SOLVED Use CrashPlan Plugin to Backup Other Computers?

[nello]

I use the free version of CrashPlan to back up all my computers to local storage on my FreeNAS server.

https://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/Latest/Backup/Backing_Up_To_Another_Computer_You_Own

My configuration consists of an iMac running CrashPlan and using FreeNAS for storage. (My LAN-based iMac also accepts WAN connections from other computers, including those of several family members, so that I can do remote backups when I travel with my laptops.) With this configuration, backups require both my iMac and FreeNAS server to be up. To improve reliability, I'd like to run CrashPlan directly from my FreeNAS server, thereby eliminating my iMac as a single point of failure.

I know there is a CrashPlan Plugin but I don't know how to configure it as a CrashPlan server. The documentation and tutorials I've seen show using the Plugin to run CrashPlan as a client to backup the FreeNAS server; I need to use the CrashPlan Plugin as a server to backup other computers to the FreeNAS server.

Is it possible to use the CrashPlan Plugin to backup other computers to the FreeNAS server?

Thank you for taking the time to read this post.

- nello

 

[nello]

This seems to do what I want:

http://techflow.io/blog/crashplan-plugin-for-freenas

It is based on:

• FreeNAS version 9.2.1 and
• CrashPlan plugin version 3.5.3_1

Any changes based on current versions?

Any better approaches?

- nello

 

[TooMuchData]

If I understood you correctly, you wanted Crashplan running on FreeNAS to backup your local computer. Have you accomplished that?

If so, is the plugin doing all the work or is Crashplan on your local computer sending the data to the Crashplan plugin?

Thank you for helping me understand the process.

 

[nello]

… you wanted Crashplan running on FreeNAS to backup your local computer. Have you accomplished that?

Yes.

If so, is the plugin doing all the work or is Crashplan on your local computer sending the data to the Crashplan plugin?

CrashPlan uses a client/server architecture. The client runs on the computer being backed up. The server runs on the computer that stores the backups. In my case, the server is the CrashPlan plugin running in a jail on my FreeNAS box.

So, you need to run CrashPlan on both computers.

 

[TooMuchData]

Thanks for responding.

As I assumed. But, if CP is running on both machines, how is that different/better than CP running only on the local computer (to be backed up) and using a FreeNAS share as the output for the backup?

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

There are at least 2 reasons:

1. CrashPlan can communicate computer to computer over WAN.
2. Archive maintenance - you want this to be done on local storage.

 

[nello]

…how is that different/better than CP running only on the local computer (to be backed up) and using a FreeNAS share as the output for the backup?

If you are backing up a single computer on your LAN, using a share point on FreeNAS as the backup destination works reliably in my experience. (Perhaps Robert Trevellyan can expand on the reasons that CrashPlan archive maintenance shouldn't be done on a share.)

My requirements for CrashPlan, however, included backing up my own computers while traveling as well as acting as a service for non-resident family members to back up their computers. In other words, the hitch was that I had to allow for WAN access.

Yes, I could have had one local computer mount a FreeNAS share point and have CrashPlan running on this local computer act as both a client for it's own backups as well as a server for remote backups. I did this for over a year and it was very reliable.

However, this architecture adds a single-point-of-failure. In other words, both the local computer as well as FreeNAS must be up in order for remote machines to do their backups; if either is down, then the remote computers can not backup. So, effectively, this architecture requires two servers running 24/7 instead of just one. By running CrashPlan in a Jail directly on FreeNAS, I can back up remote computers via the Internet with a single server. Ultimately, I put a UPS on my FreeNAS server as well as the ADSL modem and routers/switches that it uses and I've been very happy with the reliability, with the caveat that CrashPlan running on FreeNAS will always go down when Code42 updates CrashPlan.

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

CrashPlan archive maintenance is I/O intensive. If you have sufficient network bandwidth, or your archives aren't very large, this may not be an issue, but it's worth considering. Even maintaining an archive on an attached USB drive can be painful.

 

[nello]

CrashPlan archive maintenance is I/O intensive.

My FreeNAS did nothing but CrashPlan backups and I was not aware of any problems when I was backing up a half-dozen Macintoshes to a FreeNAS share. Obviously, we had different experiences.

Interestingly, Code42's warning against backing up to a share-mounted NAS are within it's statement that running CrashPlan on a NAS (using a headless configuration as the FreeNAS plugin does) is an unsupported use of the product.

http://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/Latest/Configuring/Using_CrashPlan_On_A_Headless_Computer

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

My reading of that page is that they support backup of mounted NAS shares by Linux and Mac clients (but not Windows). I see nothing there about backup using a mounted share for archive storage.

 

[depasseg]

There are multiple issues going on here. so I'll try to address them separately.

- The first is that any crashplan installation can both be a source and destination for backups. Meaning if you have a laptop with crashplan installed, you can backup to any attached storage, another machine of yours (internet connected somewhere) with crashplan installed, a friends machine (if they give you a code), and finally Crashplan in the cloud (for a fee).

- The second issue is is it better to have crashplan running directly on the NAS, or on a computer on the same network which has the NAS storage mounted somehow. It depends on the specs of the FreeNAS server. I'd say if your FN has a healthy CPU and at least 4GB of excess RAM (don't forget to adjust the java RAM settings in the crashplan config files), then go with installation directly on the FreeNAS. If you don't have the CPU and RAM, then look at at alternate machine, and mount a freenas share to it. This is where Robert's message comes into play. There is a problem with Windows and the service account that crashplan uses, which it is why it's not supported to configure crashplan on windows to back up to a CIFS share. You can however do this on Linux or Mac. Or do a kludgey workaround on Windows. I've run multi TB backups to a a couple of ReadyNas (both Pro 6 and a 516) units (8GB RAM, and Intel E5300 2.6Ghz CPU (dual core) and i3-3220 3.2GHz dual core, respectively) and it would bog down to the point of being non-responsive when doing archive maintenance. Anything with a couple 100 GB's was fine, but the maintenance on the 1+TB dataset was tough.