How use a VM Copy

[bar971]

Dears all,
before disposing (and delete) a virtual server (vSphere 4.0 u4) of production had thought to perform a new 'VM Copy' safety to keep for a few months.
The 'VM Copy' I did it on a disk where I installed Veeam 6.0 but now I was wondering:

how can I make a restore in production?
I can use VMwarePlayer to use it?

thanks

[foggy]

Christian, I would use VeeamZip in your case. VM copy copies VM in a native format, which requires more space, besides, all disks are copied in thick format as thin disks can reside on VMFS only. VeeamZip creates a full VM backup (compressed and deduped) and is much more applicable in this case. You can always restore VM from a VeeamZIP-created backup file by simply importing it to Veeam B&R console and starting regular restore. Thanks!

[bar971]

@foggy, thanks for your answer, but I want use 'VM Copy' without installing other software ( it would had to be validate before by my bosses ).
Space is not an issue for me, and the VM copy will be delete in 4/6 week.
I can find a way to restore the 'VM Copy' in the vCenter. I need to 'Copy File' in the datastore and re-register the vm after deleting the original?
VMware Player isn't a valid option?

Thank you

[foggy]

Sorry, should have mention this - VeeamZIP is a feature of Veeam B&R (both free and paid versions), you can read in the product user guide about it.

Yes, you need to copy the VM files to the datastore and register the VM to be able to run it.
And no, you cannot use VMware Player to run this VM as it has different VM format.

[Gostev]

Check out the video here:
http://www.veeam.com/virtual-machine-ba ... -free.html

[Jmont]

Hello,

I'm trying veeam 6.5 TRIAL version .

I need to do VM copies to an external disk . I've to carry those machines to a new work project on a foreign client that doesn't have veeam and that for commercial / agreement reasons we are not allowed (yet) to change anything on their infrastructure (meaning i can't install veeam on their site for now) ...

I have 18 machines that have a provisioned size of 6 TB . We did these machines for our client with thin provision disks so, in fact, the used space of vmdk's are about 2 TB .

I'm trying to do VM-Copy jobs to our external (2 TB) disk but the jobs are doing full provisioned size disks so they can't fit the media .

the reason for copy job was because i can choose all VMs at once instead of veeam zip which only allows for a VM at a time .

Is there a way of doing it, in a one job, and copying the vmdk's as thin provision disks ?

Thank you all,

[veremin]

Hi Jorge.

In fact, thin disks cannot exist without being attached to a registered VM, so the disk format is always changed to thick during both File Copy and VM Copy jobs. That's why VM Copy isn't suitable for such task.

Thanks.

[foggy]

Actually, if you are on the trial (not FREE) version of Veeam B&R, then you can VeeamZIP multiple VMs at a time.

To restore those VMs into the remote site infrastructure, you can use a standalone utility (extract.exe) coming with every Veeam B&R installation and allowing to restore VMs from any VBK file, even without the product installed.

[itdirector]

I am opening up a support ticket tonight, but I was wondering if anyone else is seeing this same issue:

A simple VM Copy job from one datastore to another (tried multiple different datastores) inflates the vmdk on the target to its full provisioned size.

Example: VM has one thin disk vmdk size at 12GB with provisioned size at 200GB. VM Copy job copies this VM to another datastore, but transfers the full 200GB, with the target copied VM showing the vmdk size at 200GB.

This was a similar issue in the past with seeding with version 6.0, which a patch fixed. I thought patch 3 would fix it for 6.5, but it hasn't.

Veeam 6.5.0.144
vSphere 5.0 update 2

Thx

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi friedman, please see Vladimir's explanation of this behavior in the post above. Thanks!

[ssobolev]

Hi Jorge.

In fact, thin disks cannot exist without being attached to a registered VM, so the disk format is always changed to thick during both File Copy and VM Copy jobs. That's why VM Copy isn't suitable for such task.

Thanks.

Vladimir, does the same apply to VeeamZIP for the whole machine? I have similar behaviour with version 7.0.0.690 for some of the VMs.
Are there any particular VM properties that can affect this?

Regards

[foggy]

Sergey, do you mean VM disks are inflated upon restore from the backup created by VeeamZIP?

[Vitaliy S.]

VeeamZIP preserves VM configuration and virtual disk configuration, so the limitation discussed in this thread does not apply to backup/VeeamZIP jobs.

[ssobolev]

Sergey, do you mean VM disks are inflated upon restore from the backup created by VeeamZIP?

No, what I'm seeing at the moment is that VeeamZIP starts to read the whole space for thin-provisioned disk (i.e. 1.5 TB, while only 200 GB is used).
This does not happen to all the VMs, but to the selected few.

[Vitaliy S.]

It looks like you're seeing this behavior, which is not the same as OPs was having with VM Copy jobs. Thanks!