Answer» - Storage Area Networks (SAN): The VMware Backup Host must be installed on a physical COMPUTER that has access to a Fibre Channel or iSCSI SAN that contains the virtual discs to be accessed. Because no data must be SENT through the production ESX/ESXi host, this is an efficient data channel. In this mode, the vStorage APIs get information about the structure of VMFS LUNs from the vCenter server or the ESX/ESXi host and then read data directly from the SAN or iSCSI LUN where the VMDK is stored.
- Local Area Network (LAN): The ESX/ESXi host reads data from storage and transmits it via a network to the VMware Backup Host in this mode. Unlike SAN transfer, this kind of TRANSPORT does require a LAN. The following are some of the benefits of LAN transport:
- Any storage device, whether local storage or NAS, can be used by the ESX/ESXi host.
- Because the VMware Backup server could be a virtual machine, you can use VMware vSphere's resource pool and scheduling capabilities to reduce the backup's performance impact. You can PUT the VMware Backup Host, for example, in a different resource pool than the production ESX/ESXi hosts, with a lower backup priority.
- If the ESX/ESXi host and the VMware Backup Host are on the same private network, you can use unencrypted data transfer instead of NBDSSL, which is faster and uses fewer resources. You can transport virtual machine data in an encrypted form using NBDSSL if you need to protect sensitive information.
- HotAdd: When running VMware Backup Host on a Virtual Machine, vStorage APIs can use the ESX/ESXi server's SCSI Hot-add feature to attach the VMDKs of a backed-up Virtual Machine to the VMware Backup Host. It's simple to move a virtual machine around, and it can back up local storage without utilising the LAN, however, this has a higher burden on the physical ESX/ESXi host than using SAN transport mode.
- Network Attached Storage (NAS): The VSA proxy computer can read data directly from the network file server using NAS.
|
