Veeam Newbie - VM and vRDM disks

[cbradshaw]

Hi Guys

Hoping you can help.

Our organisation has had Veeam installed but not running for a period of time. Our infrastructure was put into place just prior to my arrival and as such I'm not privvy to the conversations that were had in terms of the setup. It seems nobody was really(!)

Anyway, the way in which VM's have been setup in the past are as per the below procedure.

• Provision LUN on our Dell Equalogic SAN ensuring that the correct iSCSI access has been given to all hosts (to aid vMotion)
• Rescan then add Datastore on vCenter>Host
• Create a VM hightlighing the datastore previously created to use as a base for the Guest OS Files.
• Once installed, provision a second LUN (if required) for Data
• Rescan then Add datastore in vCenter ensuring the ISCSI settings allow the VM or Host (or both/multiple) access.
• Use the MS iSCSI initiator to connect to the LUN and deploy as additional disk

We've seen with Veeam that obviously because the VMDK has no idea of the iSCSI initiated additional disk, it won't be included in any backups (as VMWare can't snapshot it, that's done at a SAN level).

My issue is this.

As I'm new to Veeam, I created a new VM, added an additional disk, this time using RDM (virtual) method, and then backed up. All worked fine. The backup took into account the 2GB test vRDM I'd created. Great!

I then restored to a new VM and a new Datastore (a sandbox) to check it had backed up correctly. The Guest OS powers on absolutely fine...all is well, but the 2GB vRDM I had created, whilst possibly obviously, has been restored as a flat VMDK file (it obviously couldn't create a vRDM as in a restoration you might not have that LUN!). Furthermore, it's not "active". I can mark as active but do no more....I cannot assign it a letter as I get told the Disk Management pane is out of date and it needs refreshing. Numerous refreshes and reboots later...no difference.

Questions:

1) Can anyone tell me why we would have been using the original iSCSI method? Is this a normal method to use rather than RDMs?
2) Why can't I see the restored vRDM (now a flat VMDK) in my Guest OS?

If anyone can help me, I'd not only appreciate it, I'd consider giving you the princely sum of "mucho respect" for your efforts

Thanks in advance.

[Vitaliy S.]

Hello Craig,

Welcome to our Community forums!

1. I cannot really comment on your company decision to go with iSCSI, but here is pretty informative blog post talking about all pros and cons while using RDMs and MS iSCSI Initiators: Deciding between RDMs or the MS iSCSI Initiator

2. vRDM disk which has been converted to flat VMDK file should be visible in the Disk Management snap-in within the Guest OS, at least I can see it in my lab. What OS do you have deployed on this VM?

Thanks!

[cbradshaw]

Hello Vitaliy,

Thanks for your response.

The disk is viewable from the Disk Management pane, however when I attempt to make the partition active I cannot. This is a Windows 2008 Server.

The error I get simply tells me that the Disk Management pane is no long up to date and I should try a reboot. That's a no go....nothing is solved.

Any ideas?

[Vitaliy S.]

My VM was running Windows 2003 and everything went fine, besides I do not recall same issues reported before, so I would suggest contacting our support team and let them investigate this issue.

[cbradshaw]

Hi Vitaliy

This is the first restore I've tried so I'm just worried that something so simple hasn't restored correctly?

[Gostev]

Hi Craig, there is no need to worry, just open a support case and let our support investigate this for you. BTW, I would not consider vRDM "so simple" considering the disk is restored in both different format and different destination than the original. Thanks!

[cbradshaw]

Can I open a support ticket if I'm still in an evaluation period?

[Gostev]

Yes.