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Back up Deduplication Device Files

The procedure for including the deduplication device data and index files during a backup job is the same whether the device is locally or remotely connected to the Arcserve Backup server.

Note: If you are backing up data to a deduplication device, and Arcserve Backup is backing the deduplication device to another device, the data that is backed up on the deduplication device may not be complete on the other device. If you want to back up a deduplication device completely, you should back up the deduplication device while it is not in use by other jobs.

To back up deduplication device files

  1. Ensure that you have licensed the Arcserve Backup Agent for Open Files so that files in use can still be backed up. If the deduplication device is connected locally to the backup server, you must issue the license on the backup server.
  2. Ensure that the machine to which the deduplication device is connected supports VSS.
  3. Configure backup job options as usual:
    1. Select the deduplication data folder and index folder of the device you wish to back up. If these folders reside on different volumes as recommended, they are backed up to two different sessions.

      Note: Arcserve Backup lets you protect deduplication data when the data files and the index files reside on different computers. If you are using this approach, ensure that you specify the proper source nodes on the Backup Manager, Source tab.

    2. From the Global Options Operation tab, enable Back up deduplication device data/UDP RPS datastore data.
    3. From the Global Options Volume Shadow Copy Service tab, enable Use VSS and disable Revert to traditional backup if VSS fails. If you do not perform this step, then the backup job automatically enables this option when the backup job runs.
  4. Save and run the backup job as usual. For more information, see Backing up Data.

Note: The ca_backup command line utility does not support the process of backing up data that belongs to deduplication devices.