Anyone using Acronis 10 with vSphere/ESXi 4?

[blautens]

Our vendor sold us vSphere Enterprise (not Enterprise +) with Acronis 10 Backup and Restore Virtual Edition licenses (the order was put together in the ESX 3.5 time frame - but when it came through vSphere 4 was already released).

I couldn't get Acronis installed and working. I had our vendor try and do it in their lab - they couldn't do it, either, and after a couple of weeks they said it's a known issue with Acronis 10 and vSphere/ESXi 4 - they said Acronis knows it doesn't work.

I haven't been able to verify this. I also haven't seen firm evidence anyone is using (or even tried) that combo. Sooooo....

Is anyone using Acronis 10 with vSphere and ESXi 4 or have any information about that combination?

The P2V and V2P, imaging, backup, etc, all look very nice...assuming it worked (and I'm told it used to - with ESX 3.5)...

[RParker]

Well that's very interesting, we used Acronis 9 enterprise, and it did work fine. I wonder what the problem is, we haven't used it in quite some time. Why can't you use vConverter?

I didn't particularly like Acronis, the Enterprise console was horrible, it wasn't fast ( like they said it would be) and I finally gave up trying to make it work. It's a great product.. if you are doing single desktops, not deployments. For that we use vConverter now with templates.

[blautens]

I do use vConverter - and it works quite fine 9 out of 10 times. But it doesn't do V2P, which may be needed when app vendors point the figure at the VM environment (we are a healthcare system - some app vendors are still fighting this, believe it or not).

I use VDR 1.10, for that matter, and it works most of the time...some of the time....errr, most of the time lately.

Plus if Acronis worked well, I was thinking about purchasing it for our enterprise desktop imaging/deployment (still using PowerQuest Deploy Center 5.5) and standardizing images to make it less confusing for others.

Did you use Acronis 9 with vSphere/ESXi 4?

[AntonVZhbankov]

>Why can't you use vConverter?

Last 10 times out of 10 vCenter Converter failed to P2V machines, both servers and workstations. The only machine I successfully migrated was migrated in 2 stages: first I made image with acronis 9 and then used it as a source for Converter.

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MCSA, MCTS, VCP, VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[RParker]

VM environment (we are a healthcare system - some app vendors are still fighting this, believe it or not).

Oh no I believe it, the trick is DON'T tell them you are on a VM. They really don't need to know. The problem I have with their "fight" is Windows is STILL Windows, nothing has changed, so why are they complaining about what it runs on? They program for Windows, period. It makes no sense they "don't support" VM Ware, great, you don't NEED to support VM WAre, support Windows, that's their function in life.



So when they ask what you are running, Windows, on Intel Hardware (AMD whatever) and give them the host specs, that's ALL they need to know. There is NO functionality in a VM that make's a Virtual Machine perform ANY different, not one. It just does it a little slower.... If anything VM's are more pure (no vendor drivers, no hardware firmware versions to worry about, no software / DLL hardware conflicts, no ancillary hardware like USB ports, Serial, Parallel, etc.. so why MORE companies don't simply adopt VM Ware is beyond me.

Did you use Acronis 9 with vSphere/ESXi 4?

Nah, should have clarified, ESX 3.5. I didn't like it overall, it worked fine and it works great on physical machines, but their Enterprise console needs a LOT of work.. driver / RAID support for one just isn't there. And Acronis isn't working for you NOW, so take the hint..

What's weird is it doesn't make sense it won't work. You put the CD in the VM drive, and boot it, and you are telling me that Acronis simply won't run?

[RParker]

> Last 10 times out of 10 vCenter Converter failed to P2V machines

Well I won't say vConverter is perfect but it worked way better than other P2V solutions I tried. Acronis works.. it's just DOG dlow, and they claim it's faster.. not sure how they tested it, and I their management is lacking, but it's a hassle to use a product when it doesn't support mainstream native hardware...

So vConverter may not be perfect, but our success / failure raitio was MUCH higher than that with P2V, I would say at least 80%. And the times it didn't work, was because of registry errors in Windows or Disk problems, so realistically vConverter is pretty solid.

[AntonVZhbankov]

>And the times it didn't work, was because of registry errors in Windows or Disk problems, so realistically vConverter is pretty solid.

I don't want to say that Converter is bad product. Maybe I just don't know how to cook it

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MCSA, MCTS, VCP, VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[s1xth]

@blautens - When you say you are using Acronis 10 Virtual Edition, are you using an agent inside the guest OS or are you using Acronis's ESX Appliance to backup running VM's on the host?

If you are doing the latter, which I believe is supported under the license you purchased you shouldnt have a problem. I have used Acronis's ESX Backup and Recovery 10 Appliance without a problem. I dont have it deployed anywhere but when it first came out I tried it out and worked without a problem.