FLR directly from tape

[AlexB]

Hi

we are backing up several sites to a backup server in a DR location. This server is connected to a tape library. Our goal is to archive some of the Veeam backups to tape.
This seems to work only when using "File to tape" jobs. Downside is, before restoring single files out of the Veeam backup on tape, the backup has to be copied back to disk. That's pretty uncomfortable when dealing with large VMs. I've found no other way to send backups to tape, as there are no jobs defined on the DR server. And choosing a backup repository as source results in jobs ending with "There is nothing to backup".

What am I missing? Any ideas?

Thanks in advance

AlexB.

[veremin]

Hi, Alex.

In order to use backup to tape job in DR you have to either create a “dummy” job, map it to resulting backup data and use, then, as a source for a backup to tape job or initiate backup jobs from DR VB&R instance, instead of production one.

Though, please be aware, that even in case of backup copy job, you will have to restore entire .vbk file from tape media prior to performing any granular data restore.

Thanks.

[AlexB]

Thanks for the reply.

Will there ever be a chance of restoring single items directly from tape? Or at least being able to search the index of a vbk on tape? Our Situation often is that project files are needed, but exact point in time is unknown. It's very impractical to restore >2TB vbk files just to have a look what's inside them.

AlexB.

[veremin]

Will there ever be a chance of restoring single items directly from tape?

Yep, there is possibility that one of the future versions will support such scenario. Currently there is no ETA. Thanks.

[tsightler]

You can use enterprise manager even today to search for a file and find out what restore points it is located in, and thus what VBK you would need to bring back. This can help you know which VBK you need to restore.

[HussainMahfood]

restore guest file level from tape.

The issue now is we need to restore the whole vbk to restore a single file.

Thanks in advance for such a great product.

[Dima P.]

Hussain,

Thank you for the provided feedback, we will look into this.

[larimerE]

I was told by Veeam support that they did not have record of many FLR search and restore from tape. I am not happy with the situation of having to restore the whole vbk to retrieve guest OS files to restore but I do understand it from an architectural perspective.
I don't understand why other organizations are not in an outcry that the index created during original server backup is not kept when the image moves to tape therefore allowing search of the backup to find the specific files needed before restoring a 10 tb file server and not finding the file that the customer needs.
If there are any updates on this feature let me know. I see they are improving tape in version 9 but not this feature as far as I can tell.

[veremin]

Are you using search in Enterprise Manager for that? It should have the mentioned index kept in accordance with the specified retention period. Thanks.