Question..

[ps23Rick]

Hi all ..

I've been playing with Veeam for a number of months now as time permits. I still feel like an newbie.

I work in a small office with just a few people and I'll admit that I feel like I need a degree to run Veeam properly. In our case I just want to be able to do incremental backups weekly with perhaps a full backup monthly or something similar.

I've got a fair amount of IT background but not much experience specifically with backups as I've never needed to have that knowledge until now. I'm the only one here that can set this thing up and run it and I'd like something that is fairly bulletproof and not requiring weekly oversight which may keep me from doing my other jobs in the office. We've got a server running Windows 2019 Server with AD and some hyper-v VM's (one Windows and one Linux).

Ideally, I'd like to do a file-level backup (I think) for the Windows shares that we have, and perhaps file-level backups for the Linux VM and skip the Windows VM as we're not using it right now.

Is there some sort of write-up/primer on backup strategies/methodologies for those new to backups that is tailored towards Veeam -- not for those well versed in all things IT? I just thought I'd ask.

As it stands now, what I thought were my incremental backups are actually full-backups (.vbk)'s at 109Gb each and if I leave things as they are, I'll run out of disk space quickly.

Thanks in advance for any direction/wisdom that you might be able to provide!

[Mildur]

Hi Rick

Ideally, I'd like to do a file-level backup (I think) for the Windows shares that we have, and perhaps file-level backups for the Linux VM and skip the Windows VM as we're not using it right now.

File Level backups are possible, but you should create volume level backups. You cannot restore the entire machine from a file level backup job which only protects files on a share. Reinstalling all production machines may take a long time to get things back running for your office.
For the VMs, use a VM backup job. For the physical machines, use our Veeam Agent to create an entire machine backup.

Also consider your ransomware protection strategy. Your backups must be immutable (hardened repository, object storage) or airgapped (rotated usb disks, tapes). If the backup storage is accessible all the time from the agent or backup server, an attacker can delete those backups if they are not immutable or air-gapped.

Is there some sort of write-up/primer on backup strategies/methodologies for those new to backups that is tailored towards Veeam -- not for those well versed in all things IT? I just thought I'd ask.

If you are completely new to Veeam and you need help in designing your backup strategy/environment, I strongly recommend to contact a local partner. We have a list on our website where you can find all partners from your region:
https://www.veeam.com/find-partner.html?type%5B%5D=VASP

Best,
Fabian

[ps23Rick]

Thanks Fabian..

I think you're right .. I'll probably have to reach out to a local partner that can assist with setting things up properly. Even though we're currently using the community edition, we're open to switching to one of the other tiers with support & so forth. Regarding your suggestion regarding hardening, I neglected to indicate that we are using tape backups for LTO6 drives that we've got, so we definitely have the airgapping that you spoke of which is a step in the right direction.

Thanks for the suggestions!

[Mildur]

You're welcome.
Offline Tapes are still a good protection against malicious attacks.

Best,
Fabian