back up into many disks

  • Hello All,

    can you please help me to solve this issue

    I have a 400gb of data to take backup

    the back up of data should be split as below in different drives

    100 gb in x drive

    100 gb in y drive

    100 gb in z drive

    100 gb in d drive

    Thanks In Advance

  • Do you have a database of 400 GB? In general, its FULL backup won’t cross 100 GB size.

    Can you please explain how your database files are distributed on I/O subsystem For Example Primary file group on C: drive with XX size and Log on D: drive with YY size?

  • Dev (2/12/2012)


    Do you have a database of 400 GB? In general, its FULL backup won’t cross 100 GB size.

    A database of 400 GB will generally have a backup size under 100GB? Really?

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • Why are you so surprised?

  • Dev (2/12/2012)


    Why are you so surprised?

    Tell me exactly how a 400 GB database will generally have a full backup of under 100GB (and note that backup compression wasn't in SQL 2005)?

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • Hello All,

    400gb i had taken it as example

    i want to know how to split the database backup into multiple disks and how to restore them

  • GilaMonster (2/12/2012)


    Dev (2/12/2012)


    Why are you so surprised?

    Tell me exactly how a 400 GB database will generally have a full backup of under 100GB (and note that backup compression wasn't in SQL 2005)?

    How? I guess I don't know and you know it better but I can produce few figures... Just took a backup of 5 GB database (test).

    backup size with Compression: 13 MB

    backup size without Compression: 850 MB

  • mssql.dba (2/12/2012)


    i want to know how to split the database backup into multiple disks and how to restore them

    If you specify multiple destinations for your backup, the data will be striped evenly across them all. Be careful, you need all of the files to restore, lose one and the backup is useless.

    So if you want to stripe a backup over two files, it would be

    BACKUP DATABASE <database name> TO DISK = <destination 1>, DISK = <destination 2>;

    Restore is much the same way, specify multiple sources for the restore.

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • Dev (2/12/2012)


    GilaMonster (2/12/2012)


    Dev (2/12/2012)


    Why are you so surprised?

    Tell me exactly how a 400 GB database will generally have a full backup of under 100GB (and note that backup compression wasn't in SQL 2005)?

    How? I guess I don't know and you know it better but I can produce few figures... Just took a backup of 5 GB database (test).

    backup size with Compression: 13 MB

    backup size without Compression: 850 MB

    Compression didn't exist in SQL 2005 hence irrelevant in this thread.

    Those figures mean that your 5GB database is mostly empty space. It's mostly either log file or free extents within a data file. That's nice, but it's not something that's always or even generally true. A 400GB database that stores only 100 GB of data is a waste of space.

    If I have a 400GB database with a 350GB data file and a 50GB log file and the data file is 80% full, is its backup going to be under 100 GB (without compression, SQL 2005 did not have compression)?

    Let me give you another set of figures.

    Testing database, data file 3 GB in size. Uncompressed full backup 2.55GB.

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • Does it mean 1 TB database will have ~1 TB backups (FULL, without compression)? Let me add 2 DIFF backups (100 GB each) and few LOG backups (up-to 300 GB in a week) as well. As a best practice we must have backup preserved equivalent to 2 FULL backups (at least). So it’s approximately 3TB backups.

    If it's so, then duplicating database is better than taking backups.

  • Thanks you very much for the answer

  • Dev (2/12/2012)


    Does it mean 1 TB database will have ~1 TB backups (FULL, without compression)? Let me add 2 DIFF backups (100 GB each) and few LOG backups (up-to 300 GB in a week) as well. As a best practice we must have backup preserved equivalent to 2 FULL backups (at least). So it’s approximately 3TB backups.

    If it's so, then duplicating database is better than taking backups.

    But wait, you're making a HUGE assumption that a database size and the amount of data within it are either always the same or always wildly different. It completely depends on how people have configured their systems. I've seen it where a 100gb database consists of 20gb of data and I've seen it where a 100gb database consists of about 100gb of data. It's that configuration that matters. You can't just dismiss the concept that when someone says that they have a 400gb database that there might be as much as 400gb of data within it.

    So, your 1TB database may have 1TB of data within, in which case, yes, your backup is 1TB in size, but if it has less data, then the backup is less. What's the issue here?

    Just for clarity, what do you mean by "duplicating database is beter than taking backups"?

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
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  • Dev (2/12/2012)


    Does it mean 1 TB database will have ~1 TB backups (FULL, without compression)?

    If there's 1 TB of data in there, yes. How else would it work? 1 TB of data's not smaller when backed up than normally.

    If it's so, then duplicating database is better than taking backups.

    Huh?

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • So, your 1TB database may have 1TB of data within, in which case, yes, your backup is 1TB in size, but if it has less data, then the backup is less. What's the issue here?

    No issues at all. I was just trying to setup a formula for backup size estimation. It’s always good to know in advance that how much time & space a backup will take.

    Just for clarity, what do you mean by "duplicating database is beter than taking backups"?

    Hot / Warm standby servers.

  • Dev (2/13/2012)


    Just for clarity, what do you mean by "duplicating database is beter than taking backups"?

    Hot / Warm standby servers.

    Those are HA/DR, not backups. They're great for HA/DR, but pretty useless when you need to get last night's data.

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass

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