Host-based backup of Microsoft Hyper-V VMs.
elsispro
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[MERGED] Moving VMs to another host

Post by elsispro »

Is there a way to make VBR be aware of the VM being moved from one standalone Hyper-V host to another and continue the backup chain instead of creating a new chain? For example If I have one job that has multiple Hyper-V hosts added (that is - all possible VMs) and I move some VM from one host to another (even preserving the name and ID of VM) VBR does not continue the original chain, but create a new one instead. This is very inconvenient if there are frequent VM moves. And you cannot delete the old chain right away, because you would lose previous restore points.
Vitaliy S.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by Vitaliy S. »

If you're using Failover Cluster or SCVMM as a root object in the backup inventory (jobs), then migrating VMs between hosts should not cause this behavior. Please review this thread for more information. Thanks!
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by willrussell »

mkaec wrote: May 14, 2019 1:17 pm Mike,

It would actually be possible to do for the normal case. The VM GUID does not change when the VM is moved (at least on Hyper-V). B&R currently maps the VMs based on both the GUID of the host and the VM. Logic could be implemented that if a VM is missing from a backup job, to see if the missing GUID is now present on another host and automatically link it back up. This would work 99% of the time, but I understand if you wouldn't want to implement something that is not 100%.

However, what your standalone host users could use is a mapping tool that would allow an administrator to tell B&R where a VM has been moved to, just like there is for telling B&R where backup files have moved to. This would be a suitable solution for the standalone host users. They typically don't move VMs that often, but when they do it is unpleasant to have to restart the backup chain over again.
Mike Resseler wrote: May 15, 2019 6:11 am Hmmm. That might be something to consider. Fact will remain that it will be a full backup on everything pre-2016 because we lost the incremental knowledge there.
Mike,

Was this ever actually considered as an improvement?

We've got a few clients who have only two Hyper-V hosts but no shared storage or VMM server. If we could have a manual mapping tool to tell B&R it's the same VM on the new host that would be very helpful in terms of saving backup storage space.

Will
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by Vitaliy S. »

If you're using the reversed incremental mode, then you could use a backup mapping option in the job settings. This option will still create a new full backup, but it will not consume 2x space since you already have a full image stored on the VBK file (latest file). If you're using forward incremental mode, then there are no changes in how Veeam B&R behaves when VMs are migrated from host to host without using Failover Cluster/SCVMM. Thanks!
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by willrussell » 1 person likes this post

Hi Vitaly,

Thanks for the clarification, that's useful to know.

Will
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by mkaec »

I was excited to be notified there was a response in this thread, but sad to find that there is still no plan to ease the pain for customers that move VMs on standalone Hyper-V hosts that don't have SCVMM.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by dmitryk8 »

I need to move some VMs from one Hyper-V cluster to another. Current VBR build is 10.0.0.4461 P1.
As I understand, the only way is to remove VM from the job and then add again? Or may be there were improvements?
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by Egor Yakovlev »

No improvements.
Moved VM receives a new ID at the target host\cluster and is treated as new VM by Veeam respectfully. Re-add is still the way to go, and if mass VM migration is planned, a PowerShell script might ease your migration process with jobs edit.
/Cheers!
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by mkaec »

And "Map" functionality that would ease the process after the move is still MIA.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by DrazenSego »

Hi all,
Im have similar question:
In different hyper-v hosts, 2016 and 2019, can i migrate vm from 2016 to 2019 and then back to 2016 (after maintance is over on 2016 host) host with B&R suite. Im not going to upgrade vm version, it will stay V8.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by willrussell » 1 person likes this post

You can migrate without Veeam, just use Hyper-V (shared nothing) live migration. If your processors are different model/stepping then you might need to turn on the processor compatiblity mode first for each VM (and doing that requires a short VM downtime).

If you are talking about the backup side of things, then the info above is still relevant if you need to back up the VM on its temporary location, i.e. you'll have to re-add the VM(s) to the job via it's the 2019 host, and the next backup Veeam will run will be a full backup, not incremental. Then when you move it back to 2016, you re-add the VM(s) to the job again, and the full backup will happen again. This doesn't happen if you have your hosts configured via SCVMM or within a cluster.

The backup is only relevant if you are moving the VM for an extended period. If you are just dealing with a short (few hours) maintenance window, then your RPO might not need to worry about backup via the 2019 host. Just move the VMs via Hyper-V live migration, do maintenance, then move VMs back again via live migration. Note that storage live migration can take a while (depending on storage speed at both sides, network speed and VM size).
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by DrazenSego »

Thx Will,
Thing that worries me, if i remember correctly, vm once moved to a newer hyper v host cannot be moved back because source hyper v host is newer now...
Thats why im looking for B&R sollution.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by willrussell »

It's not an issue with Hyper-V live migration, so long as you keep the configuration at V8. I have moved VMs from 2016 to 2019 and back to 2016 without issue using LM. This is the best way to do it.

Funnily enough it's NOT possible to do this with Veeam - https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=110

"The version of the target host on which the VM is restored must be the same or later than the version of the source host where the original VM was registered."

When you try and restore a backup of a 2019 VM to 2016, it will not let you.

So just use live migration, easiest solution all round :)

If you want to test for your own piece of mind, create a test VM (it doesn't need an OS installing, so just give it a small disk) and try to move backward and forward.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by DrazenSego »

Many thx Will.
It was 2 years ago since i had that scenario. Thx for guidance.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by audax »

Hello Veeam?
Any progress with remapping utility for HyperV users with standalone hosts?
In SMB environment we cannot all afford SCVMM or cluster.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by Vitaliy S. »

Hi audax,

Unfortunately, there is no such utility for Hyper-V.

Thanks!
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by JRRW »

Mike Resseler wrote: May 14, 2019 5:53 am Marc,

It will be difficult to add support for that. We can't do that either with VMware. It is because vCenter is their SCVMM (And no, don't start saying which one is best ;-)) that we have that support. vCenter is widely used by everyone with VMware while Hyper-V has... Well, not so much SCVMM fans...

I agree it is not pleasant, but unless we have a control center to connect to, we are in the dark
Hey now, I resemble that comment!

SCVMM 2022 isn't..... well it's not completely horrible, it has some neat features vCenter doesn't have... But it also leaves a lot to be desired.
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Re: Moving Hyper-V guest VM to another host

Post by karsten123 »

SCVMM 2022 is still not supported
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