hosted by Mario Blandini @ Drobo Backup and recovery as agile as the virtual machines being protected Approaches and architectures for protecting VMware virtual machines using image-based backup Special guest Jerome Boutaud Senior Virtualization Engineer @ Acronis April 17, 2012 1
Abstract & Background Session Abstract Backing up VMware can be done by most any software, but trying to backup VMs the same way as physical servers has its challenges Best backup is often using technology designed for virtualization New technology options can also be used for physical to virtual migrations and building new VMs in VMware vsphere Background on Expert Guest Jerome Boutaud Acronis is a leading provider of easy-to-use DR and data protection solutions across physical, virtual and cloud environments Jerome is has been working in IT for the past 10 years in mixed environments covering numerous OS's and virtualization platforms, focused on Backup and migration of physical systems and virtual environments 2
VMware Backup for SMBs Managing backup in VMware environments requires a new way of thinking Reducing backup storage utilization & storage cost requires new tiers of storage & new technology What do SMBs need for VMware Backup? Simple installation & ongoing operation Robust recovery that is repeatable Facilities for migrations of physical to virtual That solution in a cost effective model today & future 3
Strategies for Recovering a Virtual Machine Failover to Replica VM Run VM from Backup Traditional Full Restore Time to Recover Fastest Fast Slowest # of Versions One Multiple Multiple Disk space Large Small Small Individual Files No Yes Yes Works w/o datastore No Yes No Encryption, Dedup, & Compression No Yes Yes Each approach leverages VMware CBT for incremental backup All strategies provide best RTO/RPO when using disk for backup 4
Basic Architecture What You Will Need Severs, Network, & WAN likely already in place Reliable storage that is lower cost than primary for backup & offsite Backup Software that supports unique virtualization requirements With Deduplication / Compression in order to increase efficiency and lower cost LAN-free direct from shared storage, leverages VMware vstorage APIs for CBT 5
Requirements For SMB VMware Backup Reliable recovery Full-scale recovery, bare-metal + files Store backup images on a lower-cost tier No dependency on a specific type of machine or hardware Simple is better than Complex Simplified recovery that does not require lengthy procedures Quick install, obtains reliable backups every time Grows at the lowest possible cost with backup data 6
Leveraging a VMware Backup Solution Top concerns Cost of protecting an expanding data set Complexity of backup & especially recovery Evolving from physical to virtual of time Addressing Those Concerns in a Backup Solution Scalable disk-based backups w/ deduplication & compression Disk imaging technology for fast recovery of VMs Migration to facilitate moving from Physical to Virtual 7
Disk Imaging Technology / BMR Backup entire VMware ESXi host including binaries for vsphere Hypervisor & configuration settings Reduces time, risk and training necessary to rebuild and reconfigure a v5 / 4.1 ESX(i) server manually, including patches Recover ESXi host to same machine or dissimilar hardware Automatically creates documentation of steps to recover data 8
Replication for faster recovery Create and incrementally update a copy of a VM on another ESX(i) host for even faster recovery Recovery process is simple: just power on the replica VM Reduces downtime to minutes or seconds 9
Migration built-in to Backup Technology Reliably migrate physical machines to VMware virtual machines Supporting server consolidation projects V2V migrations from other hypervisors to a VMware VM E.G. Convert a VM running on the free VMware vsphere (ESXi) version to a purchased version of VMware vsphere, or Hyper-V to purchased VMware 10
Putting It Together Heterogeneous Backup Acronis vmprotect 7 Priced affordably at $499 per CPU / Socket Includes deduplication and unlimited migrations at no extra charge Install as Virtual Appliance or on a Windows machine Drobo iscsi SAN Storage for Business File Sharing storage can also work, though iscsi is more flexible in VMware environments Enterprise-grade 7200RPM SATA disk drives (recommended) 11
Questions & Key Takeaways Top Questions Virtual Appliance vs. Windows Server installation, when? Can different recovery strategies be used for different VMs? Can backups be made directly to offsite storage? Key Takeaways VMware backup has its challenges, and the best backup is often using technology designed for virtualization New technology options can also be used for physical to virtual migrations and building new VMs in VMware vsphere 12 Drobo iscsi + Acronis vmprotect 7 is a great solution for easy, low-cost VMware Backup
hosted by Mario Blandini @ Drobo Thank You For Participating! How-To Guide @ http://www.drobo.com/vmprotect Additional information + 15-day Free Trial @ http://www.acronis.com/enterprise/download/vmprotect/ + a special THANK YOU to our listeners and to expert guest Jerome Boutaud More info @ http://acronisinfo.com Twitter: acronis_virtual April 17, 2012 13