Best Practices for VMware and Hyper-V Backup

A look at the virtual environment, management tools,

and some tips!

Bill Kleyman, MISM, MCSA, CCA, VTSP5 – MTM Technologies Data Center Knowledge, BusinessWeek, InformationWeek, UBM DeusM, TechTarget

@QuadStack @Veeam @MTM_INC

LinkedIn.com/in/BillKleyman

Administrative points on this webinar

Questions ● Can use the virtual Q&A panel.

● This webinar is recorded and available for replay after a few days.

● At the end of the webinar, we can raise virtual hand for dialog

questions.

● Stick around until the end of the webinar!

− Winners will receive a choice of books!

Bill’s Content

Veeam information, wrap-up

The VM and Virtualization Backup Conversation

What’s happening in the industry ● More data

● More cloud

● More demand for resiliency

The rise of virtualization – and the need for creative backup options

Diversity and Planning ● Environment Efficiencies

● VM Consolidation

Today’s Agenda and Conversation Creating a plan for a virtual environment and the disk-based systems.

Understanding today’s data recovery demands and how VMs play a role.

Examining a distributed virtualization infrastructure – And how cloud computing fits in.

A quick look at new features within Hyper-V and VMware for VM backup and resiliency.

Considerations and best practices for disk-based backup in a virtual environment.

Creating a plan for virtual environments

and disk-based systems

The amount of data being backed up and the sources ● SAN

● File Servers

● Cloud-based storage

● Account for everything!

The data retention policies to be applied ● Remember the average life of a disk – SAN, NAS or other storage.

● Disk-based backup is great for short-term initiatives

● Have a good archiving strategy for longer term data retention.

● Consider the policies and your industry.

− Government

− Education

− Healthcare

Creating a plan for virtual environments

and disk-based systems – Cont…

Let intelligent deduplication help you out! ● Having a deduplication system is almost necessary in today’s virtual

infrastructure.

− Cut network traffic

− Deduplication at the block level

− Reclaim storage

− Cut virtual environment storage demands by over 70%

Management tools and feature considerations ● Data deduplication

● Data Archival

● VMware and Hyper-V integration (Hypervisor Agnostic)

Understanding today’s data recovery demands

and how VMs play a role

Set realistic Recovery Time Objectives ● Close to ‘0’ means more expensive

● Segment systems and allocate RTOs to the respective workload or VM.

● Prioritize data and the VM

Remember: DR doesn’t usually include history − Separate disk-based backup and regular backup jobs

Replication and data migration methodologies − Have dedicated bandwidth between data centers

− Create a replication and migration policy

− Use Site-to-Site replication features built into the backup software

Examining a distributed virtual infrastructure –

And how cloud computing fits in The Cloud

● Data center extensions

● DR and backup

● Multiple data points

Bandwidth considerations ● Data size

● WAN QoS

● Be aware of saturation

Data retention and cost considerations ● More data in the cloud means more cost

● Prioritize the data sets

● Create data retention policies

Examining a distributed virtual infrastructure –

And how cloud computing fits in – Cont…

Site-to-site replication ● Know the amount of data being replicated

● Look for network compression features

● Schedule the replication as needed:

− Synchronous

− Asynchronous

A look at the latest recovery and backup benefits

from Hyper-V and VMware Hyper-V 3.0 (Server 2012)

● Hyper-V Extensible switch

● Improved Live Migration

● Resource metering

● Hyper-V replica

VMware vSphere 5 ● Storage Improvements

● vSphere Storage API

● vSphere Auto Deploy

● vSphere High Availability

● vSphere vMotion

● vSphere Distributed Switch

● vCenter Site Recovery Manager

Considerations and best practices for disk-

based backup in a virtual environment.

Creating good documentation ● And have a good management platform

Use deduplication features ● Either native or third party

Configuring compression settings ● This is a must for site-to-site replication

Testing and maintenance ● Always have a good schedule in place

“Future-proof” your environment ● Be ready for today’s and tomorrow’s demands

Considerations and best practices for disk-

based backup in a virtual environment – Cont…

Understand how VSS functions ● VMware Tools drivers and support

Ease of use and training ● Get certifications, and learn the platform

Remember: Backups and Snapshots are very different ● Snapshots are for temporary use – Backups are for longer term

Always back up physical host and hypervisor configurations ● Have the info to rebuild the host – it saves time in an emergency

Backup VMs incrementally, and not at the same time ● Schedule backups wisely so as not to overwhelm the host or storage

Final thoughts

Q&A and wrap-up

One question to you!

More information:

● Veeam.com Veeam Forums @Veeam