This probably goes beyond support, so I am just testing this.

Here is a description of my environment.
We have a SQL 2000 server running on a Windows 2003 x64 VM. MDFs are located on a separate VMDK. LDFs are located on a separate VMDK. Both of these have been made independent persistent VMDKs, so they do not get snapshot.

Using the freeze scripts, I was able to use osql to call a stored procedure I created for backing up the databases on the VM, and then pause the MSSQLSERVER service so the snapshot can occur. Once the snapshot gets done, the MSSQLSERVER service is set to continue. This seems to be working very well without killing the applications on the VM that use the database instance.

I have not tested this in VDR yet. But I worry that deduplication may not matter here, since I am overwriting the same bak file for the backup of each database. WIll VDR be that smart and know what to do? Or will the block arrangement for that bit of data be completely different and it backs it up again?

Am I alone in this method? Can someone shed some insight?