Microsoft Azure Storage

Edit online

You can configure the Azure Blob storage location by referring the information given in this topic.

Before you begin

Note the following before configuring Azure Blob storage location:

  • The supported Azure account kinds are Storage and StorageV2 of Standard performance type. For details on creating a storage account, refer to the Microsoft article: Create a storage account.
  • Before you add the Azure storage account to the IBM® Storage Protect for Cloud interface, you must ensure your storage can be accessed by IBM Storage Protect for Cloud products. For details, refer to Allow IBM Storage Protect for Cloud Agent Servers to Access Your Storage Account.
  • If you use Microsoft Azure Blob Storage to store backup data for Azure VM and Azure Storage, navigate to Storage account > Settings > Configuration > Permitted scope for copy operations, and ensure the permitted scope for copy operations of the storage account used by the storage profile is properly configured as follows:
    • For the storage account within the same Microsoft Entra tenant, you can select the From storage accounts in the same Microsoft Entra tenant option.
    • For the storage account from a different Microsoft Entra tenant, ensure the From any storage account option is selected.
  • To help reduce storage costs, the backup data generated after October 2023 release will be automatically stored to the Microsoft Azure storage cold tier, if the retention period is more than 45 days.
  • If you are about to use your own Microsoft Azure Blob Storage as the storage location, IBM recommends using the device in the same Data Center as your IBM Storage Protect for Cloud tenant for the best network performance. For available data centers, refer to Microsoft Azure Cloud Platform.

Procedure

Complete the following steps:
  1. Storage Type – Select Microsoft Azure Blob Storage from the drop-down list.
  2. Access point – Enter the URL for the Blob Storage Service. The default URL is https://blob.core.windows.net.
  3. Note: The entered name must match an existing container.
    Container name – Enter the container name you wish to access.
  4. Account name – Enter the corresponding account name to access the specified container.
  5. Account key – Enter the corresponding account key to access the specified container.
  6. Advanced – Enter the following extended parameters if necessary. If you have multiple parameters to enter, use a semicolon (;) to separate the parameters. Refer to the instructions below to add parameters.
    • RetryInterval – Customize the retry interval when the network connection is interrupted. You are allowed to enter any positive integer between 0 and 2147483646 (the unit is in milliseconds). For example, RetryInterval=30000 means that it will try to reconnect every 30000 milliseconds.

      If you do not configure this parameter, the value is 30000 milliseconds by default.

    • RetryCount – Customize the reconnection times after the network connection is interrupted. You are allowed to enter any positive integer between 0 and 2147483646. For example, RetryCount=10 represents when the network connection is interrupted, it can reconnect at most 10 times.

      If you do not configure this parameter, the value is 6 by default.

  7. Click Save to save your storage. The storage path cannot be changed once saved, and the storage profile cannot be deleted once the storage has been applied to store the backup data for a region.