When SQL Backup performs backups does it create any temporary workfiles on the C drive?

mpugh

We are experiencing issues on our DB server with the C drive filling up and consuming 20+GB of storage in a 5 minute window only to be released after the 5 minutes.  From this I conclude that the files are of a temporary nature.  We are struggling to track down what process is causing the problem.  Does SQL Backup perform any compression or encryption on the C drive during backups?  If the backups are to network shares, would the work files if used, be on the network share or on a drive local to the machine?

petey2

Just for further clarification, DURING the backup process, SQL Backup does not create any temporary files anywhere on the system.  All compression/encryption is done in-memory and written to the backup file(s) directly.  There are no 'work' files or 'temporary' files used to store any data prior to being written out to the  backup file(s).

This also applies for backups to network shares.  However, if you were backing up to a local share and then using the COPYTO option to copy to a network share, then yes, you would need space to hold the backup file(s) locally first, as Mac mentioned above.

Mac_F

Hello,

Thanks for your inquiry!

The compression occurs locally on the server performing the backup. The compressed backup file is then written to the network share / NAS.

So, you would still need space on the C drive for the temporary files used for the actual backup. 

For example: 

In order to backup a 6 TB database, you would need roughly 6.25 TB of hard drive space (the .25 TB would be for the OS and the application). 

I hope this helps.

Kind regards,

petey2

polikuj said:

A backup copy of the data is created and written to the physical backup device during the SQL Server database backup operation. So the message that SQL Backup does not create any temporary files on the system is false.

Could you please post some evidence that SQL Backup creates temporary files while it backs up a database?  Thanks.