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Manage backup of physical machine from Veeam Backup & Replication Update 3

  • February 21, 2018
  • 7 min read
IT and Virtualization Consultant. Romain is specializing in Microsoft technologies such as Hyper-V, System Center, storage, networking, and MS Azure. He is a Microsoft MVP and MCSE in Server Infrastructure and Private Cloud.
IT and Virtualization Consultant. Romain is specializing in Microsoft technologies such as Hyper-V, System Center, storage, networking, and MS Azure. He is a Microsoft MVP and MCSE in Server Infrastructure and Private Cloud.

Requirements

There is no need to deploy Veeam Agent before using this new feature. If you have already deployed Veeam Agent for Windows / Linux on several servers, you can use them in Veeam Backup & Replication without uninstalling.

If you deploy Veeam Agent from Veeam Backup & Replication, you need an account which is a local administrator of the physical machine/cloud instance.

Create the protection group

The protection group is a set of physical machines/cloud instances which are protected by an agent. In this example, I create a protection group and I populate it by browsing the Active Directory.

To create the protection group, navigate to Inventory | Physical & Cloud Infrastructure. Then click on create the protection group.

Veeam backup and replicalion - create protection group

Then specify a protection group name and provide a description.

Veeam backup and replicalion - create protection group - name and description

In the next window, I choose to populate the protection group from Active Directory. You can also specify an individual computer or computers from a CSV file.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Microsoft Active Directory objects

Then I click on Add to browse the Active Directory and add an object such an OU or a computer.

Veeam backup and replicalion - adding an object Computer

You can specify excluded objects such as virtual machines (they don’t need an agent), offline computers or objects.

PS: I unchecked All virtual machines because, for this example, I have installed the agent on a VM. It is exactly the same process for physical machine or cloud instance.

Veeam backup and replicalion - New Protection Group

Then configure the discovery schedule and the installation/update of the agent automatically. For example, if you have chosen an organizational unit as an included object when you add the computer in this OU, Veeam is able to discover and install agent automatically on this machine.

Veeam backup and replicalion - New protection group - Options

Then review settings and click on apply to install the agent and create the protection group.

Veeam backup and replicalion - New protection group - Inslall Agent

 

Veeam backup and replicalion - New protection group - Apply

 

Veeam backup and replicalion - New protection group - Summary

Backup the physical machine

When the protection group is created, you can browse the Inventory | Physical & Cloud Infrastructure. You should see the computers where the agent has been installed. Right-click on a machine and select Add to backup job | New job.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - New job

Next, choose the job type and click on Next.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - Job Mode

Next, choose the backup mode. You can backup at the file level, at volume level or the entire computer.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - Beckup Mode

In the next window, select the backup repository and the number of restore points to keep on disk.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - Storage

As other Veeam backup job, you can enable application-aware processing and guest file system indexing. These settings depend on the application deployed on the machine. For example, if you have installed SQL Server on the physical machine, I recommend you to enable application-aware processing.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - Guest Processing

To finish, you can schedule the backup job as other Veeam backup job.

Veeam backup and replicalion - Add to backup job - Scedule

Agent management

In addition, to create a backup job, you can also manage the computer agent. In Inventory | Physical & Cloud Infrastructure, right click on a computer and select Agent.

You can uninstall agent, reboot the machine create a recovery media and so on.

Veeam Agent Management

Conclusion

Veeam has filled a huge gap with Update 3 of Veeam Backup & Replication: the backup of the physical server. Since several years, I heard clients complain about the lack of physical server backup in Veeam Backup & Replication. Now Veeam Backup & Replication is able to manage the backup of the physical server and it is also able to backup VM in public Cloud. As usual, Veeam has implemented an easy to use the feature.

Found Romain’s article helpful? Looking for a reliable, high-performance, and cost-effective shared storage solution for your production cluster?
Dmytro Malynka
Dmytro Malynka StarWind Virtual SAN Product Manager
We’ve got you covered! StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) is specifically designed to provide highly-available shared storage for Hyper-V, vSphere, and KVM clusters. With StarWind VSAN, simplicity is key: utilize the local disks of your hypervisor hosts and create shared HA storage for your VMs. Interested in learning more? Book a short StarWind VSAN demo now and see it in action!