Restore Files from Tape

[wernermp]

Hello, Veeam Backup & Replication v. 11.

We are being told that if you backup a Windows Server 2016 VM using the backup VM method, as opposed to using an agent installed on VM and backing up the filesystem via an agent, that there is no ability to perform a restore at the file level from tape.

Specifically, A backup job that backs up the VM using no agent via the backup VM option, to a backup repository. A secondary job in the backup job will move the backup from the backup repository to tape. Now, once that backup is on tape there is no longer the ability to perform a restore at the file level from that tape. The entire VM must be restored. Is this accurate?

[MarkBoothmaa]

You can do file to tape directly to the vm in question. That reads and backs up the file system.
Backup to tape is exactly that it copies the backup files to tape. Then you would restore the backup files, import the backup if required and from that do a VM restore of a file level recovery etc.

[wernermp]

Hi, we are not looking to perform file to tape. We are not wanting to backup at the file system level. We currently backup to disk using VM backups. There are then secondary auxiliary jobs that run monthly to archive backups from disk to tape and store off site.
As far as we can tell. You can backup VMs to disk and, along with being able to restore the entire VM and / or VM configuration files, you can also restore only specific folders or files of the VM. Once the backups are moved from disk to tape, you no longer can restore at the file level, or disk level or vmdk level, You can only restore the entire VM backup from tape to a backup repository and then you can restore a folder or file from their. I certainly hope this is not the case but it sure seems to be.

[Mildur]

You can only restore the entire VM backup from tape to a backup repository and then you can restore a folder or file from their. I certainly hope this is not the case but it sure seems to be.

You can restore the entire VM back to your hypervisor infrastructure without using a repository. But restores like Guest OS file restore or single disk restores requires you to copy the VM backup back to a Veeam backup repository.

To optimize the restore time, backup chains should use "Per-Machine chains" or "True Per-Machine (since v12)" format.

Best,
Fabian