Allocating Cores, RAM, and Hard Disk Space for Your Barracuda Message Archiver Vx

Last updated on 2022-01-06 12:08:16

This article refers to Barracuda Message Archiver Legacy Release firmware or higher.

Barracuda Networks recommends the following sizing for initial deployment of your virtual appliance, or upgrading existing installations.

Important: Additional disk space must be allocated before the Barracuda Message Archiver can process mail. If additional space is not allocated, archiving services are disabled. Be sure to perform a backup before attempting to allocate additional hard disk space. If possible, Barracuda Networks recommends a fresh deployment with migration.

Sizing CPU, RAM, and Disk Space for Your Barracuda Message Archiver Vx

Model	Cores - Recommended Minimum	RAM - Recommended Minimum	Maximum Storage
150 Vx	2	4GB	500GB
350 Vx	2	8GB	2TB
450 Vx	4	16GB	4TB
650 Vx	8	32GB	8TB
850 Vx	8	64GB	18TB
950 Vx	16	128GB	28TB
1050 Vx	16	256GB	66TB

Sizing

The most common mistake when designing an environment for a Barracuda Message Archiver Vx is to size for capacity as opposed to sizing for performance. Tasks such as Exchange message integration, PST import and export, and end-user search and retrieval can use a significant amount of system resources. When considering Barracuda Message Archiver deployment, it is best to take into account the use cases in addition to needed storage.

Allocating Cores

In your hypervisor, specify the number of cores to be used by the Barracuda Message Archiver Vx. The recommended minimum number of cores is listed in the table above.

To add cores to your appliance:

Shut down the Barracuda Message Archiver Vx in your hypervisor.
In the virtual machine CPU settings, add cores.
Your hypervisor license and version might limit the number of cores that you can specify for your appliance. In some cases, you must add cores in multiples of two.

Allocating Hard Drive Space

The Barracuda Message Archiver Vx ships with a 50GB virtual disk. You must allocate additional space to effectively deploy the virtual appliance:

Shut down the Barracuda Message Archiver Vx in your hypervisor.
Perform a backup of your virtual machine.
In your virtual machine settings, specify the new size for the hard disk or add a new hard disk.
Restart the virtual machine. As the appliance is booting up, view the console for the Barracuda Message Archiver Vx. When the blue Barracuda console screen appears and asks if you want to use the additional hard disk space, enter Yes.

If you do not respond to the prompt in 30 seconds, the answer defaults to No . Resizing can take several minutes, depending on the amount of hard disk space specified.

Next Step

For instructions on how to deploy the Barracuda Message Archiver Vx on supported hypervisors, see How to Deploy Barracuda Message Archiver Vx Images.