Bare Metal Restore: cannot connect to a backup server

[RoderikdW]

Support Case ID: 00913359

I am attempting to restore a Windows 2012 R2 Server to VMWare vCloud DIrector 5.6 using VEEAM Endpoint Backup Free Recovery Media.
I created a Recovery Media which includes hardware drivers, and made a backup which was sent to the B&R server.

Now I made a clean machine and inserted the ISO of the Recovery Media. I selected Bare Metal Restore and am attempting to connect to my B&R Server. But for some reason I receive the following error: cannot connect to a backup server.

I have tried it on a VM which had windows server 2012 R2 already installed and a completely new VM. I have tried using the login credentials of the VM's current OS, the backupped server's credentials, and finally my B&R account's credentials. But nothing works and I keep receiving the same error message.

I can ping the server from cmd.

Is this issue known to anyone?

[Mike Resseler]

I haven't seen this problem yet. Normally I would think that there is no network or something but since you state you can ping the server from CMD that should not be the issue.

I do kind of not understand what you mean by VMware vCloud Director. So you created an "empty" VM, attached our recovery media ISO onto it and booted on that media. Correct?

Then, through the recovery media, you try to recover a backup created by Endpoint Backup Free that is stored on the B&R server.

Correct?

Let us know

Mike

[RoderikdW]

What you said is completely correct. I am trying to restore a backup stored on the B&R server through the Recovery Media on an empty VM on the vCloud Director environment.

Kind Regards,
Roderik

[Mike Resseler]

OK.

In that case, can you rerun the entire procedure. When it fails, and you are back on the main window of the recovery media, do not restart but go to the tools. There is an option to save the logs. Save those somewhere and PM Dima.P from the forums here so support can do an investigation to figure out why it is not connecting

Thanks

Mike

[RoderikdW]

Thank you - I will do this as soon as possible, I apologize for the delay in response.

[Mike Resseler]

No worries, we are all busy

Keep us posted with the case ID and if you have received a solution, please let everybody else know also

Thanks

Mike

[RoderikdW]

My apologies for the delay,
I have sent the Exported Logs as requested to Dima P.
However the error I am getting is slightly different now.
The reason for this is because a collegue deleted the VM's I was using to test Veeam Endpoint.
So after setting up a new environment to test the Bare Metal Restore in, I tried to execute a Bare Metal Restore and got the following error:

Unable to make a connection to VBR. Either host is unreachable or VBR is down or VBR Version is not supported. Endpoint supports connection to VBR patch2 or greater.

I am quite confident in the fact patch2 is installed as I have done this myself, and this error did not occur last time.
The only change that has taken place in between these 2 attempts to execute a Bare Metal Restore is the upgrade of our Cloud Provider rental license from standard to enterprise plus, however I am not sure how this impacts my Veeam Recovery Media and the connection to the server with this media.

[Mike Resseler]

Ok,

Thanks for the heads up. Dima will take those logs to QC and we will see from there

Thanks

Mike

[RoderikdW]

Alright Thanks!

Also for an unknown reason the Support Case I opened with the abovementioned support case ID has disappeared from my Support Cases. It's neither in Open or Closed Cases.

Kind Regards,
Roderik

[Mike Resseler]

I will request support to quickly look what has happened

Thanks

Mike

[Mike Resseler]

Hi Roderik,

The reason it is out of your portal is because this is a support case for VEBF (Sorry, didn't realize that you were talking about the portal... should have known that...) Because our support for free tools is a bit different than our support for paid versions (no SLA's given, everything on best effort) we converted it to a VEBF case and therefore it is gone. However, the case still exists and the email conversation will continue as normal but as said, it is on best effort.

Hope it helps

Mike

[RoderikdW]

Alright, thanks for the heads up on that!

[Dima P.]

Hi Roderik,
We’ve detected from the logs that the Recovery Media iso was created in the RC code. May I ask to recreate it then boot and configure the network in the wizard and if the repository is reachable. Once configured, check if you can properly ping the repository server via cmd. Thanks in advance.

[RoderikdW]

Thank you for the update, I will get to this as soon as possible and post an update when it is done!

[RoderikdW]

I am not able to ping it because the firewall does not allow it, but I can telnet it over port 10001 and 6180, yet I cannot connect to the server on the bare metal restore wizard. I am slightly confused as to which credentials must be given when trying to access it too. Should it be the credentials given during the configuration of the actual backup ,or should it be the credentials of the account you received from your cloud provider?

[Dima P.]

Roderik,
The credentials you used to set up the Endpoint Backup Permission to the VBR repository.

[RoderikdW]

I finally succesfully got through to the actual repository, once the backup starts I get the following error during restore though.

The VM is a blank VM, with a lot of storage space on the 2 disks needed to restore the backup of Windows Server 2012 R2.
I am attempting to do this in vCloud vDirector.

Not unimportant to note is the fact I get the following message right before I start the backup, which might have something to do with the problems I am experiencing while trying to execute the backup.

Any idea's on this?

Kind Regards,
Roderik

[RoderikdW]

Sadly I cannot use the mouse in vCloud Director in this wizard, it is a bug in VMWare vCloud Director 5.6 where it is not possible to use the mouse without the installation of VMWare Tools. So it is not possible to expand the window and see the full error.

[Dima P.]

RoderikdW,

That’s a pity: I see the error that even the restore logs were not transferred to the repository, can you check that please? If it was not saved, can you manually save it using the export log functionality of the recovery media (Main Screen > Tools) to file share? Thanks

[RoderikdW]

I sent you a PM with a link for the files!

Kind Regards,
Roderik

[Dima P.]

Thanks, I’ve downloaded the logs and I still see the communication issue between the Recovery Media and VBR repository:

Code: Select all

[10.06.2015 18:11:22] <11> Error    Failed to connect to agent's endpoint '172.20.10.38:2505'. Host: 'LABS01VCC01'.
[10.06.2015 18:11:22] <11> Error    A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond 172.20.10.38:2505 (System.Net.Sockets.SocketException)

If you confirm the needed ports are opened between repository and the said machine, I can advise to modify the ConnectByIPsTimeoutSec registry key like described in the post. Let me know if it helps.

[RoderikdW]

Thanks, I'll get to it as soon as possible!

[RoderikdW]

Opening the ports has not made a difference. I looked at the post you linked me, but it refers to SOFTWARE/Veeam Endpoint Backup. But my Veeam Cloud Connect Server does not have an end point backup folder in the registry. I am trying to restore from my VBR Repository, in which folder in registry should I make the new DWORD in this case?

[Dima P.]

My bad the solution with the regkey indeed works only on the Endpoint machine’s end during the backup. QA team advised to temporary shutdown your firewalls between the VM and backup repository for testing purposes. If the restore fails again – there must be another error message in the logs.

[RoderikdW]

Alright thanks, I will try this!

[RoderikdW]

still need to test the abovementioned, haven't had a chance to do it yet, but still on the case!

[Dima P.]

Hello RoderikdW,

Thanks for the heads up. No rush here, take your time – just do not forget to share the results with the community

[RoderikdW]

Sadly I am not able to shut down the firewall between the 2 due to other machines. However opening all ports did not work either for both sides.

[corby2112]

Hello,

I have created backups to a directly attached drive using VEB. If I do a backup to a folder on the attached drive, I can do a bare metal restore using VEB recovery without any problem.

I prefer to do my VEB backups to a B&R repository, also stored locally, so that I can make use of backup copy. I created the repository and can perform the backup without any problem.

However, when I try to do bare metal restore using VEB recovery disk, I cannot attach to the repository using the same credentials as used to backup to repository.

Using command prompt with the recovery media, I do an Netstat and do not see port 10001 as listening.

Any suggestions?

[Dima P.]

Hi corby2112,

I cannot attach to the repository using the same credentials as used to backup to repository.

You get an error while connecting to the VBR or to the repository? Could you share the test of the error? Thanks.