Backup into Azure

[Srobbins333]

Good morning everyone,

I know there has been extensive work between Azure and Veeam. Is it now feasible to backup directly into Azure? If so, what is the recommended course of action? We currently backup to an on-site repository and the Azure agent backs it up into our storage there. Is there a better way at this time?

[csinetops]

Not directly from the Veeam console. We use a NetApp AltaVault appliance to achieve what you are talking about.

You run a backup copy to the AltaVault which dedupes/compresses the files and streams it to your Azure BLOB. Per your retention policies on the AltaVault, it'll keep a certain amount of data on local disk then purge local, keeping the files in Azure only. Veeam doesn't know the difference, it thinks it has a huge repository. If you have to recall the data from Azure, you can go into the AltaVault and pre-populate the backups before you kick off the restore. We're seeing about a 13x dedupe/compression on our data so far. We have 170Tb logical but 13.6TB used on the device/Azure. This 13.6 TB costs us about $150 a month.

Not sure if there are other services that do the same. The AltaVault comes in physical and virtual models...

[Srobbins333]

Ah I see. I didn't know if there was a new or up-and-coming piece that allowed smaller businesses to backup to/restore from Azure to on-prem.

[veremin]

If you have a VM running in Azure, you can assign a repository role to it and leverage it as a target for backup or backup copy jobs.

As to restoring VMs to MS Azure, we already support that.

Thanks.

[Srobbins333]

Hey v.Eremin,

Right now I have only have VMs on-premise. I'm just using Azure as an offsite storage location at the moment. Is that supported all through Veeam yet, or do I still need the separate Azure Agent to send my data to that vault?

[csinetops]

v.Eremin was saying that you could spin up a Windows server in Azure and install the Veeam roles on it to make it a repository in the cloud. Since you don't have any Azure groundwork setup for running VM's out there,not a option for you. There is no native direct backup to Azure from Veeam without running a VM as a proxy in Azure.

[Srobbins333]

Ah, that makes more sense. It is something to consider. I'll look at the costs of that.

[nmdange]

If you have a Windows-based Veeam repository, you could install the Azure Backup agent (aka "MARS agent") on that server and have it backup all of the Veeam backup files to Azure Backup. If all you need to do is move all of your backups off-site then this might work.

I like the integration between DPM and Azure Backup and I really wish we could do the same with Veeam!

[Mike Resseler]

Hi @Srobbins333

Just for my own information and to be sure I understand the scenario, are you saying that you want to do a backup on-prem first, and after x amount of time do a backup copy job to Azure blob? (Even if you know that downloading those files could be extremely slow...)

[Srobbins333]

Sorry for the delayed response, but that is the correct scenario. I'd be okay with the slower download time.

[Mike Resseler]

Hi Shaun,

Understood. As you know not at this moment but this is certainly an important scenario for us (and a big request). This is noted down and counted as a vote!

Thanks
Mike