I'm managing Microsoft 365 backups for about 50 clients as an MSP, which involves dealing with dozens of terabytes of data and numerous mailboxes. Currently, we're utilizing Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 along with a Synology NAS as our NFS repository. While this setup has served us well, the Synology is nearing its end of life, and we've hit the limits on our Veeam licensing. It's time to rethink our strategy. I'm looking for advice on a few key points: Should we redesign our storage architecture—are there benefits to moving to cloud storage instead of keeping things on-premises? Since we're sticking with Veeam but need to handle license limits, what's the best way forward—should we deploy an additional Veeam server or add extra proxies? And if we stick with local storage, what solutions would be suitable for managing this workload? Any recommendations on systems like NetApp, Lenovo, or perhaps another Synology model? I'd love to hear what others in similar situations are using.
5 Answers
Have you thought about Veeam's newer cloud version? It offers unlimited storage, though the per-user licenses do cost a bit more. We switched to it recently, and it’s noticeably faster and easier than maintaining backups ourselves.
Though, switching to cloud means you're just backing up Microsoft to Microsoft, which might not be ideal for everyone.
I recommend looking into Synology's Active Backup for Office 365. It's cost-effective since there are no additional fees, and you can expand storage by daisy-chaining units. It also gives user access to self-restore, which is pretty handy.
Switching to a direct-to-cloud backup setup could really simplify things. A lot of MSPs cling to backing data to their datacenter, but options like Druva are reliable and let you set it and forget it.
If you're managing 50TB of data with around 3000 mailboxes, you’ll want a robust setup. Consider following Veeam's best practices; you might need four servers and an object storage solution to handle that load efficiently. Wasabi is an affordable option I’ve had good results with. Plus, switching to object storage has greatly reduced my backup issues.
Exactly! We automated our process and can onboard customers in under five minutes now. It saves so much time!
Just a heads up, backing up to NFS isn't supported with Veeam. You might want to look into targeting object storage, which allows for features like encryption and immutability. It also makes scaling easier if you use proxy pools. And if you opt for local storage, think about going with iSCSI rather than NFS—it can slow you down significantly without the benefits of object storage.
I mistakenly mentioned NFS too—it's actually NTFS that's being mounted. But I’m definitely leaning towards the Veeam Data Cloud solution.
I totally agree with this! The speed difference is definitely worth it.