Backup solutions

[fabricesforzani]

Hi

I must find a backup software but dont knowq which one to choose

Free or not ?

[ShanVMLand]

My vote goes to VEEAM and esXpress...(Both are paid version) low version of esXpress seems to be free (I read it somewhere). Please check their portal

Shan

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[LarsLiljeroth]

Hi

I have been using Visioncore vRanger Pro for some years and it is very good in my oppinion.

They have just released a great new version. Also take a look at the new backup feature in vSphere ( Data Recovery )


Best regards

Lars Liljeroth

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[babyorange]

Hi,

I'm looking around for a good backup solution as well and stumbled across Symantec Backup Exec's "Backup Exec Agent for VMware Virtual Infrastructures". Further details can be found below.

Symantec Backup Exec for Windows Servers

http://www.symantec.com/business/backup-exec-for-windows-servers

Technical FAQ: Backup Exec 12.5 for VMware

http://eval.symantec.com/mktginfo/enterprise/other_resources/b-backupexec_12.5_faq_10-2008_69739.en-...

Has anyone tried it before or any comments on how it sizes to other's like Vizoncore, esXpress, etc?

TIA!

[Troy_Clavell]

Let me plug William Lam's script as well

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-8760

[AndreTheGiant]

>Has anyone tried it before or any comments on how it sizes to other's like Vizoncore, esXpress, etc?

This software are specific for virtualization and can work also without VCB.

This mean no script and feature that VCB doesn't provide, like incremental backup or block deduplication (in esXpress).

[petedr]

Thanks Shan for mentioning esXpress

Pete@esXpress

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[jfrantz]

I've got to give another big thumbs-up to esXpress. I've been using it for about two years and it is great - inexpensive, easy to use, flexible, and (most importantly) reliable. I just upgraded to 3.5 this week. Version 3.5 includes a deduplication virtual appliance and it is outstanding.

-Jeff

[babyorange]

Am reading the text for esXpress currently, thanks for pointing the direction. Seems like a cool product!

Would you guys be able to share on the configuration and environment which you are using it in? The number of ESX hosts being backed up, the type of backend storage used, whether you are backing up to FTP/SSH/NFS, the size of the largest VMDK being backed up, etc?

Thanks,

[JoJoGabor]

I really like anything that integrates with VCB when using in a SAN environment where the VCB proxy can backup straight off the SAN, however it doesnt scale very well - any environmnet larger than around 80VMs may struggle to finish backups within a nightly backup window.

vRanger is very simple to use, esxpress is a good product but take some more time to get used to.

[kchawk]

vRanger backing up to a DataDomain device. 60+ to 1 compression on Data Domain.

[FlEric]

Before you made a final decission i recommend you to consider that you also have a look on the restore speed.

Depending on your topologie you will have a different result of the restore speed..

For example on esXpress you have very fast backups but in the case of direct restores to the vmfs terrible slow restore speeds.. arround 8 - 30 MB/S depending on the actuall workload on the VMFS and your Hardware.

This is a point sometimes not communicated from the backup vendors...

Also keep in Mind that VSPHERE will bring a new backup VMWare Data Recovery running from VC with a usefull GUI which maybe outperform some of the existing Backup-Solutions especially esXpress due to a similar concept...

Regards

Eric

[dazole]

I just use netapp snapshots. quick backups, restores are as fast as your network. Since we are running everything over nfs, this was a dead simple, easy, free solution.

David

[babyorange]

Hi kchawk,

I was reading the vRange manual and if I understand correctly, it required both the VC administrator as well as ESX root passwords to work. This does seem to be on the securely dangerous side of things. Do you happen to know of any workaround that can remove this need?

Thanks,

[kchawk]

You can setup seperate accounts for vRanger to use non-root. We have an AD account that the backups run as for connecting to the VC, which also has access to our Data Domain device. To add the host you provide the root password so the job will run as root, however connections are made as the non-root user.