Install without a License

[tsightler]

We've recently been going through some exercises for DR and we have a quick question regarding Veeam Backup licensing. We replicate our VBK/VBR files to a recovery site but our Veeam Backup server is at our main site. I had read that it was possible to preform restores without a license however, it appears that there is no way to actually install Veeam Backup without having a key first. I think you should be able to install Veeam Backup for use for restore only purposes, without a license at all, otherwise, we have to worry about making sure we have an already installed Veeam Backup and license. This is of course not a big issue, a CD with a copy of Veeam Backup and the key at the recovery site covers this, but it still seems to me that the installer should "require" a key just to install.

Any thoughts?

[Vitaliy S.]

Hello Tom,

Yes, you're correct installing Veeam Backup and Replication without license isn't possible, however license only covers your source hosts involved in backup and replica jobs, so your target hosts do not require any license. As for now, unfortunately, it seems like you should keep license file with Veeam setup files together to be able to do restores.

Thank you

[Gostev]

This is valid point, and it is in our short-term plans to provide stand-alone utility for restores (aka "backup mounter"). Actual Veeam Backup will however remain uninstallable without the valid production/trial license. Note that production licenses do not expire for 50 years or so.

[tsightler]

But why? It's easy enough to get around this issue (we could repackage our own installer without the requirement for a license file in about 5 minutes). Why not simply allow the product to install, but not preform a backup unless a key is available (I'm sure it already does this)? Seems like a really strange restriction to me. It buys trouble for the customer, and buys nothing at all for you (well, that I'm aware of). Now you have to create some "special" stand-alone utility when could just relax this restriction a be done. It's obviously your choice, but it seems strange.