Veeam Backup on Hyper-V - SQL Server Backup recommendations?

[doug.coleman]

Hello,

We are a new Veeam Hyper-V customer. I am looking for best practice for backup up SQLServer 2008 R2 Enterprise databases consistantly that are running in Hyper-V VMs with v6 of Veeam Backup & Replication. I understand that the vPower features are not part of the product on the Hyper-V implementation (yet - but are planned for the future). Our goal would be to generate recovery points every hour or so that could be used to recover to the same VM or to a different VM as our requirements might dictate.

Thanks in advance for any input & suggestions,
Doug Coleman

[Gostev]

Hi Doug,

Do you do any other backups of your SQL server involving log shipping (native or 3rd party), or you are aiming to use Veeam as the only backup solution for your SQL server? Knowing this will help me to better answer your question.

Also, let me know if you are using shared storage for your Hyper-V servers.

And good news - as far as vPower, we have added Instant VM Recovery capability for Hyper-V in version 6.1 (due to be released in the next few weeks), and we are planning to add other vPower-based features down the road as well.

Thanks!

[doug.coleman]

Hi Gostev,
This is a new Hyper-V implementation consisting of two Hyper-V servers with local disk, the 1st machine for production, the 2nd for recovery. We also have a NAS that is accessible to both machines running Wk28R2 - this is what is running Veeam. Both Hyper-V machines are connected via multiple 1GBit linked teams. Our Database is relatively small @ under 30GB currently. I understand of course that I could setup Windows backups, or log-shipping or both, but I was looking for what was currently best practice and suggestions given the tools available currently and utilizing Veeam. I look forward to the availability of 6.1...

Doug Coleman

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi Doug,

Since you would like to use Veeam only, then I would recommend to enable "application aware image processing" and choose to truncate logs on each successful backup job run. In this case, you will be able to restore your SQL Server VM in consistent state to any point in time available in Veeam restore wizard.

Thanks!

[kewnev]

We use SQLBackupAndFTP to create exported to file backups within the VM, as well as backing up the whole VM with Veeam. It just gives extra assurance and another option for database recovery. Backing up a couple of databases pre VM is free, but the paid version is inexpensive too http://sqlbackupandftp.com/ .
(And no, I have no affiliation with them, just a happy customer of the product)