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User Manual: acronis Backup Advanced 11.7 - Backing Up Virtual Machines Free User Guide for Acronis Backup Software, Manual

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Acronis Backup Advanced
Version 11.7
APPLIES TO THE FOLLOWING PRODUCTS

Advanced for VMware / Hyper-V / RHEV / Citrix XenServer / Oracle VM

BACKING UP VIRTUAL MACHINES

Copyright Statement
Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016. All rights reserved.
“Acronis” and “Acronis Secure Zone” are registered trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.
"Acronis Compute with Confidence", “Acronis Startup Recovery Manager”, “Acronis Active Restore”,
“Acronis Instant Restore” and the Acronis logo are trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.
Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.
VMware and VMware Ready are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the
United States and/or other jurisdictions.
Windows and MS-DOS are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.
All other trademarks and copyrights referred to are the property of their respective owners.
Distribution of substantively modified versions of this document is prohibited without the explicit
permission of the copyright holder.
Distribution of this work or derivative work in any standard (paper) book form for commercial
purposes is prohibited unless prior permission is obtained from the copyright holder.
DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS,
REPRESENTATIONS AND WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE DISCLAIMED, EXCEPT TO THE
EXTENT THAT SUCH DISCLAIMERS ARE HELD TO BE LEGALLY INVALID.
Third party code may be provided with the Software and/or Service. The license terms for such
third-parties are detailed in the license.txt file located in the root installation directory. You can
always find the latest up-to-date list of the third party code and the associated license terms used
with the Software and/or Service at http://kb.acronis.com/content/7696

Acronis patented technologies
Technologies, used in this product, are covered and protected by one or more U.S. Patent Numbers:
7,047,380; 7,275,139; 7,281,104; 7,318,135; 7,353,355; 7,366,859; 7,475,282; 7,603,533; 7,636,824;
7,650,473; 7,721,138; 7,779,221; 7,831,789; 7,886,120; 7,895,403; 7,934,064; 7,937,612; 7,949,635;
7,953,948; 7,979,690; 8,005,797; 8,051,044; 8,069,320; 8,073,815; 8,074,035; 8,145,607; 8,180,984;
8,225,133; 8,261,035; 8,296,264; 8,312,259; 8,347,137; 8,484,427; 8,645,748; 8,732,121 and patent
pending applications.

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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

Table of contents
1

About this document .......................................................................................................4

2

Supported virtualization platforms ...................................................................................5

3

Backup at a hypervisor level .............................................................................................7

3.1

Features and capabilities ...........................................................................................................7

3.2

Limitations .................................................................................................................................8

3.3

What does a virtual machine backup store? .............................................................................9

3.4

Working in VMware vSphere .....................................................................................................9

3.4.1
3.4.2
3.4.3
3.4.4
3.4.5
3.4.6
3.4.7
3.4.8
3.4.9
3.4.10
3.4.11
3.4.12

3.5

Getting started with Agent for VMware........................................................................................................ 9
Installation of Agent for VMware................................................................................................................. 11
Operations with agents................................................................................................................................. 12
Flexible configuration of the agents ............................................................................................................ 14
Using a locally attached storage................................................................................................................... 15
Configuring ESX(i)-related options ............................................................................................................... 16
Support for VM migration ............................................................................................................................ 19
Support for datastore clusters and Storage DRS ........................................................................................ 19
Backing up fault tolerant machines ............................................................................................................. 20
Backing up independent disks and RDMs ................................................................................................... 20
Backing up virtual machine templates ........................................................................................................ 21
Privileges for VM backup and recovery ....................................................................................................... 21

Working in Microsoft Hyper-V .................................................................................................23

3.5.1
3.5.2
3.5.3
3.5.4
3.5.5

Getting started with Agent for Hyper-V ...................................................................................................... 23
Backing up clustered Hyper-V machines ..................................................................................................... 25
Backing up pass-through disks ..................................................................................................................... 26
Backing up and recovering a Hyper-V host ................................................................................................. 27
Support for Hyper-V 3.0................................................................................................................................ 28

3.6

Backing up Linux logical volumes and MD devices ..................................................................29

3.7

File-level recovery ....................................................................................................................30

3.8

Virtual machines on a management server .............................................................................31

3.9

VM-specific backup and recovery options...............................................................................32

3.9.1
3.9.2

Simultaneous VM backup ............................................................................................................................. 32
VM power management .............................................................................................................................. 33

3.10 Limitations for backup and recovery options ..........................................................................33
4

Backup from inside a guest OS ....................................................................................... 34

4.1

Working with Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization .....................................................................34

4.1.1
4.1.2
4.1.3
4.1.4

3

Overview of the RHEV platform ................................................................................................................... 34
How Acronis Backup works with RHEV ....................................................................................................... 35
Backup and recovery of RHEV virtual machines ......................................................................................... 36
Migrating a physical machine to a virtual machine .................................................................................... 41

Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

1 About this document
This document contains information that is specific for backup and recovery of virtual machines with
Acronis Backup.
For the most comprehensive information about the functionality provided by Acronis Backup, please
refer to
Acronis Backup Help
Web Help: http://www.acronis.com/en-us/support/documentation/AcronisBackup_11.7/
Built-in context-sensitive Help available in Acronis Backup Management Console by clicking the
question-mark button
.

For the purpose of convenience, this information is also presented in other sources. Use the ones
that correspond to your preferences.
Installation information
Installation Help available in your setup program by clicking View Installation Help.
Installation Guide for Acronis Backup Advanced:
http://www.acronis.com/en-us/download/docs/aba11.7/installguide

Information about the core functionality provided by Acronis Backup
User Guide for Acronis Backup Advanced:
http://www.acronis.com/en-us/download/docs/aba11.7/userguide

Command-line interface
Command-Line Reference: http://www.acronis.com/en-us/download/docs/ab11.7/cmdlineref

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2 Supported virtualization platforms
The following table summarizes how various virtualization platforms are supported by Acronis
Backup.
Platform

Backup at a hypervisor
level (p. 7)

Backup from inside a
guest OS (p. 34)

+

+

VMware
VMware vSphere versions: 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, and 6.0
VMware vSphere editions:
VMware vSphere Essentials
VMware vSphere Essentials Plus
VMware vSphere Standard*
VMware vSphere Advanced
VMware vSphere Enterprise
VMware vSphere Enterprise Plus
VMware vSphere Hypervisor (Free ESXi)**

+

VMware Server (VMware Virtual server)
VMware Workstation

+

VMware ACE
VMware Player
Microsoft
Windows Server 2008 (x64) with Hyper-V
Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V
Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008/2008 R2
Windows Server 2012/2012 R2 with Hyper-V
Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012/2012 R2

+

+

Windows 8, 8.1 (x64) with Hyper-V
Windows 10 with Hyper-V
Windows Server 2016 with Hyper-V
Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 and 2007
Windows Virtual PC
Microsoft Virtual Server 2005

+
+

Citrix
Citrix XenServer 4.1.5, 5.5, 5.6, 6.0, 6.1, 6.2, and
6.5

Only fully virtualized
(aka HVM) guests

Red Hat and Linux
Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization (RHEV) 2.2,
3.0, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, and 3.5
5

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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

Platform

Backup at a hypervisor
level (p. 7)

Backup from inside a
guest OS (p. 34)

Kernel-based Virtual Machines (KVM)

+

Parallels
Parallels Workstation

+

Parallels Server 4 Bare Metal

+

Oracle
Oracle VM Server 3.0 and 3.3

+

Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.x

+

* The Standard edition does not support Hot-add so backups may run slower.
** Backup at a hypervisor level is not supported for vSphere Hypervisor because this product
restricts access to Remote Command Line Interface (RCLI) to read-only mode. The agent works
during the vSphere Hypervisor evaluation period while no serial key is entered. Once you enter a
serial key, the agent stops functioning.

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3 Backup at a hypervisor level
Backup at a hypervisor level (also known as agent-less backup) means the ability to back up and
recover virtual machines without installing agents into the guest systems. This functionality becomes
available by using Acronis Backup Agent for VMware or Acronis Backup Agent for Hyper-V.
Agent for VMware can be imported or deployed to a VMware ESX(i) host as a virtual appliance.
Agent for VMware requires either of the following licenses to work:




Acronis Backup Advanced for VMware
Acronis Backup Advanced Universal License

Agent for Hyper-V needs to be installed directly on a Hyper-V host.
Agent for Hyper-V requires either of the following licenses to work:




Acronis Backup Advanced for Hyper-V
Acronis Backup Advanced Universal License

3.1

Features and capabilities

Backup at a hypervisor level includes the following main features and capabilities.



Disk-level backup
Backup of entire machines or individual disks or volumes.
During backup, a virtual machine can be running, stopped, suspended, or switching between the
three states.



Disk-level recovery
Recovery of entire machines, individual disks or volumes to a new or existing virtual machine.
A virtual machine has to be stopped during the recovery to this machine. By default, the software
stops the machine automatically.



File-level recovery (p. 30)
Recovery of individual files and folders to a network share, FTP or SFTP server.



Cluster support
Backup and recovery of clustered virtual machines.



Support for VMware vMotion (p. 19)/Microsoft Migration
A backup plan is executed no matter which host the machine is running on.



Simultaneous backups of virtual machines (p. 32)
An agent can simultaneously back up as many as 10 virtual machines. The exact number is
defined by the user.



Incremental conversion to a virtual machine
An agent can convert a disk-level backup to a virtual machine of the corresponding type: VMware
ESX(i) or Microsoft Hyper-V. Conversion of an incremental backup updates the machine instead
of creating it from scratch.



Flexible configuration of the agents (p. 14)
Applies to VMware vSphere only

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Protect your virtual environment with as many agents as you want, from one agent for each host
to one agent for each machine. The management server evenly distributes virtual machines
among the agents running within each host. Or, you can bind the agents (p. 17) with the
machines manually.



Automatic agent deployment (p. 16)
Applies to VMware vSphere only
Just include virtual machines in a backup plan. The agents will be deployed and configured in the
background if you allowed this when configuring integration with the vCenter Server.



Backup to a locally attached storage (p. 15)
Applies to VMware vSphere only
Add a dedicated virtual disk to Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) and do backups directly to
this storage, omitting LAN.



New Changed Block Tracking (CBT) (p. 18) developed by Acronis
Perform faster incremental and differential backups of ESX(i) virtual machines without using
VMware CBT.



Support for UEFI-based virtual machines
Back up and recover virtual machines that use Unified Extensible Hardware Interface (UEFI).
Convert a UEFI-based physical machine to a virtual machine that uses the same boot firmware.



Support for VM templates (p. 21)
Back up and recover virtual machine templates in the same way as normal ESX(i) virtual
machines.

3.2

Limitations

Sometimes, backup at a hypervisor level is not possible because of virtualization product or Acronis
Backup limitations.




Agent for VMware cannot back up fault tolerant virtual machines.



Microsoft Hyper-V does not provide control over pass-through disks to a host system. As a result,
the Microsoft Software Shadow Copy provider cannot provide Agent for Hyper-V with snapshots
of pass-through disks.

Agent for VMware cannot back up Raw Device Mapping (RDM) disks in physical compatibility
mode and independent disks.

To overcome these limitations, use backup from inside a guest OS (p. 34). Using this method, you can
also:






Execute pre/post backup or pre/post data capture commands within the guest operating system.



Use the backup and recovery options that are not effective for backup at a hypervisor level (p.
33).

Back up individual files and folders of a virtual machine.
Recover files to a virtual machine's file system.
Back up a guest system stored on a logical volume to be able to recover the machine to a
different platform.

For more details, please see the following sections:



8

Backing up independent disks and RDMs (p. 20)
Backing up pass-through disks (p. 26)
Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016




Backing up fault tolerant machines (p. 20)
Backing up Linux logical volumes and MD devices (p. 29)

3.3

What does a virtual machine backup store?

Backing up an entire virtual machine, its disks or volumes, results in a standard disk backup. A backup
created at a hypervisor level also stores the virtual machine configuration. This configuration will be
suggested by default when recovering the backup content to a new virtual machine.
You can recover disks and volumes from a virtual machine backup to a physical machine. Similarly,
you can recover disks or volumes from a physical machine backup to a new or existing virtual
machine. Hence, physical to virtual and virtual to physical machine migration becomes available.
With Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux, you can mount volumes from a virtual machine backup
and recover individual files from it.

3.4
3.4.1

Working in VMware vSphere
Getting started with Agent for VMware

This section describes how to start backing up ESX(i) virtual machines.

3.4.1.1

Prerequisites

Ensure that:




You have a vCenter Server that manages one or more ESX(i) hosts.



You have an appropriate number of Acronis Backup Advanced licenses (p. 7). Each ESX(i) host
whose virtual machines you want to back up requires a separate license. For a vSphere cluster,
you need as many licenses as there are hosts in the cluster.
To use the product in the trial mode, you do not need licenses.



You have a machine running Windows that will act as the management server. This machine
must be always turned on and available across the network. For system requirements, see the
installation documentation.

VMware Tools is installed on every virtual machine you want to back up. See installation
instructions later in this section.

 You downloaded the setup program of Acronis Backup Advanced.
To install VMware Tools
1.
2.
3.
4.

In VMware Infrastructure/vSphere Client, log on to the vCenter Server.
Select the virtual machine and run the guest operating system.
Right-click the virtual machine and select Guest > Install/Upgrade VMware Tools.
Follow the onscreen instructions.

3.4.1.2

Installation

In this step, you will install the management server. This will enable backing up the virtual machines
of the vCenter Server.
1. On the machine that will act as the management server, log on as an administrator and start the
setup program.
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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

2. Click Install Acronis Backup.
3. Accept the terms of the license agreement.
4. Select the Centrally monitor and configure the backing up of physical and virtual machines
check box.
5. Type all your license keys or import them from a text file.
6. Click Install.

3.4.1.3

Integration with the vCenter Server

In this step, you will integrate the management server with your vCenter Server. Integration enables
the management server to automatically deploy agents to ESX(i) hosts.
1. Start the management console, by clicking Acronis Backup on the desktop.
2. Click Connect to a management server. In Machine, type the name of the current machine.
3. In the Navigation pane, right-click Virtual machines, and then click Configure VMware vCenter
integration.
4. Specify the name or IP address of the vCenter Server, and the user name and password of a
vCenter Server administrator.
Note: If you want to specify a non-administrative user account, make sure that the account has the
appropriate privileges (p. 21).

5. Select the Automatically deploy Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) check box.
6. Click OK.
Result:




The All virtual machines view shows all virtual machines of the vCenter Server.
The virtual machines are shown as grayed out because Agent for VMware has not been deployed
yet. The agent will be deployed automatically after you select the virtual machines for backing
up.

3.4.1.4

Creating a centralized vault

In this step, you will create a centralized vault available across the network. This will enable easy
access to the backups.
1. In your network, choose a machine where you want to store the backed-up data. It can be the
machine where you installed the management server.
2. On the machine where you installed the management server, click Acronis Backup on the
desktop.
3. Click Connect to a management server. In Machine, type the name of the current machine.
4. On the Actions menu, click Create centralized vault.
5. In Name, type the name of the vault.
6. In Type, select Unmanaged.
7. Click Path and then specify the path to the network share where the backups will be stored. Click
OK. When prompted, provide access credentials for the shared folder.
8. Click OK. You can see the vault name in the Navigation tree under Vaults > Centralized. Click the
vault name to check its free space and contents.

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3.4.1.5

Backup and recovery

Backup
In this step, you will back up one or more virtual machines to the centralized vault you created.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

In the welcome screen, click Back up now.
Click Items to back up. In Data to back up, select Virtual machines.
Select the virtual machines that you want to back up.
Click Location, expand Vaults, and then specify the vault you have created.
Click OK to start backing up the virtual machines.

Result:



Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) is deployed on each host or cluster whose machines you
selected to back up.



The machines are backed up to the centralized vault you specified.

Recovery
In this step, you will recover the disks of a backed-up virtual machine to an existing virtual machine on
the vCenter Server.
1. In the Navigation tree, expand Vaults > Centralized and then select the vault where you saved
the archives. If prompted, provide access credentials for the vault.
2. In the Data view tab, in Show, select Disks.
3. Select the virtual machine that you want to recover. Under Versions, select a recovery point. By
default, the latest recovery point is selected.
Details. Instead of recovering the entire virtual machine, you can recover individual disks of it.
4. Click Recover.
5. Under Where to recover, in Recover to, select Existing virtual machine.
6. Click Select, and then select an existing virtual machine, either the same one you have backed up
(recommended for getting started), or a different one.
Details. The agent will automatically stop this virtual machine before starting the recovery to it.
The machine must be powered off during the recovery for the recovery task to succeed.
7. If required, do the following for every disk found in the backup:
a. Сlick Recover 'Disk N' to: and choose the destination disk from the disks of the existing
machine.
b. In NT signature, leave the default setting: Select automatically.
8. Click OK to immediately start the recovery.

3.4.2

Installation of Agent for VMware

Agent for VMware enables backup and recovery of ESX(i) virtual machines without installing agents
into the guest systems. The agent is delivered as a virtual appliance.

Preparation
We highly recommend that you install Acronis Backup Management Server prior to the Agent for
VMware installation.

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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

Installation
There are three methods of installing Agent for VMware:



Importing to a ESX(i) host as an OVF template.
Use this method for troubleshooting purposes or if you cannot install Acronis Backup
Management Server for some reason.



Deployment (p. 13) from Acronis Backup Management Server to a specified host or cluster.
Connect the console to the management server. In the Navigation tree, right click Virtual
machines, then click Deploy Agent for VMware. Refer to the context help for further
instructions.



Automatic deployment from Acronis Backup Management Server.
This is the easiest method. It is recommended in most cases. Connect the console to the
management server. In the Navigation tree, right click Virtual machines, and then click Configure
VMware vCenter integration. Specify the vCenter Server, and then enable Automatic
deployment. Any time a virtual machine is selected for backup but the agent is not installed on
its host, the Virtual Appliance will be automatically deployed on the host when the backup starts.

Providing licenses
Agent for VMware requires either of the following licenses to work:




Acronis Backup Advanced for VMware
Acronis Backup Advanced Universal License

The installation of the agent does not require a license. However, you must specify a license server
when installing the management server, or when connecting the console to the agent (if the agent
was imported manually). Once the agent starts backing up a virtual machine, the agent checks
whether the virtual machine's host has a license. If it does not have one, the agent takes a free
license from the specified license server and assigns it to the host. If the host is included in a cluster,
licenses will be assigned to all of the clustered hosts. Therefore, you need one license for each
clustered ESX(i). This ensures the uninterrupted operation of your backup plans when virtual
machines are moved around the cluster.

3.4.3

Operations with agents

This section explains how to deploy, update or remove Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) using
Acronis Backup Management Server.

3.4.3.1

Prerequisites

To perform operations described in this section, Acronis Backup Management Server uses a number
of TCP ports:




Ports 443 and 902 are used to access the vCenter Server and ESX(i) hosts.
Port 9876 is used to access Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance).

If the management server uses a custom firewall, ensure that this firewall allows outgoing
connections to these ports. Windows Firewall is configured automatically by Acronis Backup.
If the traffic from the management server to the vCenter Server, the ESX(i) hosts, or the agents goes
through a router or a similar network device, ensure that the device does not block this traffic.
No special configuration is required on the vCenter Server or the ESX(i) hosts.
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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

3.4.3.2

Deploying Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance)

If your host contains a big number of virtual machines, you may want to deploy one or more agents
in addition to the automatically deployed one. The instructions below will also help you deploy the
agent to a stand-alone ESX(i) host that is not managed by vCenter Server.

To deploy an additional virtual appliance
1. Connect the management console to the management server.
2. In the Navigation tree, right click the group that has the same name as the vCenter Server. When
deploying an agent to a stand-alone host, right click Virtual machines.
3. Click Deploy Agent for VMware.
4. Select the hosts or clusters to which you want to deploy the agent, or check the Select all check
box. When deploying an agent to a stand-alone host, enter the host name or IP address and
administrator credentials.
5. [Optional] If necessary, modify the VA name, Datastore and Network interface settings
suggested for each agent by default.
[Optional] You may also want to modify the credentials that the agent will use to access the
vCenter Server or ESX(i). Keep in mind that centralized backup and recovery tasks will run under
this account by default. This means that the account must have the necessary privileges (p. 21)
on the vCenter Server. Otherwise, you will need to specify credentials for the account with the
necessary privileges in every centralized backup plan or recovery task.
[Optional] You may want to manually set the agent network settings, including the IP address. To
do so, click Network configuration. By default, the agent obtains the network settings from the
DHCP server, provided that this server is present in your network.
Tip: You will be able to change the network settings after the agent is deployed. To do so, select the virtual
appliance in VMware vSphere inventory and go to the virtual appliance console. Under Agent options, click
the Change link next to the name of the network interface, such as eth0.

6. Click Deploy Agent for VMware.
Result: Once a new agent is deployed, the management server redistributes the virtual machines
among the agents.

3.4.3.3

Updating Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance)

You can update Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) using the management server GUI.

To update Agent for VMware
1. In the Virtual machines view, on the toolbar, click Update Agent for VMware.
2. Select the agents to update.
3. Click Update Agent for VMware.
When upgrading from Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 to Acronis Backup, you need to additionally
specify the agent's host.

3.4.3.4

Removing Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance)

You can remove Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) using the management server GUI.
If other agents are connected to the same ESX(i) host, they will undertake the backups of the
machines assigned to the removed agent. If there are no such agents, the machines will become
unprotected.
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Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

To remove Agent for VMware
1. In the Virtual machines view, on the toolbar, click Remove Agent for VMware.
2. Select the agents to remove.
3. Click Remove Agent for VMware.

3.4.4

Flexible configuration of the agents

This section gives you an overview of how the management server organizes the operation of
multiple agents running within a VMware vCenter host.
All agents must be registered on the management server. All agents must be connected to vCenter
Server.

Distribution algorithm
The management server evenly distributes the virtual machines between the agents. By evenly, we
mean that each agent manages an equal number of machines. The amount of storage space
occupied by a virtual machine is not counted.
Once a virtual machine is assigned to an agent, all centralized backups of this machine will be
delegated to this agent.

Redistribution
Redistribution takes place each time the established balance breaks, or, more precisely, when a load
imbalance among the agents reaches 20 percent. This may happen when a machine or an agent is
added or removed, or a machine migrates to a different host, or if you manually bind a machine to an
agent. If this happens, the management server redistributes the machines using the same algorithm.
For example, you realize that you need more agents to help with throughput and deploy an
additional virtual appliance to the host. The management server will assign the most appropriate
machines to the new agent and update the centralized backup plans on the involved agents. The old
agents' load will reduce.
When you remove an agent from the management server, the machines assigned to the agent are
distributed among the remaining agents. However, this will not happen if an agent gets corrupted or
is deleted bypassing the management server. Redistribution will start only after you remove such
agent from the management server.

Viewing the distribution result
You can view the result of the automatic distribution in the Agent column available for each virtual
machine on the management server. Also, it is displayed in the management server options. To
access this window, select Options > Management server options from the top menu, and then
select Agent for VMware binding.

Manual binding
The Agent for VMware binding (p. 17) option lets you exclude a virtual machine from this
distribution process by specifying the agent that must always back up this machine. The management
server will continue maintaining the overall balance, but it is allowed to pass the machine to a
different agent only if the original agent is removed.

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Tips on setup
Below are brief instructions on how to set up some of the available configurations. For detailed
information about integration with vCenter see the "VMware vCenter integration" (p. 16) section.



1 agent per host - default (achieved by automatic deployment). Enable vCenter integration (do
not disable automatic deployment of virtual appliances). Alternatively, you can deploy or install
the agents manually and connect them to vCenter Server.



more than 1 agent per host - Enable vCenter integration (automatic deployment of virtual
appliances may be enabled or disabled). Deploy the required number of agents to the hosts (at
least one agent per host). Connect the agents to vCenter Server.

Make sure that all agents are registered on the management server. If you deploy virtual appliances
from an OVF template, you need to add them to the management server manually.
In any case you can bind one or more virtual machines to the agents manually.
Do not create local backup plans on agents if you want to make the best of the automatic
distribution.

3.4.5

Using a locally attached storage

You can attach an additional disk to Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) so the agent can back up
to this locally attached storage. Such backup is normally faster than backup via LAN and it does not
consume the network bandwidth. We recommend using this method if you have only one ESX(i) host
in your environment.
Data backed up to a locally attached storage does not appear in the centralized catalog. To access a
backup stored in a locally attached storage, connect the console directly to the agent.
Using a locally attached storage presumes that the agent always backs up the same machines. If
multiple agents work within the host, and one or more of them use locally attached storages, you
need to manually bind (p. 17) each agent to all machines it has to back up. Otherwise, if the
machines are redistributed among the agents by the management server, a machine's backups may
be dispersed over multiple storages.
You can add the storage to an already working agent or when importing the agent from an OVF
template.

To attach a storage to an already working agent
1. In VMware vSphere inventory, right click the Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance).
2. Add the disk by editing the settings of the virtual machine. The disk size must be at least 10 GB.
Be careful when adding an already existing disk. Once the storage is created, all data previously contained
on this disk will be lost.

3. Go to the virtual appliance console. The Create storage link is available at the bottom of the
screen. If it is not, click Refresh.
4. Click the Create storage link, select the disk and specify a label for it.
Details. The label length is limited to 16 characters due to file system restrictions.

To select a locally attached storage as a backup destination
When creating a backup plan, in Where to back up > Location do one of the following, depending on
where the console is connected:

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

When connected to the management server – Select Store each machine's archive in the
specified folder on the machine with agent. Then type the letter corresponding to the locally
attached storage, for example, D:\.



When connected directly to the agent – Type the letter corresponding to the locally attached
storage, for example, D:\.

To recover a machine from a locally attached storage
Connect the console directly to the agent where the storage is attached. Click Recover. In What to
recover > Select data, select the locally attached storage. Complete the recovery settings as
described in the "Creating a recovery task" section.

3.4.6

Configuring ESX(i)-related options

This section describes the ESX(i)-related options that you can configure on the management server
and on a managed machine.

3.4.6.1

VMware vCenter integration

This option enables communication between Acronis Backup Management Server and VMware
vCenter Server. To access this option, connect the console to the management server and then select
Options > Management server options from the top menu.
Integration provides the capability to:



View virtual machines managed by the VMware vCenter in the management server GUI.
The VMs and Templates inventory view appears under Navigation > Virtual machines.



View the backup status of these machines in the vCenter Server.
This information appears in the virtual machine summary (Summary > Annotations) or on the
Virtual Machines tab for every host, datacenter, folder or entire vCenter Server.



Automatically register virtual machines created by Acronis Backup in the vCenter Server
inventory.



Automatically deploy agents to the ESX(i) hosts managed by the vCenter Server.
After you create a backup plan, an agent is deployed to each host whose virtual machines are
included in the backup plan.

To enable integration of the management server with a vCenter Server
1. Click VMware vCenter integration.
2. Select the Enable integration with the following vCenter Server check box.
3. Specify the vCenter Server's IP address or name and provide access credentials for the server.
This account will be used for deploying agents from the management server. This means the
account must have the necessary privileges (p. 21) for deploying virtual appliances on the
vCenter Server. We also recommend that the account have the necessary privileges for backup
and recovery, because the agents will use this account to connect to the vCenter Server by
default.
4. [Optionally] Select the Automatically deploy Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) check box.
5. Click OK.

To enable automatic deployment of Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance)
1. Enable integration with the vCenter Server as described above.
2. Click Automatic deployment.
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3. Select the Automatically deploy Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) check box.
4. Specify the credentials that the automatically deployed agents will use to connect to the vCenter
Server.
Centralized backup and recovery tasks will run under this account by default. This means the
account should have the necessary privileges (p. 21) on the vCenter Server. Otherwise, you will
need to specify credentials for the account with the necessary privileges in every centralized
backup plan or recovery task.
5. Click OK.

To disable integration of the management server with a vCenter Server
1. Click VMware vCenter integration.
2. Clear the Enable integration with the following vCenter Server check box.
3. Click OK.
Result. Automatic deployment of the agent is also disabled. The virtual machines managed by
the already existing agents remain on the management server. The backup plans that back up
these machines continue functioning.

To disable automatic deployment of Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance)
1. Click Automatic deployment.
2. Clear the Automatically deploy Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) check box.
3. Click OK.
Result. Automatic deployment of the agent is disabled. Integration with the vCenter Server is
preserved.

3.4.6.2

Agent for VMware binding

This option is effective if more than one Agent for VMware are running within a VMware vCenter
host.
To access this option, connect the console to the management server and then select Options >
Management server options from the top menu.
The management server evenly distributes the machines between the agents. This balance may
break when a machine or an agent is added or removed. If this happens, the management server
redistributes the machines and updates the centralized backup plans accordingly. You can view the
result of this distribution in the Agent column available for each virtual machine on the management
server. For more information about automatic distribution see "Flexible configuration of the agents"
(p. 14).
The Agent for VMware binding option lets you exclude a virtual machine from this distribution
process by specifying the agent that must always back up this machine. The management server will
continue maintaining the overall balance, but it is allowed to pass the machine to a different agent
only if the original agent is removed.
To configure the Agent for VMware binding option, associate (bind) a virtual machine with one of
the agents.

To bind a machine with an agent:
1. Select the agent. The software shows the virtual machines currently managed by the agent.
Machines available for automatic distribution are grayed out.
2. Click Bind with virtual machine. This opens a window that shows the full list of machines the
agent can access.
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3. Select one or more machines, and click OK.
Result. The list of the virtual machines currently managed by the agent is updated. Machines
bound to the agent are displayed in black color. They are no longer available for automatic
distribution.

To unbind a machine from an agent:
1. Select the agent. The software shows the virtual machines currently managed by the agent.
Machines available for automatic distribution are grayed out. Machines bound to the agent are
displayed in black color.
2. Click Unbind virtual machine. This opens a window that shows the list of machines bound with
the agent.
3. Select one or more machines, and click OK.
Result. The list of the virtual machines currently managed by the agent is updated. The unbound
machines become grayed out. If a machine disappears from the list, it means that the machine
was assigned to a different agent as a result of automatic distribution.

Usage examples


It is necessary to use this option if one or more of the agents have locally attached storages (p.
15).



Let's assume you want to back up 20 virtual machines using three Agents for VMware. Five
machines out of 20 need to be backed up to Acronis Cloud Storage.
Allocate one of the agents for cloud backups. Then, bind each of the five machines with this
agent. The remaining 15 machines will be distributed among the three agents.
As a result, the cloud backups of a virtual machine will be sent to a single archive. Without the
binding, each agent will create its own archive in the cloud storage, starting from a full backup.
So, backups of one machine will be distributed among up to three archives.

3.4.6.3

Changed Block Tracking (CBT)

This option applies only to Agent for VMware.
This option determines whether to use Changed Block Tracking (CBT) when performing an
incremental or differential backup of an ESX(i) virtual machine.
To access this option, connect the console to the management server or to Agent for VMware. Then,
select Options > Default backup options or Options > Default backup and recovery options >
Default backup options, respectively. The default setting will be used unless you override it with a
different setting in the backup plan.

How it works
The Changed Block Tracking mechanism tracks changes to the contents of virtual disks.
Changed Block Tracking was originally introduced in VMware ESX(i) 4.0. Starting with Acronis Backup
11.5 Update 5, there is an Acronis proprietary implementation of the CBT mechanism, which is
unrelated to the VMware implementation. Acronis CBT does not use or change the virtual machine
configuration settings related to VMware CBT (ctkEnabled, scsi#:#.ctkEnabled, and ctkDisallowed).
Without using CBT, Agent for VMware reads the virtual machine's file system to determine which
blocks have changed. When using CBT, the agent obtains the list of changed blocks from the ESX(i)
host. The agent only needs access to the file system to determine which of these blocks must be
included in the backup. This leads to faster backups and reduces the load on the storage during a
backup.
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CBT is most effective for large amounts of data that changes little between backups. In particular,
databases often consist of large files with relatively small daily changes.

Available settings
The preset is: Use CBT



Use CBT
Acronis Backup uses CBT for each virtual machine that is included in the backup plan.



Do not use CBT
Acronis Backup does not use CBT.

3.4.7

Support for VM migration

This section informs you about what to expect when migrating virtual machines within a datacenter,
by using the vCenter Server migration options.

vMotion
vMotion moves a virtual machine's state and configuration to another host while the machine's disks
remain in the same location on shared storage.




vMotion of Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) is not supported and is disabled.
vMotion of a virtual machine is disabled during a backup. Backups will continue to run after the
migration, but will be managed by the agent on the target host. If there is no Agent for VMware
on the target host, a new agent will be deployed.

Storage vMotion
Storage vMotion moves virtual machine disks from one datastore to another.




Storage vMotion of Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) is not supported and is disabled.
Storage vMotion of a virtual machine is disabled during a backup. Backups will continue to run
after the migration.

3.4.8

Support for datastore clusters and Storage DRS

Datastore clusters and Storage Distributed Resource Scheduler (Storage DRS, SDRS) are new features
in VMware vSphere 5.
A datastore cluster is a collection of datastores. The Storage DRS feature provides load balancing for
a datastore cluster in terms of storage space and I/O traffic. Storage DRS uses storage vMotion to
distribute the virtual disks among the datastores included in the datastore cluster.
Storage vMotion of a virtual machine is disabled during a backup. If a backup starts while storage
vMotion is in progress, storage vMotion fails. To avoid this, you can set up the SDRS Scheduling
option for the datastore cluster so that the automation level changes to Manual for the duration of
your backup window. For more information about compatibility with Storage VMotion, see the
"Support for VM migration" (p. 19) section.
When setting up a destination for a recovery to a new virtual machine or for a regular conversion to
a virtual machine, you can select either a datastore cluster or one of its datastores, depending on
whether SDRS is enabled:



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Datastore clusters with enabled Storage DRS are shown with this icon:

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

Datastore clusters with disabled Storage DRS are not shown. Instead, their individual datastores
are shown in the form DatastoreClusterName/DatastoreName.

3.4.9

Backing up fault tolerant machines

Agent for VMware does not back up virtual machines with the VMware Fault Tolerance feature
enabled, and you cannot select them for backup under Virtual machines. If you include a group
containing a fault tolerant machine in a backup plan, this machine will be automatically excluded.
To back up a fault tolerant virtual machine, do one of the following:



Turn off VMware Fault Tolerance, then turn it on after performing the backup.
Note that you should "turn off" rather than "disable" it. You can turn Fault Tolerance off and on
when required using vSphere scripts. Normally this works, but unnecessary actions (such as
removing or creating the secondary virtual machine) take time and resources. Also, the machine
reliability is reduced during the backup.



Install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux in the guest operating system.
An Acronis Backup Advanced license (p. 7) assigned to the host enables you to install agents in an
unlimited number of guest systems.
For more information about how to install the agent, see the installation documentation.
After you install the agent and add the machine to the management server, the machine appears
under Machines with agents in the All machines with agents group. When creating a backup
plan, select the machine here rather than under Virtual machines. Or, you can connect the
console to the machine directly as to a physical machine.

3.4.10 Backing up independent disks and RDMs
Agent for VMware cannot back up Raw Device Mapping (RDM) disks in physical compatibility mode
or independent disks. The agent skips these disks and adds warnings to the log. You can avoid the
warnings by excluding independent disks and RDMs in physical compatibility mode from the backup
plan.
If you want to back up these disks, install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux in the guest
operating system.
An Acronis Backup Advanced license (p. 7) assigned to the host enables you to install agents in an
unlimited number of guest systems.
For more information about how to install the agent, see the installation documentation.
After you install the agent and add the machine to the management server, the machine appears
under Machines with agents in the All machines with agents group. When creating a backup plan,
select the machine here rather than under Virtual machines. Or, you can connect the console to the
machine directly as to a physical machine.
You might want to use a different backup strategy for independent disks or RDMs in physical
compatibility mode. For example, if these disks contain frequently changing databases, you can back
them up more often than the operating system, or use different settings for them. In this case, create
a separate backup plan for these disks.

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3.4.11 Backing up virtual machine templates
A virtual machine template (or simply a template) is a set of files and parameters that represents a
complete virtual machine. Templates are typically used to create multiple similar virtual machines.
Virtual machine templates appear in the All virtual machines group on the management server along
with other virtual machines.
In terms of backup and recovery, a virtual machine template acts as a normal virtual machine. You
can back up its disks, recover its disks and files, add it to static or dynamic groups, and perform other
operations described in this document.
Virtual machine templates are unrelated to OVF templates that are used to deploy Agent for VMware
(Virtual Appliance).

3.4.12 Privileges for VM backup and recovery
Once Agent for VMware is deployed to a vCenter's host, any user of the vCenter Server can connect a
management console to the agent. The scope of available operations depends on the privileges a
user has on the vCenter Server. Only those actions are available that the user has permission to
perform. The below tables contain the privileges required for backup and recovery of ESX virtual
machines and, additionally, for virtual appliance deployment.
If the agent was deployed directly to an ESX(i) host or manually imported to the host, and you want
the vCenter users to be able to connect to the agent and the below privileges to take effect, connect
the agent to the vCenter Server rather than to the ESX(i) host. To change the connection, access the
virtual appliance GUI using the vSphere Client and specify access credentials for the vCenter Server in
the ESX(i)/vCenter setting.

Privileges on vCenter Server or ESX(i) host
Outlined in the below table are the privileges a vCenter Server user must have to perform operations
on all the vCenter hosts and clusters.
To enable a user to operate on a specific ESX host only, assign the user the same privileges on the
host.
Operation
Object

Privilege

Datastore

Allocate space

Global

+

Back up a
VM's disk

+

Recover to a Recover to
new VM
an existing
VM

+

+

VA
deployment

+

Browse datastore

+

Configure datastore

+

Low level file
operations

+

Licenses

Host > Configuration VM autostart
configuration

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Back up a
VM

+

+

+

+
+

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Operation
Object

Privilege

System
management
Host > Inventory

Modify cluster

Host > Local
operations

Create VM

Back up a
VM

+

Back up a
VM's disk

Recover to a Recover to
new VM
an existing
VM

+
+
+

Delete VM
Reconfigure VM

VA
deployment

+
+

+

+

Network

Assign network

+

+

+

Resource

Assign VM to
resource pool

+

+

+

vApp

Import

Virtual machine >
Configuration

Add existing disk
Add new disk

+
+

+

+

+

+

+

Add or remove
device
Advanced

+

+

Change CPU count

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

Disk lease
Memory
Remove disk
Rename

+
+

+

+
+

Settings
Virtual machine >
Interaction

Configure CD media

+
+

Console interaction

+

Guest operating
system
management by VIX
API

+

Power off

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+

+

+

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Operation
Object

Privilege

Back up a
VM

Back up a
VM's disk

Recover to a Recover to
new VM
an existing
VM

Power on
Virtual machine >
Inventory

+

Create from existing

VA
deployment

+

+

+

Create new

+

+

+

Move

+

Remove
Virtual machine >
Provisioning

Allow disk access
Allow virtual
machine download

Virtual machine >
State

3.5.1

+
+

+

+

+

+

+

+

Create snapshot

Remove snapshot

3.5

+

+

+

+

+ (VA
update)

+

+

+ (VA
update)

Working in Microsoft Hyper-V
Getting started with Agent for Hyper-V

This section describes how to start backing up Hyper-V virtual machines.

3.5.1.1

Prerequisites

Ensure that:




You have a machine running Windows with the Hyper-V role enabled.



You have an appropriate number of Acronis Backup Advanced licenses (p. 7). You need one
license per Hyper-V host. If you have a Hyper-V cluster (also called a failover cluster), obtain
licenses for each node of the cluster.
To use the product in the trial mode, you do not need licenses.



You have a machine running Windows that will act as the management server. This machine
must be always turned on and available across the network. For the system requirements, see
the installation documentation.

Hyper-V Integration Services are installed on every virtual machine you want to back up. See
installation instructions later in this section.

 You downloaded the setup program of Acronis Backup Advanced.
To install the Hyper-V Integration Services
1. Run the guest operating system.
2. Select Action > Insert Integration Services Setup Disk.
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3. The server connects the ISO image of the setup disk to the machine. Follow the onscreen
instructions.

3.5.1.2

Installation

Installing the management server
In this step, you will install the management server. This will enable backing up the virtual machines
of the Hyper-V host or cluster.
1. On the machine that will act as the management server, log on as an administrator and start the
setup program.
2. Click Install Acronis Backup. Accept the terms of the license agreement.
3. Select the Centrally monitor and configure the backing up of physical and virtual machines
check box.
4. Type all your license keys or import them from a text file.
5. Click Install.

Installing the agent for Hyper-V
In this step, you will install Acronis Backup Agent for Hyper-V on a Hyper-V host.
Perform the following procedure on the Hyper-V host. If you have a Hyper-V cluster, perform this
procedure on each node of the cluster.
1. Log on to the Hyper-V host as an administrator and start the setup program.
2. Click Install Acronis Backup. Accept the terms of the license agreement.
3. Select the Back up this machine's data check box, and then ensure that the Hyper-V Virtual
Machines check box is selected on the next page.
4. Select I purchased a license or a subscription.
5. Select the Use the following license server check box, and then enter the name or IP address of
the machine where you installed the management server.
Details. The license server is integrated with the management server.
6. Ensure that the proper license is selected, and then click Next.
7. If prompted for the Acronis Managed Machine Service (agent) account, specify an account of a
domain user who has administrative privileges on all nodes of your Hyper-V cluster.
8. Click Register now. Specify the name or IP address of the machine where you installed the
management server. Provide the user name and password of an administrator on that machine.
9. Specify whether the Hyper-V host will participate in the Acronis Customer Experience Program
(CEP).
10. Click Install.

3.5.1.3

Creating a centralized vault

In this step, you will create a centralized vault available across the network. This will enable easy
access to the backups.
1. In your network, choose a machine where you want to store the backed-up data. It can be the
machine where you installed the management server.
2. On the machine where you installed the management server, click Acronis Backup on the
desktop.
3. Click Connect to a management server. In Machine, type the name of the current machine.
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4.
5.
6.
7.

On the Actions menu, click Create centralized vault.
In Name, type the name of the vault.
In Type, select Unmanaged.
Click Path and then specify the path to the network share where the backups will be stored. Click
OK. When prompted, provide access credentials for the shared folder.
8. Click OK. You can see the vault name in the Navigation tree under Vaults > Centralized. Click the
vault name to check its free space and contents.

3.5.1.4

Backup and recovery

Backup
In this step, you will back up one or more virtual machines to the centralized vault you created.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

In the welcome screen, click Back up now.
Click Items to back up. In Data to back up, select Virtual machines.
Select the virtual machines that you want to back up.
Click Location, expand Vaults, and then specify the vault you have created.
Click OK to start backing up the virtual machines.

Recovery
In this step, you will recover the disks of a backed-up virtual machine to an existing virtual machine on
the Hyper-V host.
1. In the Navigation tree, expand Vaults > Centralized and then select the vault where you saved
the archives. If prompted, provide access credentials for the vault.
2. In the Data view tab, in Show, select Disks.
3. Select the virtual machine that you want to recover. Under Versions, select a recovery point. By
default, the latest recovery point is selected.
Details. Instead of recovering the entire virtual machine, you can recover individual disks of it.
4. Click Recover.
5. Under Where to recover, in Recover to, select Existing virtual machine.
6. Click Browse, and then select the Hyper-V host to which you want to recover the virtual machine.
7. Click Select, and then select an existing virtual machine, either the same one you have backed up
(recommended for getting started), or a different one.
Details. By default, the agent will automatically stop this virtual machine before starting the
recovery to it. The machine must be powered off during the recovery for the recovery task to
succeed.
8. If required, do the following for every disk found in the backup:
a. Сlick Recover 'Disk N' to: and choose the destination disk from the disks of the existing
machine.
b. In NT signature, leave the default setting: Select automatically.
9. Click OK to immediately start the recovery.

3.5.2

Backing up clustered Hyper-V machines

In a Hyper-V cluster, virtual machines may migrate between cluster nodes. Follow these
recommendations to set up a correct backup of clustered Hyper-V machines:

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1. A machine must be available for backup no matter what node it migrates to. To ensure that a
backup plan can access a machine on any node, run the plan under a domain user account that
has administrative privileges on each of the cluster nodes.
We recommend that you specify such an account for the agent service during the Agent for
Hyper-V installation. Otherwise, you will need to specify credentials for such account in every
centralized backup plan or recovery task.
2. Install Agent for Hyper-V on each node of the cluster.
3. Register all of the agents on the management server, either during installation or later.
4. Back up clustered machines by using the management server, rather than by connecting directly
to a cluster node.
5. When creating a centralized backup plan, select a clustered machine under the cluster, rather
than under a cluster node. This way, the backup plan will still apply to the machine after it moves
to a different node.

High Availability of a recovered machine
When recovering backed-up disks to a new Hyper-V virtual machine, you can choose whether to
make the machine highly available. In the VM/VS Selection window, after clicking Create a new
virtual machine on the server, you need to specify the target Hyper-V host. If you select the target
host under the cluster, the resulting virtual machine will be highly available. If you select the same
host outside the cluster, the machine will not be highly available.
When you recover backed-up disks to an existing Hyper-V virtual machine, the machine's High
Availability property remains as is.
When you do a conversion to a Hyper-V virtual machine within a backup plan, the resulting machine
is not highly available. It is considered as a spare machine and is normally powered off. If you need to
use the machine in the production environment, you can configure it for High Availability from the
Failover Cluster Management snap-in.

3.5.3

Backing up pass-through disks

Microsoft Hyper-V does not provide control over pass-through disks to the host operating system. As
a result, the Microsoft Software Shadow Copy provider cannot provide Agent for Hyper-V with
snapshots of pass-through disks. During backup, the agent skips these disks and adds warnings to the
log. You can avoid the warnings by excluding pass-through disks from the backup plan.
If you want to back up pass-through disks, install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux in the guest
operating system. An Acronis Backup Advanced license (p. 7) assigned to the host enables you to
install agents in an unlimited number of guest systems. For more information about how to install
the agent, see the installation documentation.
After you install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux and add the machine to the management
server, the machine appears under Machines with agents in the All machines with agents group.
When creating a backup plan, select the machine here rather than under Virtual machines. Or, you
can connect the console to the machine directly as is done with a physical machine.
You might want to use a different backup strategy for pass-through disks. For example, if these disks
contain frequently changing databases, you can back them up more often than the operating system,
or use different settings for them. In this case, create a separate backup plan for these disks.

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3.5.4

Backing up and recovering a Hyper-V host

For disaster recovery purposes, you can perform a disk-level backup of the entire Hyper-V host. This
will back up the operating system and all virtual machines that are stored on the host's local disks.
To back up the host, you need to install Agent for Windows on it. In Microsoft Hyper-V Server
2008/2008 R2, we recommend installing Agent for Windows remotely. If Agent for Hyper-V is already
installed on the host, no additional license will be taken by Agent for Windows.
Alternatively, you can back up the host by using a bootable media.

Usage examples
Example 1. Backing up a stand-alone host
Consider the following scenario:



You want to back up a host whose virtual machines are stored locally, such as on local disks or on
logical unit number (LUN) devices.



You do not need to recover individual virtual machines from the backup.

In this scenario, install Agent for Windows, and then create and run a backup plan to back up the
entire host.
Backup
When setting up a backup for a host, make sure that:



You selected to use the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) backup option. In Snapshot provider,
select Software - System provider. This ensures that the virtual machines are backed up in a
consistent state.



You installed Hyper-V Integration Services (p. 23) in the guest operating systems. This ensures
that VSS does not put running virtual machines into a saved state (does not pause them) when
taking the snapshot.

Recovery
Use the bootable media to recover the host to the same or dissimilar hardware.
After recovering the host to the same hardware in the same configuration, you can resume working
with the virtual machines right away.
After recovering the host to a machine with a different set or placement of network adapters, you
need to reassign the virtual network adapters of the virtual machines to the physical adapters of the
host.
The most recent operating systems remain bootable when recovered to dissimilar hardware, or the
VMware or Hyper-V platforms. If a recovered operating system does not boot, use the Acronis
Universal Restore tool to update the drivers and modules that are critical for the operating system
startup. For details, see the Acronis Universal Restore page at http://www.acronis.com/en-us/aur/.

Example 2. Backing up a cluster node before installing software updates
Consider the following scenario:



You have a Hyper-V cluster with two or more nodes that use Cluster Shared Volumes (CSV) for
storing virtual machines.



You want to regularly back up virtual machines of the cluster.

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

You want to back up cluster nodes before installing software updates on them.

In this scenario, install both Agent for Hyper-V and Agent for Windows on each node of the cluster.
Register the nodes on the management server.
Set up disk-level backups for both nodes, by creating a centralized backup plan. You can exclude
virtual machines from the backup, by excluding the CSV where the machines are stored from the CSV
owner backup. Volumes that correspond to CSV do not have letters, so you can easily recognize
them.
Before installing the software updates, back up the nodes. Install the software updates on one node
at a time. If installing the updates has caused problems with the operating system, turn off the node.
The remaining nodes will take over the virtual machines that ran on the node. Use the bootable
media to recover the node. Once the node is operational again, the virtual machines will migrate
back to it.
To back up the virtual machines themselves, create a separate backup plan. For details, see "Backing
up clustered Hyper-V machines" (p. 25).

3.5.5

Support for Hyper-V 3.0

This section describes how Acronis Backup supports new features introduced in Hyper-V 3.0. This
version of Hyper-V appears in Windows Server 2012.

VHDX format
The VHDX format appeared in Hyper-V 3.0 as a new version of the virtual hard disk (VHD) format. The
VHDX format supports a maximum disk size of 64 TB, compared with the maximum size of 2 TB for
VHD. The VHDX format also supports disks with a physical and/or logical sector size of 4 KB.
Agent for Hyper-V can back up and recover virtual machines whose disks have the VHDX format.
When recovering a virtual machine from a Hyper-V host of an earlier version to a Hyper-V 3.0 host,
the agent converts the machine's disks to the VHDX format.
When recovering a virtual machine with VHDX disks to a Hyper-V host of an earlier version, the agent
converts the disks to the VHD format. The agent tries to make the resulting disk meet the
requirements of the VHD format. For example, if the source VHDX disk is greater than 2 TB, the agent
attempts to reduce the resulting VHD disk size to 2 TB.

Dynamic Memory
Dynamic Memory adjusts the original amount of the virtual machine's memory depending on the
machine's actual memory needs. Agent for Hyper-V can back up and recover virtual machines that
use the Dynamic Memory feature. However, the agent does not save the Dynamic Memory settings
for these machines.
When recovering a machine to a new virtual machine, the agent sets up the original amount of
memory for it. The Dynamic Memory feature for the recovered machine will be turned off.

Private VLANs
Private virtual local area networks (private VLANs, PVLANs) enable you to isolate groups of virtual
machines on a host as if each group were on a separate physical network. This feature of Hyper-V 3.0
is useful when hosting virtual machines of more than one organization, to prevent any
communication between machines that belong to different organizations.

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When backing up a Hyper-V 3.0 virtual machine, Agent for Hyper-V backs up the machine's PVLAN
settings. The agent recovers these settings when recovering the machine to a new or existing
machine on the same host.
When recovering the machine to a different host, the agent clears the PVLAN settings for the
recovered machine.

Virtual Fibre Channel HBAs
Virtual Fibre Channel host bus adapters (HBAs) enable each virtual machine to access a Fibre Channel
storage as if the machine had an individual Fibre Channel connection. For example, you can configure
a virtual machine to access only a specific logical unit number (LUN) of a Storage Area Network (SAN),
rather than all of the LUNs available to the Hyper-V host.
Although Agent for Hyper-V can back up virtual machines that have HBAs, it cannot back up the
contents of the storage itself. If you have to back up this storage directly from the virtual machine,
install Agent for Windows into the guest operating system.

3.6

Backing up Linux logical volumes and MD devices

Acronis Backup can back up virtual machines that have logical volumes (also known as LVM volumes)
or MD devices (also known as Linux Software RAID).
You can choose between backing up these machines at a hypervisor level (by using Agent for
VMware or Agent for Hyper-V) or by installing Agent for Linux inside the guest operating system.

Backing up at a hypervisor level
This is your natural choice if you back up entire machines and recover them onto the same platform
(ESX(i) or Hyper-V). You do not need to install multiple agents or create bootable media in this case.
Since Agent for VMware or Agent for Hyper-V cannot access the file system of a logical volume or MD
device, they back up the underlying disks or partitions sector-by-sector. Non-LVM volumes are
backed up in the normal mode, by backing up their file systems. All backed up data can be recovered
back to the original place without any problem.
Limitations
Sector-by-sector backup of logical volumes results in the following limitations:



If the root directory is located on a logical volume, the system may fail to boot after recovery to
hardware or to a different platform (ESX(i) or Hyper-V). Please be aware of this, since recent
Linux distributions, such as Fedora or RHEL, place the root directory on a logical volume by
default. Use the Acronis Universal Restore tool to make the recovered system bootable.



When creating a backup plan, you cannot select a logical volume or MD device. Select either the
entire machine or all of the partitions that make up the volume group or device.



File backup and file recovery from a disk-level backup are not possible for files located on logical
volumes and MD devices.



Resizing of a logical volume during recovery is not possible.

The common limitation of hypervisor-level backup is that you cannot execute pre/post backup or
pre/post data capture commands within the guest operating system.

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Installing the agent into the guest system
For advanced operations, install Agent for Linux in the guest system and back up the logical
volumes/MD devices as the ones of a physical machine. By doing this, you will overcome almost all of
the above limitations.
Using Linux-based bootable media, you will be able to recover logical volumes/MD devices "as is".
However, the Acronis Universal Restore tool is still required for virtual-to-physical and
virtual-to-virtual machine conversion. For more information about backing up logical volumes and
MD devices on physical machines, see the Acronis Backup Advanced User Guide.

3.7

File-level recovery

Agents for VMware and Agent for Hyper-V can recover files from a file backup or from a disk backup
of a physical or virtual machine.
Depending on the agent that performs the recovery, you can recover files to the following locations:



A local folder on the machine where the agent is installed. This location is not available for Agent
for VMware (Virtual Appliance).

 A network share
 An FTP or SFTP server
To recover files by using the management server
1. Connect the console to the management server.
2. If the backup is stored in a managed vault, click Data catalog. Otherwise, click the respective
centralized unmanaged vault and then click the Data view tab.
3. Select the files and the point in time to recover them to. We recommend selecting the files as
follows:
a. Select Show > Folders/files.
b. Select the files and the point in time.
c. Click Recover.
Details. If the backup is stored in a centralized unmanaged vault, the files may initially not appear
in Data view. The reason is that Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) does not catalog data to
the file level when backing up to such vaults. If you cannot find a file in Data view, use Archive
view:



Click the Archive view tab, expand the archive, right-click the backup, and then click Recover.
In Backup contents, select Files and then select the files to recover.
Alternatively, update the catalog by clicking Catalog now, and then use Data view again.
Updating the catalog may be time-consuming.
4. Under Where to recover, select Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) or Agent for Hyper-V that
will perform the recovery.
Tip. Alternatively, you can select a machine where Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux is
installed. This way, you can recover the files directly onto that machine.
5. Proceed with creating the recovery task.
Using a similar procedure, you can recover files when the console is directly connected to an agent.
Use either Data view or Archive view when connected to Agent for Hyper-V. When connected to
Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance), the Data view tab is available only for managed vaults and a
locally attached storage (p. 15).

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Recovering files to a virtual machine
To recover files directly into a virtual machine, use either of the following methods:



Recover the files to a system network share of the virtual machine. For example, the
\\MyVM\c$ network share corresponds to the C volume of the MyVM virtual machine. This
method applies only to virtual machines running Windows. You must specify the credentials of
an administrator on the virtual machine.



Install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux inside the guest operating system and then recover
the files by using this agent.

Or you may recover the files to a network share in your network, and then move them to the virtual
machine or access them from the virtual machine.

3.8

Virtual machines on a management server

Availability of virtual machines
Virtual machines are displayed as available when the agent is available for the management server
and the machines are available for the agent. The list of virtual machines is refreshed dynamically
every time the management server synchronizes with the agents.
When the virtualization server or the virtual appliance becomes unavailable or is withdrawn, the
virtual machines are grayed out.
When virtual machines become unavailable for the agent (this happens when machines are removed
from the virtualization server inventory, deleted from the disk, or the server's storage is down or
disconnected), the machines disappear from the All virtual machines groups and other groups they
are included in. Tasks that back up these virtual machines will fail with an appropriate log record; as a
result, the backup plan will have the Error status.
The online or offline state of a virtual machine does not affect its backup since virtual machines can
be backed up in both states.

Backup plans for virtual machines
Virtual machines can be included in a backup plan that backs up disks and volumes.
What happens when a group of virtual machines is included in a backup plan
Each machine will be backed up to a separate archive. The default archive name will include the
virtual machine name. It is advisable to keep the default archive naming so that you can easily find
each machine's backups in the storage vault.
The backups can run concurrently even if executed by the same agent. You can set the number (p.
32) of virtual machines for the agent to simultaneously back up. The maximum value is 10.

Grouping of virtual machines
The Virtual machines section of the navigation tree contains one built-in group called All virtual
machines. You cannot modify this group manually, delete or move it. You can include this group in a
backup plan that backs up disks and volumes.
You can create both static and dynamic groups of virtual machines. Any virtual machine that is
currently available can be added to a static group. You cannot create groups that contain both
physical and virtual machines.
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The membership criteria for dynamic groups of virtual machines are as follows:



Virtualization server type

Using this criterion, you can create a dynamic group of virtual machines hosted on all registered
Hyper-V or ESX(i) servers. Any machine added to the servers will appear in this group. Any machine
deleted from the servers will disappear from this group.



All VMs backed up by agent

Using this criterion, you can create a dynamic group of virtual machines managed by the specified
agent.



Operating system

Using this criterion, you can create a dynamic group of virtual machines running the specified
operating system.

3.9

VM-specific backup and recovery options

When you create a backup plan or recovery task, these options appear in the Plan parameters or
Task parameters section. You can either use a default option, or override the default option with the
custom value that will be specific for this plan only.
To view and change the default options, connect the console to the management server or to the
machine with the agent, and then select Options > Default backup and recovery options from the
top menu.

3.9.1

Simultaneous VM backup

This option is effective when backing up virtual machines with Agent for VMware or Agent for
Hyper-V.
This option is not effective when the backup destination is Acronis Cloud Storage.
This option defines how many virtual machines an agent can back up simultaneously when executing
the given backup plan.
The preset is: 2.
If, according to the backup plan, an agent has to start backing up multiple machines at once, it will
choose two machines. (To optimize the backup performance, the agent tries to match machines
stored on different storages.) Once any of the two backups is completed, the agent chooses the third
machine and so on.
You can change the number of virtual machines for an agent to simultaneously back up. The
maximum value is 10.
To prohibit simultaneous backup, clear the Back up virtual machines simultaneously check box. The
backups will be queued by the agents.

Tips on usage
Remember that you can make a different setting for each agent, depending on its host load, available
transports (LAN, SAN, Hot-add) and other factors. To do so, connect the console to the agent and
select Options > Default backup and recovery options > Simultaneous VM backup. These settings
will be used unless you override them with the common setting set in the backup plan.
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By default, Agent for VMware (Virtual Appliance) uses 2 virtual processors. If you observe that CPU
usage during backup approaches 100%, increase the number of virtual processors in the virtual
appliance settings. This may significantly increase simultaneous backup performance. Power off the
virtual appliance, click Edit settings…, choose Hardware > CPUs and select the desired number of
processors.

3.9.2

VM power management

These options are effective for virtual machines residing on the virtualization servers.
These options are available only if any Acronis agent for virtual machines is installed on the
virtualization server.

Power off target virtual machines when starting recovery
The preset is: On.
Recovery to an existing virtual machine is not possible if the machine is online, and so the machine is
powered off automatically as soon as the recovery task starts. Users will be disconnected from the
machine and any unsaved data will be lost.
Clear the check box for this option if you prefer to power off virtual machines manually before the
recovery.

Power on the target virtual machine when recovery is completed
The preset is: Off.
After a machine is recovered from a backup to another machine, there is a chance the existing
machine's replica will appear on the network. To be on the safe side, power on the recovered virtual
machine manually, after you take the necessary precautions.
Select the check box for this option if automatic powering on of the virtual machine is required.

3.10 Limitations for backup and recovery options
The following backup options are effective for backup inside the guest system but not for backup at a
hypervisor level:










Fast incremental/differential backup
File-level backup snapshot
File-level security
LVM snapshotting
Media components
Multi-volume snapshot
Pre/Post data capture commands
Volume Shadow Copy Service

The Pre/Post commands options, both for backup and for recovery, are effective only for Agent for
Hyper-V. The commands that you specify in these options run on the machine with the agent and not
on the virtual machines being backed up or recovered.

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4 Backup from inside a guest OS
Backup from inside a guest OS assumes backing up and recovering virtual machines similarly to
physical machines. This functionality becomes available by using Acronis Backup Agent for Windows
or Acronis Backup Agent for Linux.
For online backup and recovery, install Agent for Windows or Agent for Linux in the corresponding
guest system. You can use bootable media to do off-line ("cold") backups and "bare metal" recovery
to an empty virtual machine. Installing the software, backing up, and recovery are the same as with a
physical machine.

4.1

Working with Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization

This section describes in brief how to use Acronis Backup in Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization
environments. It also guides you through P2V and V2V migrations that can be performed with
Acronis Backup.

4.1.1

Overview of the RHEV platform

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization (RHEV) is a virtualization solution based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
Its advanced functionalities allow enterprises to centrally manage their virtual environments while
reducing the cost and complexity of large deployments.

Components
The RHEV platform consists of the following components:



Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager which allows system administrators to view and
manage virtual machines via a single graphical user interface.



Hosts running Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor or Red Hat Enterprise Linux where
virtual machines are hosted.

Interfaces
The Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager includes an Administration Portal and a User Portal.



The Administration Portal is designed for setting up, configuring, and managing the Red Hat
Enterprise Virtualization environment.



The User Portal allows users to start, stop, reboot, and connect to virtual machines.

Storage domains
The RHEV platform uses the following storage domain types:



Data domains store virtual disks, templates and snapshots. A data domain cannot be shared
across different data centers. A data domain can be organized by using NFS, SAN
(iSCSI/FCP-connected storages), or a local storage of a virtualization host.



ISO domains store ISO files used to install and boot operating systems and applications for the
virtual machines. An ISO domain can be shared across different data centers. An ISO domain can
only be organized by using NFS.



An export domain is used to copy or move images between data centers and RHEV Manager
installations. An export domain can be moved between data centers. However, it can only be

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active in one data center at a time. An export domain can use NFS or SAN (iSCSI/FCP-connected
storages).

4.1.2

How Acronis Backup works with RHEV

Acronis Backup can back up and recover virtual machines running in the Red Hat Enterprise
Virtualization environment. Backup and recovery become available by installing Agent for Linux or
Agent for Windows into the guest systems. This means that Acronis Backup will treat the virtual
machines as physical ones and provide the full scope of functionality it provides for physical
machines. This also means that operations are not possible on the machines that are powered off.

Backup and recovery (p. 36)
Using Acronis Backup Management Server, you can:






Centrally deploy the agents onto the virtual machines managed by your RHEV Manager.



View alerts, logs, reports, current activities and more.

Create and deploy centralized backup plans which the agents will execute.
Monitor how successfully the backup plans are executed.
Recover disks, volumes, files or entire machines to their original location or to a different
machine.

In addition, you can directly manage each individual machine by connecting Acronis Backup
Management Console to it.

P2V and V2V migration (p. 41)
Acronis Backup provides several migration methods for you to easily migrate physical machines to
the RHEV environment. The methods differ in complexity and flexibility. They cover all possible
scenarios of migration. These methods can also be used to migrate a virtual machine from a different
virtualization platform to the RHEV platform.

Licensing
You need a license for each host running at least one machine that needs backing up. Taking into
account that machines migrate within a cluster, you need one license for each clustered host. An
Acronis Backup Advanced for RHEV license enables backing up an unlimited number of virtual
machines which run on the same host and an unlimited number of migrations to that host.
To install the product in the trial mode, you do not need a license key. In the trial mode, you can back
up the hosted machines during a limited time period and perform three migrations to the host.

Supported versions of RHEV



Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager: versions 2.2, 3.0, 3.1, 3.2.
Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor, Red Hat Enterprise Linux: versions 5.5 and higher.

Supported guest OS
Acronis Backup supports all the virtualized guest operating systems supported by RHEV.





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Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (32-bit and 64-bit)
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







Windows XP Service Pack 3 and newer (32-bit only)
Windows 7 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Windows 8/8.1 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 and newer (32-bit and 64-bit)
Windows Server 2008 (32-bit and 64-bit)
Windows Server 2008 R2 (64-bit only)
Windows Server 2012/2012 R2

4.1.3

Backup and recovery of RHEV virtual machines

This section contains step-by-step instructions enabling you to quickly set up centralized backups of
virtual machines and to see what recovery is like. These steps may be sufficient for protecting a basic
RHEV environment. Nevertheless, you can use the full scope of the Acronis Backup functionality
described in the product Help, Installation Guide, User Guide for Acronis Backup Advanced, and
Command-Line Reference.

4.1.3.1

Prerequisites

Make sure that:




You have the RHEV infrastructure deployed.



You know the administrative user name and password for each of the guest systems you want to
back up.



You have a machine running Windows that will act as the management server. This machine
must be always turned on and available across the network.




You downloaded the setup program of Acronis Backup Advanced.

You know the name or IP address of the RHEV Manager server and the credentials to access the
server.

You have the Acronis Backup Advanced license keys (Universal or for RHEV) in a TXT or EML file.
You need a license for each host running at least one machine that needs backing up. Taking into
account that machines migrate within a cluster, you need one license for each clustered host. For
multiple license keys, the text format is one line for one key.

4.1.3.2

Installing Acronis Backup Management Server

1. On the machine that will act as the management server, log on as an administrator and start the
Acronis Backup setup program.
2. Click Install Acronis Backup. Accept the terms of the license agreement.
3. Select the Centrally monitor and configure the backing up of physical and virtual machines
check box.
4. Type all your license keys or import them from a text file.
5. Click Install.

4.1.3.3

Adding RHEV machines to Acronis Backup Management Server

In this step, you will add machines from the RHEV environment to Acronis Backup Management
Server. Acronis Backup agents will be automatically installed on these machines.

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Alternatively, you can install the agents on each machine manually as described in the "Hot
imaging..." (p. 46) section. After the agents are installed, add the machines to the management
server.
To use the following procedure, you need:



Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager version 3.x. If your Manager version is 2.2, install the
agents manually or use other installation methods described in the installation documentation.



Guest tools installed on every machine you want to add.

Preparation of RHEV machines running Linux
1. For successful installation of Acronis Backup Agent for Linux, you may need to manually install
the following Linux packages: gcc, make, and kernel-devel. For details, see the "Preparation"
section in "Installation of Agent for Linux" (p. 46).
2. Make sure that TCP port 22 is opened and that the SSH daemon is running on each virtual
machine you want to add. After the remote installation is complete, you can close the port and
stop the SSH daemon.
3. Open TCP port 9876 on each virtual machine you want to add. Acronis Backup uses this port for
communication between the components; therefore, it must remain open for both incoming and
outgoing requests.
4. By default, the management server takes the installation packages from the
folder %CommonProgramFiles%\Acronis\RemoteInstaller\.
To be able to remotely install Agent for Linux, download the agent installation files (.i686
or .x86_64) from the Acronis website and put them into this folder on the management server.

Preparation of RHEV machines running Windows
1. For successful installation on a remote machine running Windows XP, the option Control panel >
Folder options > View > Use simple file sharing must be disabled on that machine.
For successful installation on a remote machine running Windows Vista or later, the option
Control panel > Folder options > View > Use Sharing Wizard must be disabled on that machine.
2. For successful installation on a remote machine that is not a member of an Active Directory
domain, User Account Control (UAC) must be disabled.
3. File and Printer Sharing must be enabled on the remote machine. To access this option:



On a machine running Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Windows 2003 Server: go to
Control panel > Windows Firewall > Exceptions > File and Printer Sharing.



On a machine running Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, or later: go to
Control panel > Windows Firewall > Network and Sharing Center > Change advanced
sharing settings.
4. Acronis Backup uses TCP ports 445 and 25001 for remote installation. Also, it uses TCP port 9876
for remote installation and for communication between the components.
Port 445 is automatically opened when you enable File and Printer Sharing. Ports 9876 and
25001 are automatically opened through Windows Firewall. If you use a different firewall, make
sure that these three ports are open (added to exceptions) for both incoming and outgoing
requests.
After the remote installation is complete, you can remove ports 445 and 25001 from exceptions.
Port 25001 is automatically closed through Windows Firewall. Port 9876 needs to remain open.

Connecting to the management server
1. Double-click the Acronis Backup icon on the desktop to start the management console.
2. Connect the console to the management server: Click Connect to a management server.
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a. Enter the server name or IP address.
b. If prompted for credentials, specify the user name and password.

Adding machines from RHEV environment
1. On the Actions menu, click Add multiple machines.
2. Click From Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization environment. Specify the name or IP address of the
RHEV Manager server and credentials of the account with the rights to access this machine.
When entering the name of an Active Directory user account, be sure to also specify the domain
name (DOMAIN\Username or Username@domain).
3. In the opened window:
a. Specify the machines you want to add to the management server:




Click Add to specify the selected machine.

Click Add all to specify all virtual machines included into the selected data center or
cluster.
Details. You can add only the machines that are currently powered on. To search for a
machine, you can type its exact name or use wildcards in the search box.
b. The software automatically retrieves IP addresses of the specified machines from the RHEV
Manager. If a machine has several IP addresses, you can select the value from the drop-down
list. If the IP address box is empty, enter the IP address manually.
Details. The IP address may be not available if, for example, guest tools are not installed in
the guest OS.
c. Provide the credentials of the user with administrative privileges for each machine. If there is
a universal administrator account on the network, enter the account credentials for one
machine, and set the option to apply it to all the machines that you specified.
d. Click OK.

Installing agents
Acronis Backup detects on which of the selected machines its agents are not installed. If there is at
least one machine without an agent, do the following:
1. Agent for Windows and/or Agent for Linux is selected for installation by default. Click Next.
2. Click Use licenses from the following license server. In the opened window:
a. Specify the name or IP address of the management server and administrative credentials.
b. [Optional] If you need to specify additional licenses, click Add license and type the license
keys or import them from a text file. Click OK.
c. Click Next.
3. Leave the default installation options for the agent.
4. Specify whether the machines will participate in Acronis Customer Experience Program (CEP).
Details. Acronis Customer Experience Program applies only to machines running Windows.
5. The summary window displays a list of machines where the components will be installed. Click
Proceed to start the installation.
Once the installation starts, the program displays the operation progress and names of the machines
where the agent is being installed.

Managing the machines
For further work with the machines you added, select Machines with agents from the Navigation
tree.
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4.1.3.4

Creating a bootable media

In this step, you will install Acronis Media Builder and create a bootable media ISO. The ISO file is
required when you recover (p. 48) an entire virtual machine. Also, you can back up a virtual machine
using the ISO, if you do not want to install the backup software in the guest system.

Installing Acronis Media Builder
First, you need to install Acronis Media Builder on one of the machines running Linux. The machine
must have Linux desktop GUI installed.
Download the Acronis Media Builder installation file and save it on the selected machine. Then, go to
the directory where the installation file is located and run the following commands:



If the machine is running a 32-bit operating system,
chmod 755 AcronisBackup*
./AcronisBackupAdvancedMediaBuilderL_11.7_.i686 -a



If the machine is running a 64-bit operating system,
chmod 755 AcronisBackup*
./AcronisBackupAdvancedMediaBuilderL64_11.7_.x86_64 -a

Creating a bootable media
To create a bootable media:
1. Run Acronis Media Builder by using the following command:
sudo mediabuilder

2. Follow the on-screen instructions. For detailed information, refer to the built-in Help. It is
available in every program window by pressing F1.
3. In the Select the media output window, select ISO image. Then select a directory on the RHEV
ISO domain and specify the ISO file name. The default name is AcronisMedia.iso. Or, you can
enter the directory path manually; for example, nfs://10.200.200.10/opt/iso:/{ISO DOMAIN
UUID}/images/11111111-1111-1111-1111-111111111111.
Alternatively, you can save the ISO on a network share and then import it to the ISO domain
using the ISO uploader utility.

4.1.3.5

Backing up RHEV machines

In this step, you will create an unmanaged centralized vault and set up a centralized backup plan for
multiple machines.
An unmanaged vault is just a shortcut to a shared folder on the network. In general, it is
recommended that you install a storage node and create a managed vault on the node to be able to
use data deduplication and the centralized data catalog.

Creating a centralized vault
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

39

Create a shared folder on the network.
Start the management console.
Connect the console to the management server.
In the Navigation tree, click Vaults, and then click Create.
Specify the name of the new vault. Optionally, type the comments on the vault.
Click Path. In the Path field, type the folder path. Or, you can select this folder in the tree. Click
OK to confirm your selection. If prompted, provide access credentials for the location.
Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016

7. Click OK to create the vault.

Backing up the machines
1. In the management console, click Create backup plan.
2. Under What to back up, click Items to back up.
3. Expand the Management Server node, expand the Machines with agents node, and then expand
the All Machines node.
4. Select the check boxes next to the machines you want to back up. Click OK to confirm your
selection.
5. Under Where to back up, click Location. In the opened window, expand the Centralized node,
and then select the vault you have created. Click OK to confirm your selection. If prompted,
provide access credentials for the vault.
6. Under How to back up, in Backup scheme box, specify Manual start.
7. Click OK to create the backup plan.
8. You will be taken to the Backup plans and tasks view, where you can see the backup plan you
just created. Select this plan and click Run.
Details. Later, you can manually run the same backup plan again.

4.1.3.6

Recovering RHEV machines

You can recover RHEV machines using one of the following methods:



Recovering to a machine running the operating system
Use this method if the Acronis agent is running on the machine and you need to recover the lost
data (a data disk, a data volume, or an individual file) or add the backed-up data from another
machine.
To recover the operating system itself, the Acronis agent will need to boot the machine into the
bootable environment. If the machine is running Linux, make sure that, in addition to Agent for
Linux, you have installed Acronis Backup Bootable Components & Media Builder for Linux.



Recovering to a machine booted with bootable media
Use this method when you need to recover the operating system that has crashed or is infected
with malware. Installation of the bootable components is not required in this case because the
components will be loaded from the media to the machine's RAM.

To recover to a machine running the operating system
1.
2.
3.
4.

Start the management console.
Connect the console to the management server or directly to the target machine.
Click Recover.
Under What to recover, click Select data. In the opened window:
a. Select Data path box.
b. Click Browse.
c. In the opened window, expand the Centralized node, select the vault where your backup is
stored and press Enter. If prompted, specify the user name and password to access the vault
location.
d. On the Data view tab, in the Show box, select Machines/disks/volumes to browse and
search for entire disks and volumes in disk-level backups.
Details. You should select Folders/files in the Show box when you want to recover individual
files or folders.

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e. Select the check boxes for the data disks you want to recover.
f. Select the date of the backup version you want to recover. By default, the latest version is
selected.
g. Click OK.
5. Make sure that under Where to recover, in Recover to, the Physical machine option is selected.
As a result:



If the console is connected to the management server, the data will be recovered to the
original machine by default. To select a different target machine, click Browse. Make sure
that the target machine has enough disks with sizes at least as big as the original disks.



If the console is connected directly to the target machine, the data will be recovered to that
machine.
6. [Optional] Acronis Backup maps the selected disks to the target disks automatically. If you are
not satisfied with the mapping result, you can re-map the disks manually:
a. Unmap the disks in the reverse order; that is, the last mapped disk should be unmapped first.
b. Select the destination disk for each of the source disks.
7. Under When to recover, specify Now to perform the recovery immediately.
8. Click OK to start the recovery.
Details. You will see the operation progress.

To recover to a machine booted with bootable media
For the detailed description of the procedure, see "Recovery to an existing virtual machine booted
with bootable media" (p. 48).

4.1.4
4.1.4.1

Migrating a physical machine to a virtual machine
Considerations before migration

Migration of a physical machine to a RHEV environment is performed in two steps. First, you create
an image of the machine in a .tib file on an intermediate storage. Next, you deploy this image to a
new or existing RHEV virtual machine. Acronis Backup can create a new, fully configured virtual
machine directly in a RHEV export domain. You only need to import it to the required data center.
A machine image is also referred to as a "backup" because it is created using the backup software.

When choosing the migration method, take into account the following considerations.

Choose intermediate storage
Decide where you will save the image. With the default level of data compression, the required
storage space is around 70% of the amount of data to be migrated. Consider an SMB (CIFS) or NFS
network share or a fixed disk of the machine being migrated. External devices, such as USB drives,
are also supported.

Migrate an entire machine or exclude some of the disks?
If there is a storage connected to the machine using iSCSI HBA, exclude it from the image. You will be
able to add this storage to the resulting virtual machine using iSCSI software initiator after the
migration completes.
A Fibre Channel-connected storage cannot be added to a RHEV virtual machine. If you need the
storage on the resulting virtual machine, let it be included in the image. The storage will be
converted to a virtual disk. Otherwise, exclude the storage from the image.
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Imaging method: hot or cold?
The image can be taken under the operating system (hot imaging) or under bootable media (cold
imaging). Take into account the following considerations.



Is the server reboot/downtime acceptable?
During cold imaging, the imaged machine will be off-line and will not provide the necessary
services.



Do you need Acronis software on the resulting machine?
Hot imaging requires installation of an Acronis agent on the physical machine. The agent will be
present in the migrated system as well. If you are planning to back it up using Acronis Backup,
having the agent already installed is a plus. If adding software to the system is not acceptable,
use cold imaging.



Do you need migration on a schedule?
A migration that uses hot imaging can be scheduled. This comes in handy for updating the virtual
"standby" server. Cold migration is performed interactively.



Is it critical that the latest changes to the original system will be missing in the migrated
system?
Once the hot imaging starts, Acronis Backup takes a snapshot of the physical machine. Then, it
compresses the snapshot data and saves it to the location you specify. During this process,
changes to the original system may occur. The changes will not be transferred to the migrated
system because they are not present in the snapshot. If you decommission the physical machine
or return it to a lessor, the changes will be lost. To avoid the data loss, use cold imaging.

Deployment method: convert or recover?
Acronis Backup can deploy the image automatically as soon as it is created. This method is called
"conversion to a virtual machine". The resulting virtual machine will be similar to the original
machine. If you configure the deployment as a separate operation (recovery), you will be able to
change the machine configuration: add/remove/resize disks, and set the virtual machine memory.
Resizing the disks during recovery makes good sense because the newly created disks always have
the Raw format. They will needlessly occupy a lot of space if the data size is much less than the disk
size. The alternative way to save space is recovery to a previously created virtual machine with the
optimal disk sizes.

Let Acronis create a virtual machine or do it yourself?
Take into account the following considerations.



42

Recreate logical volumes or convert them to basic ones?
A machine created by Acronis always has basic volumes. If logical volumes or MD devices are
present in the image, they will be converted to basic ones. The same applies to dynamic volumes
used in Windows systems. The operating system remains bootable, since Acronis properly
updates GRUB and standard Windows loaders. Custom boot loaders may require manual
reactivation.
The original LVM structure can be reproduced only if you create the RHEV virtual machine in
advance and boot it using bootable media. Then, either perform recovery with the enabled Apply
RAID/LVM option, or create the LVM structure manually and then perform recovery with the
disabled option.
There is no option to recreate dynamic volumes during recovery. If you need dynamic volumes
on the resulting machine, create the volume group using the disk management functionality of
the bootable media. Then, perform recovery over these volumes.
Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016



Are you ready to provide necessary drivers for Universal Restore?
When Acronis creates a virtual machine on its own and deploys an image to it, the necessary
drivers are installed automatically because the software knows what drivers or modules are
required for the machine. When you create a machine and boot it using bootable media, Acronis
treats it as a physical machine. This is why you need to explicitly apply Universal Restore and
specify the path to the necessary drivers. The ISO of the floppy disk with the drivers can be found
in the RHEV ISO domain. Its default name is virtio*.iso.

4.1.4.2

Migration methods

Based on the considerations described in the previous section, we suggest the following methods of
migration. Choose the one that best suits your needs.

Cold imaging + recovery to a new machine
This is the simplest method. It fits most cases and does not require software installation. It allows
you to modify basic settings of the virtual machine, including disk size.
Step-by-step instructions (p. 43)

Hot imaging + conversion to a virtual machine
This is a simple method. It requires software installation unless the machine is already protected with
an Acronis agent. The virtual machine settings cannot be modified on the fly. The method is useful in
the "stand-by server" scenario when you create a spare virtual machine and update it from time to
time. Also, you can easily back it up using Acronis Backup because the virtual machine contains an
Acronis agent.
Step-by-step instructions (p. 47)

Hot imaging + recovery to a new machine
This is a combination of the previous two methods. It is useful for migrating a machine already
protected with an Acronis agent. It allows you to modify basic settings of the virtual machine,
including disk size.
Step-by-step instructions can be combined from the ones of the previous two methods.

Recovery to an existing virtual machine booted with bootable media
This is the most advanced and flexible method. This is the only way to reproduce LVMs or software
RAID on the resulting virtual machine. With this method, you can use all the functionality available at
a physical machine recovery and create whatever volume layout you wish. The imaging method can
be either cold or hot. It does not influence the recovery.
Step-by-step instructions (p. 48)

4.1.4.3

Cold imaging + recovery to a new machine

Preparation
Configuring an NFS export domain
1. Make sure that an NFS export domain is attached to the data center where you want to save the
virtual machine.

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2. For RHEV Manager to be able to import the resulting virtual machine to the data center, the
virtual machine files must have the same owner (vdsm:kvm) as the NFS export directory.
This can be achieved by adding the following NFS export settings:





Map all users to the anonymous account.
Set the user ID of the anonymous account to 36 (vdsm).

Set the group ID of the anonymous account to 36 (kvm).
With these settings, files written to the directory by any user will be owned by vdsm:kvm. After
the migration is finished, you may revert the NFS export settings to the original values.
Example. In Linux, NFS exports are controlled by the /etc/exports configuration file. In this file,
the line corresponding to the export directory can look as follows:
/opt/export *(rw,sync,all_squash,anonuid=36,anongid=36)

where /opt/export is the export path; all_squash maps all user IDs and group IDs to the
anonymous account; anonuid and anongid explicitly set the user ID and group ID of the
anonymous account to the specified values.

Getting bootable media
If you have installed Acronis Backup in the trial mode, do the following:



Download the ISO of "Migration to RHEV media" from the Acronis website. Burn the ISO to a CD
or DVD by using a third-party tool.

If you have installed Acronis Backup in the full mode, do either of the following:



Download the ISO of either "Migration to RHEV media" or regular "Bootable media" from the
Acronis website. Burn the ISO to a CD or DVD by using a third-party tool.
OR



Create the regular bootable media by using Acronis Media Builder.

Booting the machine
1. Boot the physical machine using the bootable media.
2. In the boot menu, click Acronis Backup or Migration to RHEV (depending on the media you
have).
3. [Optional] Click Configure network... to check the network settings and to change them if
necessary. These settings are used as long as the machine is booted from the media.
4. Click Manage this machine locally.
5. On the Tools menu, click Change volume representation. If the machine's operating system is
Linux, make sure that the media is in the "Linux-style volume representation" mode. If the
machine's operating system is Windows, make sure that the media is in the "Windows-style
volume representation" mode.

Imaging
1. Click Back up now.
2. By default, all disks of the machine are selected for imaging. If you need to exclude a disk or
volume, under What to back up, click Items to back up and clear the check box near the disk or
volume. For more details about the exclusion, see "Considerations before migration" (p. 41).
Details. In addition, you can use the Show exclusions control to exclude files. Do not try to use
this control to exclude disks. It works at a file level.
3. Under Where to back up, click Location. In the opened window:

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a. Specify the location where to save the image. For more details about the location, see
"Considerations before migration" (p. 41).
b. [Optional, but recommended] In the Name box, type the image name. It could be the name
of the machine being imaged. The name cannot end with a number.
c. Click OK.
4. [Optional] Under Parameters, in Backup options, you can set other parameters of the imaging
such as compression or network bandwidth usage.
5. Click OK to start the imaging.
Details. You will see the operation progress.
6. After the operation is completed, click Close in the progress window.
Details. To view the operation log, select Navigation > Log from the menu.

Recovery
1. Click Recover.
2. Under What to recover, click Select data. In the opened window:
a. In the Data path box, enter the path to the image location and press Enter. If prompted,
specify the user name and password to access the location.
b. In the Archive view tab, expand the archive you have created in the "Imaging" step and
select the image. Normally, it is named like "Backup #1".
c. Select the check boxes for all of the MBRs and volumes.
d. Click OK.
3. Under Where to recover, in Recover to, select New virtual machine.
4. Click Browse, select Save the virtual machine as a set of files, and then select Red Hat Enterprise
Virtualization in the tree. Click OK to confirm your selection.
5. Click Storage, click Browse, and then do the following:



If the media is in the Linux-style volume representation mode, expand the NFS folders node,
and then select the path to the RHEV export domain. Or, you can enter the NFS path
manually; for example, nfs://10.200.200.10/opt/export:/{EXPORT DOMAIN UUID}.



If the media is in the Windows-style volume representation mode, expand the Network
folders node, expand the NFS workgroup, and then select the path to the RHEV export
domain. Or, you can enter the path manually; for example,
\\10.200.200.10\opt\export\{EXPORT DOMAIN UUID}.
Click OK to confirm your selection.
6. Click Virtual machine settings. In the opened window:
a. [Optional] Change the number and size of the virtual machine's disks, memory, virtual
machine name and/or the number of processors.
Details. Resizing the disks makes good sense because the newly created disks always have
the Raw format. They will needlessly occupy a lot of space if the data size is much less than
the disk size. On the other hand, make sure that you do not set the disk size too low. The
disks must have enough free space for the growing data and for the operating system to
work.
b. Click OK.
7. The destination disk for each of the source MBRs and volumes is selected automatically. You can
change the destination if required.
8. [Optional] Under Task, in Recovery options, you can set other parameters of the recovery.
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9. Click OK to start the recovery.
Details. You will see the operation details.
10. Click the Progress tab to see the operation progress.
11. After the operation is completed, click Close in the progress window.
12. Import (p. 50) the machine to the required data center using RHEV Manager.

4.1.4.4

Hot imaging + conversion to a virtual machine

Installation of Agent for Linux
This section describes how to install Acronis Backup Agent for Linux and Management Console on a
machine running Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Preparation
Installing Agent for Linux requires that the following Linux packages be present on the machine: gcc,
make, and kernel-devel. Acronis Backup installer will download and install them automatically using
your Red Hat subscription.
You need to install the packages manually if:




The machine does not have an active Red Hat subscription or Internet connection.



You have the required packages on the local network and do not want to spend time for
automatic search and downloading.

The installer cannot find the kernel-devel and gcc version corresponding to the kernel version. If
the available kernel-devel is more recent than your kernel, you need to either update the kernel
or install the matching kernel-devel version manually.

To install the packages manually, run the following command as the root user:
rpm -ivh PACKAGE_FILE1 PACKAGE_FILE2 PACKAGE_FILE3

Ensure that the kernel-devel version is the same as the kernel version. Ensure that the gcc version is
the same as the one with which the kernel was compiled.

Installation in a 32-bit operating system
To install Agent for Linux and Management Console in a 32-bit operating system, go to the directory
where the installation files are located and run the following commands:
chmod 755 AcronisBackup*
./AcronisBackupAdvancedAgentL_11.7_.i686 -a -l 
./AcronisBackupAdvancedMConsoleL_11.7_.i686 -a

Installation in a 64-bit operating system
To install Agent for Linux and Management Console in a 64-bit operating system, go to the directory
where the installation files are located and run the following commands:
chmod 755 AcronisBackup*
./AcronisBackupAdvancedAgentL64_11.7_.x86_64 -a -l 
./AcronisBackupAdvancedMConsoleL64_11.7_.x86_64 -a

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Installation of Agent for Windows
The following procedure describes how to install Acronis Backup Agent for Windows and
Management Console on a machine running Windows. To do so:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.

Log on as an administrator and run the Acronis Backup Advanced setup program.
Click Install Acronis Backup.
Accept the terms of the license agreement, and then click Next.
Select the Back up this machine's data check box, and then click Next.
Click I purchased a license or a subscription, and then click Next.
Type your license key or import it from a text file, and then click OK. Click Next.
Ensure that the proper license is selected, and then click Next.
In the next window, leave the default setting: I will register the component(s) later. Click Next.
Specify whether the machine will participate in the Acronis Customer Experience Program (CEP).
Click Next.
10. Click Install to proceed with installation.
11. On successful installation, click Finish to close the wizard window.

Hot imaging + conversion to a virtual machine
1. Configure an NFS export domain as described in the "Preparation" (p. 43) section.
2. Double-click the Acronis Backup icon on the desktop.
If the machine is running Linux, you must be logged on as the root user. If you are logged on as a
non-root user, run the following command:
sudo acronis_console

3. Click Manage this machine.
4. Click Create backup plan.
5. By default, all disks of the machine are selected for imaging. If you need to exclude a disk, under
What to back up, click Items to back up and clear the check box near the disk. For more details
about the exclusion, see "Considerations before migration" (p. 41).
Details. In addition, you can use the Show exclusions control to exclude files. Do not try to use
this control to exclude disks. It works at a file level.
6. Under Where to back up, click Location. In the opened window:
a. Specify the location where to save the image. For more details about the location, see
"Considerations before migration" (p. 41).
b. [Optional, but recommended] In the Name box, enter the image name. It could be the name
of the machine being imaged.
c. Click OK.
7. In Backup scheme, select Manual start.
8. Click Show backup type, validation, convert to virtual machine.
9. In Convert to virtual machine, select Convert.
10. By default, the current machine will perform the conversion. If you have selected a network
share as the image location, you can click Browse and select another machine with the agent.
Specify the credentials to access the machine.
11. Click VM type, select Save as files of the VM type that I select to the folder that I specify, and
then select Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization in the tree. Click OK to confirm your selection.
12. Click Storage, and then do the following, depending on the machine's operating system:
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

If the machine is running RHEL, expand the NFS folders node, and then select the path to the
RHEV export domain. Or, you can enter the NFS path manually; for example,
nfs://10.200.200.10/opt/export:/{EXPORT DOMAIN UUID}.



13.
14.
15.
16.
17.

If the machine is running Windows, select any convenient storage such as a local or network
folder.
Click OK to confirm your selection.
[Optional] Under Plan parameters, in Backup options, you can set other parameters of the
imaging, such as compression or network bandwidth usage.
Click OK to create the backup plan.
You will be taken to the Backup plans and tasks view, where you can see the backup plan you
just created. Select this plan and click Run.
If the machine is running Windows: once the operation is completed, copy the created virtual
machine to the RHEV export domain by using the operating system tools or third-party software.
Import (p. 50) the machine to the required data center using RHEV Manager.

4.1.4.5

Recovery to an existing virtual machine booted with bootable
media

Preparation
1. If you do not have an image (a .tib file) of the machine you want to migrate, create it in either of
the following ways:



Perform the "Preparation (p. 43)" and "Imaging (p. 44)" stages of the cold imaging (p. 43)
procedure.


2.
3.
4.
5.

Perform steps 1-5 and 11-12 of the hot imaging (p. 47) procedure.
If you do not have the ISO of "Migration to RHEV media", download it from the Acronis website.
Save the ISO on the RHEV ISO domain.
Prepare a RHEV virtual machine to perform the recovery to. If necessary, create it using the Red
Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager.
If the source machine has logical volumes, decide whether you want the target virtual machine
to have logical volumes as well.



If you want to reproduce the original LVM structure, make sure the target virtual machine
has enough disks with sizes at least as big as the original disks. The volume structure will be
created automatically if you choose the Apply RAID/LVM option.



If you want to obtain a different logical volume structure, you will need to create it manually.
Make sure that the total size of the machine's disks is greater than the amount of data you
are going to recover. The disks must have enough free space for the growing data and for the
operating system to work.

Booting the machine
1. Boot the target machine by using the "Migration to RHEV media" ISO.
2. In the boot menu, click Acronis Backup.
3. [Optional] Click Configure network... to check the network settings and to change them if
necessary.
4. Click Manage this machine locally.

[Optional] Creating the logical volumes
If you chose to create the logical volume structure manually, do the following:
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1. On the Actions menu, click Start shell. Alternatively, you can press CTRL+ALT+F2.
2. Create the volume structure by using the lvm utility.
3. Press ALT+F1 to return to the graphical interface.

Selecting the image
1. Click Recover.
2. Under What to recover, click Select data. In the opened window:
a. In the Data path box, enter the path to the image location and press Enter. If prompted,
specify the user name and password to access the location.
b. In the Archive view tab, expand the archive that contains the image, and select the image.
Normally, it is named like "Backup #1".
c. In Backup contents, select Volumes.
d. Select the check boxes for all of the volumes and MBRs.
e. Click OK.

[Optional] Applying RAID/LVM
If you chose to reproduce the original LVM structure, click Apply RAID/LVM and confirm the
expected result that appears in a pop-up window. Otherwise, skip this step.

Mapping volumes
If you created the logical volume structure manually, specify where to place each of the volumes
being recovered. Otherwise, the software automatically maps volumes from the image to the target
machine disks. MBRs and boot volumes are always mapped automatically.
To map an MBR or a volume:
a. Click Required next to it, and select the desired destination.
b. If you need to resize a volume or change other volume properties, click Properties next to
the volume. Make the necessary changes and click OK.
To change the mapping or size of a volume, you need to clear the mapping of the subsequent
volumes. To clear the mapping of an MBR or a volume, click Clear next to it. To clear the mapping of
all of the MBRs and volumes at once, click Clear all.

Starting the recovery
Click OK to start the recovery.

Applying Universal Restore
Universal Restore ensures that the operating system can boot on the new hardware.
1. Once the recovery is completed, boot the machine into Acronis Universal Restore.
2. Under Universal Restore for Linux/Universal Restore for Windows, select Use.
3. If the system being recovered is Windows, provide the RHEV drivers for it:
a. In the RHEV Manager, right-click the virtual machine being recovered to, select Change CD,
and select the ISO of the floppy disk with the drivers. This ISO can be found in the RHEV ISO
domain. Its default name is virtio*.iso.
b. On the machine, under Automatic driver search, click Add folder, expand the Local folders
node, select the CD drive, and then click OK.

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4.1.4.6

Importing a virtual machine to a data center

To import a machine from the export domain to the data center where the export domain is
attached:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

50

Go to the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager Web console.
In the upper row of tabs, click Storage.
Select the export domain to which the machine was added.
In the lower row of tabs, click VM Import.
Select the required virtual machine, and click Import.
Select the Destination Cluster and Destination Storage of the data center.
Click OK to start the import.

Copyright © Acronis International GmbH, 2002-2016



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