Procedures for adding external storage

Use these procedures to attach external storage directly to the Unitrends Backup VM and configure this storage on the Unitrends Backup appliance. Each SAN LUN or NAS share is added as a separate storage area.

Notes:   

• Unitrends recommends that you connect external storage to the hypervisor, rather than directly to the Unitrends Backup VM. Once you connect the SAN LUN or NAS share to the hypervisor, use the hypervisor to create virtual disks from this external storage, then use the procedures in Procedures for adding attached disk backup storage to add the disks to the Unitrends Backup VM.
• Attaching external storage directly to the appliance VM is not supported for Unitrends Backup on Nutanix AHV.

Before adding storage, be sure to review the recommendations in About adding backup storage to a Unitrends Backup appliance.

Procedures for adding external storage:

Use this procedure to connect a SAN LUN directly to the Unitrends Backup VM using the iSCSI protocol, and then configure this storage so it can be used by the Unitrends Backup appliance.

Note:  The appliance must be running release 9.0.0-12 or higher to use CHAP authentication.

1 Allocate a LUN on the SAN and expose it to the Unitrends Backup VM.
2 Log in to the appliance UI.
3 On the Configure > Appliances page, select your appliance.
4 Click the Storage tab.
5 Select Add Storage > iSCSI.
6 Enter a unique Name for the storage device. This name cannot contain spaces.
7 Enter the IP address of the SAN storage array in the Host field.
8 The default port used for iSCSI communication is 3260. If the LUN is configured to use a different port, enter it in the Port field.
9 Click Scan for targets to retrieve a list of targets on the remote storage array, then choose one from the list.

Notes:  If you do not see the LUN in the list, go to your SAN manager and check the following:

• Verify that you can see the Unitrends appliance in your SAN manager.
• Verify that you have a LUN assigned to the Unitrends appliance with the correct permissions.
• Check with your Storage Administrator for more information.
10 Click Scan for LUNs and select one from the list.

Note:  If you receive an error indicating CHAP authentication has failed, CHAP has been configured on the target and either CHAP has not been enabled on the Unitrends appliance, or the Unitrends CHAP credentials do not match those of the target. To configure the appliance to use CHAP, see To configure iSCSI CHAP authentication.

11 Click Save.

The storage is added as a separate device. To store backups on this device, select it when creating backup jobs. See Creating backup jobs for details.

Use this procedure to connect a SAN LUN directly to the Unitrends Backup VM using Fibre Channel, and then configure this storage so it can be used by the Unitrends Backup appliance.

1 Allocate a LUN on the SAN and expose it to the Unitrends Backup VM.
2 Log in to the appliance UI.
3 On the Configure > Appliances page, select your appliance.
4 Click the Storage tab.
5 Select Add Storage > FC.
6 Enter a unique Name for the storage device. This name cannot contain spaces.
7 Enter the IP address of the SAN storage array in the Host field.
8 Click Scan for targets to retrieve a list of targets on the remote storage array, then select one in the list.
9 Click Scan for LUNs and select one in the list.

Notes:  If you do not see the LUN in the list, go to your SAN manager and check the following:

• Verify that you can see the Unitrends appliance in your SAN manager.
• Verify that you have a LUN assigned to the Unitrends appliance with the correct permissions.
• You may need to reboot the Unitrends appliance to enable it to discover the storage device.
• Check with your Storage Administrator for more information.
10 Click Save.

The storage is added as a separate device. To store backups on this device, select it when creating backup jobs. See Creating backup jobs for details.

Note:  To remove the LUN from Fibre Channel storage on the Unitrends appliance, you must go to the SAN manager and indicate that the SAN should no longer use the LUN.

Use this procedure to connect a NAS share directly to the Unitrends Backup VM using the CIFS protocol, and then configure this storage so it can be used by the Unitrends Backup appliance.

1 Allocate a share on the NAS.
2 Log in to the appliance UI.
3 On the Configure > Appliances page, select your appliance.
4 Click the Storage tab.
5 Select Add Storage > CIFS.
6 Enter the required CIFS share information and click Save.

The storage is added as a separate device. To store backups on this device, select it when creating backup jobs. See Creating backup jobs for details.

Field

Description

Name

 Name of the storage. Cannot contain spaces.
Host IP address or hostname of the NAS share.
Port Contains the default CIFS port. To use a custom port, enter that port number.
Share Name Enter the full directory pathname of the NAS share.
Username (optional) If the share is configured for authentication, enter the domain username as user@domain.com.
Password (optional) If the share is configured for authentication, enter the password.

Use this procedure to connect a NAS share directly to the Unitrends Backup VM using the NFS protocol, and then configure this storage so it can be used by the Unitrends Backup appliance.

1 Allocate a share on the NAS.
2 Log in to the appliance UI.
3 On the Configure > Appliances page, select your appliance.
4 Click the Storage tab.
5 Select Add Storage > NFS.
6 Enter the required NFS share information and click Save.

The storage is added as a separate device. To store backups on this device, select it when creating backup jobs. See Creating backup jobs for details.

Field

Description

Name

Name of the storage. Cannot contain spaces.

Host

IP address or hostname of the NAS share.

Port

Contains the default NFS port. To use a custom port, enter that port number.

Share Name

Enter the full directory pathname of the NAS share.

Username (optional)

If the share is configured for authentication, enter the domain username as user@domain.com.

Password (optional)

If the share is configured for authentication, enter the password.