data

14. 2 Different Media
The data should be stored at least at 2 different media

15. 1 Offsite
1 of the copies should be offsite

16. 3 Copies

17. Choices
Production
storage

18. Different Media

19. Choices
Primary storage Primary storage
Backup storage

20. Offsite

21. Tape
• Best price per GB
• Does not consume power to be
stored
• Requires manual activities to be
sent offsite
• Restores are not satisfying for
demanding RTO

22. Remote Site
• All in the hands of the owner
• Disk based
• Staff needs to maintain two sites
• Capital expenses for building and
hardware rarely used

23. Co-location
• Same benefits as an owned remote site
• Rental of the “building”
• Again, staff need to maintain two sites
• Capital expenses for hardware that is
rarely used

24. “Cloud”
• No expense for building or hardware
• “Pay-as-you-go” model
• Reduce the complexity
• Seed and collect services for large
transfers
• Upload /Download
• What happens with your data
• RTO might be slow

25. Layers

26. Layers & Possibilities
• One solution fits all?
• Multiple layers is a better defense
• Why stop at 3-2-1?
• Think further

27. Tiered approach
• Sum the benefits
of different tiers
• Neutralize the limits
of each tier
• Statistics are your best friends
• Most of the restores come
from recent restore points
• Focus on your RTO, but design
around only the First Tier
of your data protection strategy
“Files are rarely re-opened. Over
66% are re-opened once and 95%
fewer than five times”
“Files re-opens are temporally
related.Over 60% of re-opens occur
within a minute of the first.”
Measurement and Analysis of Large-Scale Network File System Workloads
Andrew W. Leung, Shankar Pasupathy, Garth Goodson, Ethan L. Miller, 2008

28. Tier- (-1): Application protection
• Single point of failure (if the app fails…)
• Consume production storage (but limited)
• Leverages the application
• No impact on the hypervisor
• Fast restores!
• Possibly user restore possibilities
#1 GOAL: First defense starts within the application. E.g. SharePoint
deleted items & versioning, Email deleted items, AD deleted items, SQL
Log transaction…

29. Tier-0: Storage snapshots
• Single point of failure (inside the same storage
they protect)
• Consume precious production storage
• No application consistency (or hard to have)
• A volume contains multiple VMs
• Leverage performance of the storage
• Low impact on the hypervisor
• Fast restores! Content is non deduplicated
• With Veeam you can add application
consistency
#1 GOAL: High-frequency copies with low impact on production

30. Tier-1: Small and fast JBOD
• Hold few restore points
• The vast majority of restores come
from the last week
• A proper server with Windows or
Linux (runs Veeam Datamover locally)
• Multicore CPU and good amount
of RAM
• Local disks or DAS
• Mix SSD and HDD
#1 GOAL: Offer fast restores!!!

31. Tier-2: Large and cheap disk storage
Still local and on disk to allow decent RPO and RTO
Any disk solution with low $/GB
• SAN
• Deduplication appliance
• NAS
• Software solutions
• …
#1 GOAL: Extend retention period

32. Tier-3: Offsite archival
Can be added after Tier-2 or directly after Tier-1
#1 GOAL: Extend retention AND offer offsite protection
Tape
• Require manual activities to go
offsite
• Large amount of data can be moved
on restores
“Cloud”
• Directly reachable via Internet connection
• A dumb storage space or an active
component?
• Remote compute power allows direct
restores from cloud repositories

33. Overall design
Tier-0: Storage snapshots
Tier-1: Small and fast JBOD
Tier-2: Large and cheap disk storage
Tier-3: Offsite archival

34. I have a dream…
Production
storage

35. I have a dream…

36. Q&A

37. Thank you!