Rapid VM Restores using VSC Backup and Recovery and vCenter Storage vMotion Functionality

Keith Aasen, NetApp March 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION TO RAPID VM RESORES ............................................................. 2

1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 MOUNTING THE SMVI CREATED BACKUP................................................................................................................. 3 RAPID VM RESTORE PROCEDURE ............................................................................................................................. 4 RELOCATING THE VM................................................................................................................................................... 5 CLEANING UP ................................................................................................................................................................ 5

2 TROUBLESHOOTING ............................................................................................... 5
2.1 IDE DISK ERROR ........................................................................................................................................................... 5

3 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ 6 4 FEEDBACK ................................................................................................................ 6 5 VERSION HISTORY................................................................................................... 6

1 INTRODUCTION TO RAPID VM RESORES

This document provides the procedures to perform a Rapid VM Restore from a backup created by the NetApp Virtual Storage Console (VSC) Backup and Recovery Module. The default restore option in VSC has some distinct advantages, with NFS the utility uses SnapRestore to restore invidual VMs. This allows the entire VM to be restored with no load on the ESX hosts and with very little NetApp SnapShot growth. However depending on the size of the NFS Datastore this SnapRestore operation can take an extended period of time during which the VM is offline. The process described in this paper leverages the Mount capability of the VSC Backup and Recovery module and the Storage vMotion capability of VMware vCenter to much more quickly restore the damaged VM. This technique though does generate load on the ESX hosts and will cause greater NetApp Snapshot growth so should be used with these limitations in mind. Terms used; VSC Virtual Storage Console, this is the plug in utility for VMware vCenter provided from NetApp SMVI SnapManager for Virtual Infrastructure, this is now known as the Backup and Recovery module for VSC. It is the backup utility portuion of the VSC plugin Target VM This is the VM which is damaged or corrupted and you wish restored Source VM This the VM in the SMVI backup that you want restored

Rapid VM Restores using VSC and VI Client

1.1

MOUNTING THE SMVI CREATED BACKUP

The VSC Backup and Recovery module has functionality called Mount. This process will create a Flexclone of the SMVI backup and connect it to the vSphere server of choice. This will effectively provide a read/writable copy of the SMVI backup which allows easy access to the data contained within. 1. Begin the process by entering the the restore section of the VSC Backup and Recovery module. Alternatively click on the NetApp tab from the datastore view in VI client. 2. Select the SMVI backup from which you wish to restore the VM from 3. Right click the backup and select Mount from the dropdown list, see image below

Figure 1 -Mount Option Note the Inventory view and the backup selection

4. From the Mount Backup Wizard select the vSphere host you want the backup mounted to. This host should be the same host as the target VM (the VM you wish to restore) is currently running on. If you do not know this dont worry you can always VMotion the VM to that host 5. In the Recent Tasks area of the VI Client you should now see either Create NAS Datastore or Rescanning HBA in the task section 6. In the datastore inventory view for the selected vSphere host, you should now see a new datastore named (Backup..) This is the FlexCloned backup and is read/writable

Figure 2 -Mounted Backup - Note the naming format

Rapid VM Restores using VSC and VI Client

1.2

RAPID VM RESTORE PROCEDURE

Within the VMware VI client select the the VM you wish to restore. That is, the target VM. 1. Power off the VM, this can be a hard power off since the VM will be restored 2. Select Edit Settings on the Summary tab of the VM or alternativly you can Right Click on the VM and select Edit Settings from the drop down menu. 3. From the VM properties popup, on the Hardware tab click on the hard disk you want to restore and click on Remove 4. You will get 2 options, remove from VM or remove from disk, unless you need the disk for forensics reasons, selct remove from disk 5. From the VM properies popup, on the Hardware tab, select Add 6. From the Add Hardware wizard, select Hard Disk 7. On the Select a Disk dialog page, select the Use an existing virtual disk radio button 8. On the select Existing Disk page, click the Browse button 9. From the Browse Datastores utility navigate to the mounted Datastore you created in section 1.1 above 10. Within the mounted datastore, navigate to the VM you want to restore 11. Inside the VM folder select the VMDK you want files from and then select Next from the Add Hardware wizard 12. If this is the boot hard disk, insure its Virtual Device Node is set to (0:0)

Rapid VM Restores using VSC and VI Client

Figure 3 -Adding a Mounted VMDK - Note in this case the new disk will be number 2

13. Once this add completes you can now power the VM back on, users can begin to reconnect to the VM

1.3

RELOCATING THE VM

At this stage of the process the VM is now running and available to end users but is stored on the FlexClone of the backup. We now need to relocate it to a production datastore. 1. In vCenter, right click on the VM and select Migrate 2. In the Migrate Virtual Machine popup, select Change Datastore 3. Select the production datastore you wish the VM to run on

1.4

CLEANING UP

At this point the VM has been fully restored and placed back in the correct datastore where it will be protected. If the damaged VMDK was not deleted in the above process that VMDK should now be moved or deleted from disk. The final step is to remove the SMVI mount. 1. In the datastore inventory view, find the datastore from which we did the restore, click the NetApp tab then restore 2. Locate the mounted SMVI backup and right click the back up 3. Select unmount

2 TROUBLESHOOTING
2.1 IDE DISK ERROR

If the VM you are trying to restore was created prior to the vSphere 4.0 release, the VMDK may have a legacy descriptor which will result in this error being displayed;
Adding existing IDE disk is not supported at the moment. IDE disks cannot be hot added or there are no free available IDE controller slots.

Details on this error and a workaround are listed in VMware KB article 1025883.

Rapid VM Restores using VSC and VI Client

An alternate work around is to instead delete the entire target VM from disk, browse to the mounted datastore, locate the required vmx file, right click it and add to inventory. Then Storage vMotion the VM to the desired final location. This workaround will result in the VM having a different UUID and different MAC address on its NICS.

3 CONCLUSION
This rapid VM restore process allows VI Administrators a means to quickly restore an entire VM from a SMVI backup. This technique does generate load on the vSphere hosts and can increase the NetApp SnapShot size but can be very useful if a VM quickly needs to be restored.

4 FEEDBACK
Send an e-mail to keitha@netap.com with questions or comments concerning this document.

5 VERSION HISTORY
Version
Version 1.0

Date
March 2011

Document Version History

Original document

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2011 NetApp, Inc. All rights reserved. No portions of this document may be reproduced without prior written consent of NetApp, Inc. Specifications are subject to change without notice. NetApp, the NetApp logo, Go further, faster, Data ONTAP, FlexClone, RAID-DP, and WAFL are trademarks or registered trademarks of NetApp, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Microsoft, Windows, and Windows Vista are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. XenDesktop is a registered trademark of Citrix Systems, Inc. Stratusphere Fit is a trademark of Liquidware Labs, Inc. VMware is a registered trademark and vSphere is a trademark of VMware, Inc. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be treated as such. TR-3902-0311

Rapid VM Restores using VSC and VI Client