Feature request: Exclude disk when choosing entire computer

[Peejay62]

Hi,

is there a way too exclude a disk /volume even when you choose entire computer as backup mode for a windows physical machine?
By default we like to backup the entire computer (all disks) except 1 drive. This drive is defined as a dedicated drive for swap. (fwiw the s: drive). What happens now is that when I run a backup it ends up in a warning for the job. The S: drive is low on space (completely filled up with swapfile) and Veeam says it is unable to create a vss snapshot and warns on the low space issue. We don't want to backup that drive anyway.
Choosing volume based backup is not an option as I see it now as you have to enter drives by hand. There can be multiple drives on a system and I don't think it is a viable way to define your backup scope.
Probably this is a feature request: exclude disks when selecting entire computer backup mode. I haven't been able to find an option within Veeam B&R from centrally managed agents.

Thanks, Peter

[Dima P.]

Hello Peter.

Thank you for your request. I'll discuss it with the team.

[agrob]

+1
it would also be nice to exclude specific folders from a "entire computer backup". For example i would like to exclude the Folders from the SQL Databases (for example exclude E:\MSSQL). Reason, we use SQL Maintenance Plans.

[davidkusch]

We would like to second this request. We have clients who, as it pertains to Hyper-V, foolishly load a physical server windows 2016 server and Exchange, and then load the Hyper-V role on the same server.
We need to do an "Entire Computer" backup since Exchange is so critical, but want to exclude the VHD directories of the additional virtual machines. Since they are our client (we are a Veeam pro-partner) we cannot force them to change their setup. Thank you.

[Dima P.]

Hello and welcome David.

To clarify, you are referring to the backup jobs created in Veeam B&R console, right?

[davidkusch]

Yes, thank you.

[mimilau]

That'd be an awesome feature. We can exclude the 400GB drive which stores the shadow copies.

[Dima P.]

Hello and welcome to the community mimilau.

May ask If this shadow copy volume holds identical volume level across all computers or it's named differently? Thank you!

[mdb_ec]

Hi.

Just wanted to say the exclude disk or folder feature also make sense when using Veeam Agent for Windows. Take for instance a power user with lots of very large local drives (say video footage) which he also backs up by some other means (sync'ed to a network share). He'd like to have his workstation OS and apps restored from an image backup and that it completes as soon as possible to have it working again, and initially access the files in the network share, to have them later sync'ed back to the workstation local drives.

If he were forced to backup and restore all the local drives (OS + large data drives), it would take much longer for the workstation to be usable again.

Thanks

[garybourne]

Hi,

Can I add my request that we are able to folders on Physical server backups. Reason being that we are backing up a set of databases using Native SQL Backups and therefore want to exclude the folders.
Is there any chance that this will be included in a release coming out soon?

Thanks,
Gary.

[Dima P.]

Hello and welcome to the community Gary,

Thank you for your feedback. Cant provide you any ETA but I've added your vote to this feature request. Cheers!

[iknowtech]

Really surprised this is not an option? Using the Windows Agent, I want to exclude an internal drive on a physical server that is specifically there just for the Veeam backups. This is a bit more secure than having a USB Drive connected that someone can easily walk away with. This is small office and they don't have a dedicated IT closet or anything like that. Just a little Microserver on a shelf in one of the offices.

Also getting a message that backing up to internal hard drives is not recommended? What's wrong with internal hard drives?

I want to exclude the one internal drive from the full computer backup, and us it as the backup target. Even the most basic of backup software can do this, why am putting in a feature request for this?

[Dima P.]

Please clarify is that a managed by VBR or VAC agent or standalone deployment?

Also getting a message that backing up to internal hard drives is not recommended? What's wrong with internal hard drives?

If entire computer dies you loose both your production data and your backup files, thus such approach is not recommend (but we do not block it).

[iknowtech]

I was setting this up via VAC with Windows Agent.

Not sure I agree here that if the computer/server dies that you would lose the backup files simply for using an internal drive vs a USB drive. If the drive I'm backing up to is dedicated to just backups? I suppose if there is a major electronic failure that kills all the connected internal drives that could happen, but probably also possible for a USB drive to be killed as well if there was some serious electronic failure or power surge. In my mind a backup drive is a backup drive, and I don't see much difference with one that is in hotswap tray behind a locked door connected to a SATA port to one that is connected to a USB port hanging off a wire sitting out in the open in some cases.

You provide the option to do a whole computer backup and exclude a USB drive, how is it any different to be able to exclude an internal drive for the same purpose. The issue actually was more a problem when setting things up via a VAC profile as you don't really get much indication that that Volume level backup that only includes the C: Drive will also include the hidden partitions that would be required for a Bare Metal recovery. I found that when I used the full agent to configure the jobs it was more obvious that was going to happen. I think it just provides a bit of warm fuzzy being able to choose the Entire Computer Option along with a drive exclusion over having to manually setup the included Volumes manually, and it would improve the VAC profile setup process.

[Dima P.]

Hello Jason,

Thank you for the honest feedback, we will discuss it together with VAC team. Cheers!

[bytewiseits]

Wondering if anything came of this as I also see a great benefit from having a drive exclusion option in the Windows Agent (when selecting entire computer), and being able to push this out via VAC as well.

We usually have an Internal drive dedicated to backups for smaller SMB environments so that they have faster and more frequent local backup and restores. We alternately use USB drives where internal is not possible (but internal drives tend to be faster, less issues and don't get 'accidentally' disconnected). We also set daily backups to Cloud Connect as well for offsite.

Currently we need to set the local and cloudconnect backup policies (through VAC) to Volume based and include all drive letters except for the backup drive letter. If anything changes on the server/workstation drive letter assignments it leaves it potentially unprotected until we catch the changes and modify the backup policy etc. This necessitates frequent checking to ensure that everything (except the backup drive) is selected and backed up on every endpoint. If we could select 'Entire Computer' but specify the internal/local backup drive as an exclusion, this frequent checking and adjusting wouldn't be required thus saving alot of time wasted otherwise.

Would be awesome if this was in the works for the next major release of Veeam products (VBR V10, VAC & Endpoint).

[Dima P.]

Hello Dion,

Thank you for sharing your use case! I've added your notes to this improvement request and will discuss it with the team. Cheers!

[Steve-nIP]

This would be a great feature. Another vote from me.

[Dima P.]

Thanks for the update Steve. This functionality is planned for agents managed by Veeam B&R server. Cheers!

[bytewiseits]

Hi Dima,

We need this to be a part of the standalone agent as well (so can be deployed/managed by VAC), not just when managed by a B&R server.
Its the same with GFS on primary backup chain - it is possible with agents managed via B&R but not available via VAC/standalone and causes us much frustration. We need these features to be supported natively in the Veeam Agent where possible, not just via B&R.

[Dima P.]

Hello Dion,

As far as I know this functionality is planned for VAC as well. Cheers!

[davy.neirynck]

+1

We would really like to protect our physical blades and have the ability to turn it into a VM, We would however need to exclude the database volumes on it, since these are being backed up by another application.

[mrxee]

This feature +1 - I do not understand why it was not implemented yet...

[KelvinJones]

+1 for me too. DESPERATELY NEED THIS. For all flavours of Veeam - Service Provider, Agent, B&R. I have a server with USB drives that stay connected and some internal drives that store temp files and I don't need these in the entire server backup but do want to be able to spin up the server as a VM at the remote DC (for DR).

[Egor Yakovlev]

No "+1's" goes unnoticed.
Feature is on track and all votes counts!
/Thanks!

[kaito]

+1 - it should be done from beginning

Volume PageFile (F:) does not have enough free disk space to create VSS snapshot
Disk PageFile (F:) is running low on free space

How to exclude this :/ it's always full

[Dima P.]

kaito,

To clarify, you are running agent in standalone or managed mode? Thanks!

[jfargo]

+1 - I need to exclude the anti-virus work drive on WAN PCs. This will save me GBs of copy traffic.

[HAntonisen]

+1 managed from BR v10 the swap disk needs to be excluded

[jgswinkels]

Yes .. I also want this feature.
My Sons Gaming Computer .. equipped with 2 disks C: and D:
C: = OS 256 GB HDD
D: = Game STUFF and downloads -> 1024 GB , 65 GB free .. I down want this disk in my daily backup !!!