Question : Problem: Backup Advice Needed for Exchange Brick-level Mailbox backup.

Hello

I'm looking for advice on what to do with our backup. We use Veritas Backup Exec for Windows 10d to back up all of our servers to LTO3 tape. This happens over gigabit switch and is generally very fast.

We want to do brick level backup of our Exchange 2003 mailboxes, and we have the appropriate agents installed. This takes 13 hours to complete however, whereas the information store backup only takes 29 minutes to complete.

I have configured our antivirus software to stop scanning during the hours of the backup, and the Mailbox mangement process (defrag etc) starts at 2am. (the backup of mailboxes starts at 6.30 pm).

Does anyone have any ideas on how we can speed up the brick-level backup? I would be happy if it took half of the time, i.e. around 6 hours, but less would be better. I want to continue doing a full backup and want to continue the defrag nightly.

Answer : Problem: Backup Advice Needed for Exchange Brick-level Mailbox backup.

Brick-level backups are slow. There isn't much you can do to speed them up.

A lot of people will say you don't need them, but personally I find them useful. However I only run the brick-level backup once a week, and the backup software I use can fake a full backup using only a differential and the previous backup, which helps reduce the time taken.