VMware ESX/ESXi Backup Guide

AID: 5414

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Byhanccocka
TypeFAQs
Posted on2011-05-09 at 08:04:45

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VMware ESX/ESXi Backup Guide

If you have a licensed version of ESX/ESXi, (paid for license) you could purchase the following third party applications to perform backups. If you do not have a licensed version of ESX/ESXi, your options are limited, because a non-licensed (paid for) version does not give access to the licensed APIs for third party products to function. You will there for need at least a Standard license for ESX/ESXi for the following products listed in 1 to 3 below.

1. Veeam Backup and Replication v5 - very popular, won many awards at VMworld 2010

Download a trial here - http://www.veeam.com/vmware-esx-backup.html

2. Quest Vizioncore Vranger Pro - the first VM backup product with a good pedigree.

Download a trial here - http://vizioncore.com/product/vRangerPro

3. PHD Virtual Backup - very fast backup technology, using virtual applicance.

Download a trial here - http://www.phdvirtual.com/phd-vb-51-vmware-vsphere

4. VMware Data Recovery - supports dedupe, integrated with vCenter - maybe included with your current VMware License (available in vSphere Enterprise Plus, Advanced, and Essentials Plus Editions. VMware Data Recovery can also be purchased a la carte with vSphere Standard Edition.)

http://www.vmware.com/products/data-recovery/overview.html

Free (download) alternatives for backing up VMs

5. ghettoVCB

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-8760 ((Will work on FREE ESXi, no licensed required.)

(can be performed whilst the virtual machine is live or powered on)

6. ghettoVCBg2

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-9843 (needs licensed version of ESX/ESXi)

(can be performed whilst the virtual machine is live or powered on)

7. Scripts and NFS backup

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1029047 (Will work on FREE ESXi, no licensed required.)
(can be performed whilst the virtual machine is live or powered on)

8. VMware Converter Standalone 4.3

http://downloads.vmware.com/d/info/datacenter_downloads/vmware_vcenter_converter_standalone/4_0

VMware vCenter Converter Standalone 4.x Documentation

http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/converter_pubs.html

VMware vCenter Converter Standalone 4.3 User Guide
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/convsa_43_guide.pdf

With VMware Converter you can convert and copy a Virtual Machine to another datastore, this advantage is you can do this whilst the virtual machine is Online or Powered-Up.

9. Veeam FastSCP

Free download here http://www.veeam.com/vmware-esxi-fastscp.html

Fast Virtual Machine / File Transfer. Faster than WinSCP and other SCP-based tools as it uses full network capacity. The Veeam FastSCP engine also features traffic compression and empty block removal for best file copy performance.

You can use FastSCP to connect to the ESX/ESXi server, and download the entire virtual machine folder/directory to the current workstation or server, where yov've connected from. You must ensure that the virtual machines are powered off to complete this operation.

10. Datastore browser

The datastore browser is included in the vSphere GUI Client, and enables you access to the datastore, virtual machines are stored on. You can simple use the cut and paste, or download/upload options to backup and restore virtual machines. Again to copy a virtual machine, the virtual machine must be powered off.

Restoring with options 9 and 10, above, you must add the Virtual Machine manually to the inventory, by selecting the vmx file in the datastore browser, right click on the *.vmx file, and select "Add to Inventory".

Thank you for reading my article, please leave valuable feedback.

Asked On: 2011-05-09 at 08:04:45ID5414
Tags: VMware
,; ESX
,; ESXi
,; Backup
Topic: VMware
Views: 2542

About The Author

hanccocka

Experts Exchange Expert of the Year 2011, and VMware vExpert 2012, 2011 has 15 years of experience working as a VMware and Virtualization Consultant in the Virtualization industry. Has been working with all VMware products since ’98.

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Comments

Expert Comment

by: Iekos on 2011-07-20 at 14:54:41ID: 29952

Superb guide..

Thank you

Author Comment

by: hanccocka on 2011-07-20 at 14:58:27ID: 29953

@lekos Thanks

Expert Comment

by: aarontomosky on 2011-12-18 at 08:22:36ID: 33773

As far as paid solutions for paid esxi hosts with a deduplicated data store, do you have any thoughts on veeam, vmware data recovery, Acronis vmprotect? Am I forgetting any?
The pricing and features seem so similar without any real world experience.

Expert Comment

by: lucius_the on 2012-01-10 at 08:56:17ID: 34429

@aarontomosky: I've tried I think all of above, before reading this article. I would suggest the http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-8760. Payed solutions are somewhat pricy, and I didn't get a feeling it will do much more then this script does.

Author Comment

by: hanccocka on 2012-01-10 at 09:29:29ID: 34430

@aarontomosky: Sorry, I never saw this post.

VMware Data Recovery offers fanastic DeDupe. But is limited to how many servers and size of repo.

Veeam is great for DeDeupe and Replication.

@lucius_the The scripts provide no restore! No replication!

Expert Comment

by: lucius_the on 2012-01-10 at 09:34:27ID: 34432

@hanccocka: Essentially, you are right, yes. but you can easily recover by simply copying the files back to the datastore (using the datastore browser or the free Veeam FastSCP copy tool) on the recovered host, or any other host, then adding the VM to the inventory and powering up. It's really super simple to recover.

Author Comment

by: hanccocka on 2012-01-10 at 09:42:49ID: 34433

Experts can, but many Organisations perfer to use non-scripted solutions, and commercial products for their DR, rather than open source, it does not matter about the cost, if there is a Cost Benefit.

Author Comment

by: hanccocka on 2012-01-10 at 09:43:39ID: 34434

@lucius_the: you can!

but you would be surprised at those they cannot!

Expert Comment

by: lucius_the on 2012-01-10 at 09:44:35ID: 34435

@hanccocka: I agree. It entirely depends on who is managing it later on.

Expert Comment

by: aarontomosky on 2012-01-10 at 11:10:28ID: 34441

I'm running the trial of vmwaredr 2.0 now, super easy. Whole vm restore is really easy, dedupe datastore is quick and small. File recovery requires a vm with an app installed which is kinda weird but not terrible.

It was so simple I think il just go with it. I may check out Acronis at some point since I use it already for imaging laptops, but Acronis isn't all that stable in my opinion. They keep coming out with new versions burnout really fixing the tiny bugs with update failures and services failing to start.

Author Comment

by: hanccocka on 2012-01-10 at 11:15:28ID: 34443

Stick with vDR, Acronis years away at present!