With the release of VBR 12 several long-requested features were made available to the Veeam community. One of these was direct backup to object storage. In previous releases, backup to object was possible, but only through Move/Copy functionality built into Scale-Out Backup Repositories, meaning additional on-premises storage was required. Now in VBR 12 that’s no longer required, and users should be able to expect storage savings and a reduction in complexity and scalability for environments that typically see significant data footprint increases.
How to add an S3 Compatible Repository?
Adding an S3-compatible repository is a fairly simple process. First, launch the Veeam Backup & Replication console. Using the bottom left navigation menu, select “Backup Infrastructure”. Then, select “Backup Repositories” from the left-hand menu.
![vbr 12 console vbr 12 console](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Veeam-Backup-and-Replication-console.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Then, click “Add Repository” in the top menu. In the newly opened window, select “Object Storage”.
![VEEAM Backup add repository VEEAM Backup add repository](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-add-repository.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Select the object storage type. In this case, I will be connecting to S3-compatible storage hosted by a Ceph server in my lab, so I’ll select “S3 Compatible”.
![VEEAM Backup object storage VEEAM Backup object storage](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-object-storage.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Next, give the repository a name and description. If you’d like to limit the number of concurrent tasks on the repository, you can do so here as well.
![VEEAM Backup repository name VEEAM Backup repository name](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-repository-name.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Next, you’ll specify the service point, region, and access credentials. You can also specify a gateway server to route traffic through.
![VEEAM Backup service point VEEAM Backup service point](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-service-point.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Next, specify the bucket and folder that backups should write to. If you wish to set a limit on consumption or set an immutability period, you can do so here as well. Just like with Capacity and Archive Tier in a Scale-Out Repository, immutability requires the bucket to have S3 Object Lock enabled.
![VEEAM Backup bucket and folder VEEAM Backup bucket and folder](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-bucket-and-folder.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
On the next screen, the mount server and write cache folders are specified, just like with other repositories.
![VEEAM Backup mount server VEEAM Backup mount server](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-mount-server.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
Finally, there is a screen to review settings. If backups already exist on the repository being added, they can be imported at this time.
![VEEAM Backup review settings VEEAM Backup review settings](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-review-settings.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
After clicking Apply, the repository will be created and added to the configuration database. Once this has been completed, the repository can be used as a target for backups, either as a standalone repository or as a Scale-Out Backup Repository extent. In my case, I want to mirror the backups and send anything older than 14 days to Wasabi so I have them offsite, so I’ll be creating a Scale-Out repository. With Veeam Backup and Replication version 12, I could alternatively create a backup copy job pointed to a standalone Wasabi repository. This is made easier by Wasabi being added as a repository location, so I no longer have to input the service URL like in previous versions.
![VEEAM Backup apply settings VEEAM Backup apply settings](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-apply-settings.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
The process for creating a Scale-Out Backup Repository has remained mostly unchanged. First, I select the name and description of the SOBR, before selecting my performance tier extents. In this case, I chose the newly created repository.
![VEEAM Backup scale out backup repository VEEAM Backup scale out backup repository](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-scale-out-backup-repository.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
It seems that specifying between the data locality and performance placement policies has been retired, though this could be due to the fact that I am using a beta version of the software. Next, I configure the capacity tier. There is a change here. Namely, I can select multiple capacity tier extents just like what has been possible with the performance tier for years.
![VEEAM Backup capacity tier VEEAM Backup capacity tier](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-capacity-tier.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)
The rest of the process remains unchanged. Once the SOBR is created, I can create a backup job targeting the SOBR and start it. After creating and starting the backup job, I am seeing pretty good speeds, especially considering the Ceph cluster is only 6 disks and is not only the S3 target but also hosting the VMware datastore the VMs are located on.
![VEEAM Backup start job VEEAM Backup start job](https://efi6i6byzvk.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/VEEAM-Backup-start-job.jpg?lossy=1&ssl=1)