Requirements and recommendations

Supported operating systems

GNU/Linux FreeBSD Windows

All versions (kernel 2.6.16+, GLIBC 2.4+ with NPTL)

Minimum v12

Recommended:

Windows Server 2012 R2, 2016, 2019 and 2022

Supported file system types

The file system must be physical storage, connected as local storage or via an ISCSI target. Network-based file systems such as NFS, AFS or SMB are not suitable for storage node installation.

The following file system types are recommended:

  • Windows: NTFS
  • FreeBSD: ZFS RAIDZ-2
  • Linux: ext4 or ZFS

Storage Node Installer version

The storage node software must be compatible with the versions of backup devices hosted on it. Due to some major structural changes released at the beginning of 2017, backup devices running Backup Manager 17.0 or greater must have storage node software version 17.0 or greater. At the same time, devices powered by the older versions of the Backup Manager work well both on 16x and 17x storage nodes.

Recommended number of storage nodes

If your company has chosen to use private storage, you need to install several storage nodes to get started. If one of them becomes unavailable, its functions will be automatically transferred to another node so backups will continue running and the data will stay available for recovery.

Hardware recommendations

To create a storage node, you need a server with enough esources.

  • 2+ TB of free hard disk space (depends on the amount of data intended for backup as well as its retention period);
  • 2+ GB of RAM plus 1 extra GB for each additional TB of data.

If the amount of free space on a storage node goes below the default of 200 GB, the node status changes to "Full". It becomes impossible to create new devices on this node. All new backup data is redirected to free storage nodes. As older sessions are cleared according to the retention policy, some storage space frees up automatically. When the amount of free space reaches 300 GB (by default), the node status returns to "Free".

Storage virtualization recommendations

We recommend using the RAID storage virtualization technology.

Clusters

It is possible to use a SAN Cluster as a storage node. It must use ISCSI protocol.

Custom SSL Certificates

It is possible to use custom SSL certificates for software-only partner storage nodes.

  1. Create a valid SSL certificate, for example with Comodo or Verisign
  2. Create a server.key file
    • Put the private key of the new certificate into this file
  3. Merge domain certificate with CA bundle into a single server.crt file
    • For Windows storage nodes:
      1. Copy server.crt and server.key to C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf, replacing existing files
      2. Restart Cloud Storage Node Monitor service to apply changes
    • For Linux storage nodes:
      1. Copy server.crt and server.key to /opt/iaso-cloud/etc/nginx/ssl, replacing existing files
      2. restart the services with this command in terminal:

        sudo /etc/init.d/CloudStorageController restart

Generate Certificate Signing Request (CSR) for SSL certificates

Use the below steps to make the needed change:

  1. Open command prompt with administrator privileges and run the following commands (changing subj and domain in CN value with your information) 
    cd C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode
set OPENSSL_CONF=C:\users\remote\Documents\openssl.cnf.txt
						
openssl.exe req -sha256 -new -newkey rsa:2048 -nodes -subj "/C=US/ST=NC/L=Durham/O=LogicNowLimited/CN=backup01.company.com" -keyout "C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\new.server.key" -out "C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\new.server.csr"

    Check and confirm result CSR file with following execute:

    openssl.exe req -in "C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\new.server.csr" -noout -text
  2. Certificate from the CA should have PEM format. If intermediate certificates should be specified in addition to a primary certificate, they should be specified in the same file in the following order: The primary certificate comes first, then the intermediate certificates. Then you get certificate:
    1. Rename C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\server.key to C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\old.server.key
    2. Rename C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\new.server.key to C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\server.key
    3. Rename C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\server.crt to C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\old.server.crt
    4. Put new certificate into the C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx\conf\server.crt

      cd C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx

      nginx.exe -t

    5. Output "nginx: the configuration file C:\Program Files\CloudStorageNode\nginx/conf/nginx.conf syntax is ok" will confirm that new certificate set correctly
  3. Restart 'Clout Storage Node Monitor' service