Sneak Peak - Backup SQL Always On Using Veeam

With new update Veeam Backup & Replication v9.5 Update 3, you can protect

• Windows Failover Cluster
• SQL Cluster
• SQL Always On
• Exchange DAG

See this below video in action:-

Enjoy!

Sneak Peak - Veeam Agent Management Using Veeam Backup Server

Here is a sneak peak of new enhancement built in Veeam agent management.

Install Veeam Agent



Dynamic Installation of Veeam Agent


 Create Backup Policy


Create Recovery Media


 Enjoy!

Data Protection Physical, Cloud and Virtual Machine From a Single Console

It's about time...

or can say Finally!...

Now with Veeam Backup & Replication 9.5 Update 3 (new release), one of the features is built in agent management. Using the same console which we have used for virtualization data protection and recovery for Vmware & Hyper-V, we can use it for managing physical and cloud workload.

With Veeam Administrator Console, you can

• Deploy Veeam Agent centrally for Windows or Linux workload using static or dynamic configuration

Static - using computer name or IP address

Dynamic - using MS Active Directory Object, CSV file

Example:- Using Active Directory based on Group, OU, Domain, Computers...

• Configure Veeam Agent Policy
• Install Veeam CBT driver for Windows Server rather than using Microsoft VSS.

• Protect Microsoft Failover Cluster workload, SQL based Cluster, SQL Always ON and Exchange DAG

My scenario:-

• 2 node SQL Always on 

Backup completed

Backup result with compression & deduplication

So hurry, grab your free Update 3 (for existing customer with active maintenance)

Above just part of the new enhancement, to know more please go to this link.

Backup to OneDrive Using Veeam Agent

Good news folk,

Veeam has just released a new update for Veeam Agent for Windows v2.1. This new update allows you to set Microsoft OneDrive as a new backup target.

You can use OneDrive Personal or OneDrive for Business.

This ensures we constantly protect our data & this option is useful for those users whose are always on the move.

Check out below configuration to backup your data using Veeam Agent to Microsoft OneDrive.

Configuration

1. Configure a new policy. On destination page, select "Microsoft OneDrive" as target.

To connect to OneDrive, you need to enter your OneDrive credential.

I'm connecting using my personal outlook account.

If you use OneDrive apps, do remember to exclude "VeeamBackup" folder to avoid sync with your desktop/laptop.

Once connected, set your policy setting.

Output

The backup will run according to schedule. To verify, login to OneDrive and you will notice that your backup data is stored in "OneDrive"

Start protecting your data and give it a try! For more detail, please refer to this link

[Update on 6 Jan 2018]
Free version of Veeam Agent only allow you to backup system state. To do full recovery, you need to use the paid version.

To learn on how to perform bare metal recovery from Microsoft OneDrive, please check out here.


Enjoy!

Veeam On Demand Demo Lab

Good news folk,

Just got to know that Veeam has On Demand Demo Lab, powered by Cisco dCloud. To access the lab, you can register for Cisco ID & schedule a demo lab.

Here is the list of demo lab available:-

1.  Cisco HyperFlex 2.5 with Veeam Integration v1
The demo is intended to be used to demonstrate the Veeam integration into Cisco HyperFlex as well as different backup and recovery scenarios:

Scenario 1: Introduction to Veeam
Scenario 2: HyperFlex integration
Scenario 3: Backup HyperFlex VMs
Scenario 4: Restore VMs in a HyperFlex Cluster

To attend, click here

This is lab scenario

2. Cisco HyperFlex 2.5 with Veeam Integration Lab v1
The lab can be used to perform a full installation and configuration of Veeam as well as the integration of a HyperFlex environment. Furthermore, the lab also guides you through backup and recovery as well as replication scenarios:

Scenario 1: Install Veeam Backup & Replication
Scenario 2: Add Cisco HyperFlex Storage to Veeam
Scenario 3: Perform a backup
Scenario 4: Perform a restore
Scenario 5: VM replication

To attend, click here

Enjoy!

Verify Backup Data to Avoid Silent Data Corruption in Backup Chain

How to avoid data corruption due to unavoidance circumstance due to hardware failure which use to keep your backup data?

You backup data may corrupt in the middle of the backup chain. Example:-

• Full copy - Sunday
• Incremental - Monday
• Incremental - Tuesday
• Incremental - Wednesday
• Incremental - Thursday
• Incremental - Friday
• Incremental - Saturday

Corruption on Wednesday! :(

Accident due happen and you may not realize that your backup chain consists of corruption. It can be
Mechanical wear for tape or hard drives.

If you're using Veeam Backup & Replication, there are few things that you should do to avoid silent data corruption.

1. Modify Backup Job to "perform files health check (detects and auto heal corruption) based on schedule basic. [Under Maintenance Tab | Storage Level Corruption Guard]

 2. Create Surebackup Job to perform verification of your backup. You can enable "Validate entire virtual disk content (detect silent data corruption) [ Under Settings]

3. Use Veeam Validator to check your existing backup chain. Please refer to KB 2086:- https://www.veeam.com/kb2086

It is essential best practice to implement the 3-2-1 rule and always make 3 copies of data, store it on 2 different media and keep 1 copy on the disaster recovery site to avoid situations similar to the current one.

Hope this help.

Error 41106: Failed to Join the Availability Group for SQL Always On

If you encountered the following error when add replica to Availability Group

Error 41106

Try to turn off Windows firewall on both nodes. Open "Windows Firewall with Advanced Security".
Turn off Domain Profile
Turn off Private Profile
Turn off Public Profile

Retry to add again. Now you should be successful.

To open windows firewall traffic, create a new inbound rule | Add Port | 5022 | TCP | Apply to specific local ports: 5022

That should do the trick! 

Hope this work

Setup SQL Always On

Let build a SQL Always On...

Just follow the following steps to configure a high availability SQL Always On.

• Node running Windows Server 2016
• SQL Server 2012

Steps

1. Create a Windows Failover Cluster. Example 2 nodes

• Node1
• Node2

2. Install default standalone SQL instance on both nodes
3. Open SQL Server Configuration Manager, edit the Properties of SQL Server (MSSQLServer). On AlwaysOn High Availability tab, tick "Enable AlwaysOn Availability Groups and restart sql services

4. Open SQL Server Management Studio and Connect to SQL Server Instance
5. Create a new database first. Make sure that have performed a full database backup
5. Create a new availability group. Go to AlwaysOn High Availability | Availability Group | New Availability Group Wizard.

To create an availability group, you will need to:

• specify an availability group name

• select one or more user database

• specify one or more instance of SQL Server to host secondary availability replicas

-Add Replica ->Select Node2
-Configure automatic failover
-set the synchronous commit
-set readable secondary

• specify your availability group listener preference

• select your initial data synchronization preference

-shared a folder.Make sure both nodes has Write permission Example:-
\\Node1\Shared

• check the validation result of availability group creation

This will create and configure the SQL Always On Availability Group and join the database.

End result:-

Force Cluster Node from Quarantine to Normal State

By default, cluster node running on Windows Server 2016 enter to quarantine state when the node connectivity has an issue. The lock period is 7200 sec. (that will be 120 minutes).

To force the node to normal state, on quarantine node open Windows powershell to execute cmd
Start-ClusterNode - ClearQuarantine

Quarantine node will back to normal ("UP") status

If problem persist, please check on event viewer to identify the potential issue.

Uninstall Veeam Agent for Linux

The following is the command to remove Veeam Agent for Linux that install on Centos/RHEL/Oracle Linux/Fedora workload

Type:-
yum remove veeam veeamsnap

Sneak Peak Project Honolulu-Web Based Management Solution

Project Honolulu is a new web-based management solution from Microsoft, build to modernize and simplify administration of your Windows datacenter. Currently under technical preview, to download click here:- https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-windows-server-honolulu

After installation, you can start to Add Server that you would like to manage.

Added 3 servers: two running Windows Server 2016 and one running Windows Server 2016 Build 1709.

Based on our testing, we can manage the server, monitor performance utilization & basic administration.
Example:- Join to domain, restart server, shutdown, etc

Example:- Initialize new disk

 Example:- Format a volume

 Example:- Install Roles & Features

During our testing, the product is missing on the configuration of roles. Probably the product is still under "technical preview" & we may able to do it when the product is GA.

Give it a try if you're interested about this Project Honolulu.

Backup Windows Server 2016 Hyper-V Over SMB

In this post, we are going to look on how to perform backup Windows Server 2016 Hyper-V Over SMB by using Veeam product. VM is residing on smb path.

My scenario:-

• Host running Windows Server 2016 Hyper-V
• VM on SMB 3.1.1 Files Shares
• Veeam Backup & Replication v9.5 Update 2

To cut it short, we have documented the step by step on how to "Configure Hyper-V Over SMB" on this link:- http://www.ms4u.info/2012/11/configure-hyper-v-over-smb.html

In below video, you able to see how Veeam use Resilient Change Tracking (RCT), natively on Windows Server 2016 to perform backup.

Checklist:-
VM  run on SMB Path..........Passed
Full backup ..........................Passed
Incremental backup .............Passed

Restore On-Premise Exchange Server and Office365

In Previous post, we have look on how to backup on-premise exchange server & office365. Next, we are going to use Veeam Backup for Office365 v1.5 to recover

a) Mail item (email)
b) Task
c) Perform ediscovery to locate user mailbox items

Feel free to check this video:-

My lab scenario:-
a) delete an email subject "Love letter from Lai"
b) delete 2 tasks
c) recover my email subject "Love letter from Lai"
d) recover 2 tasks
e) perform ediscovery by specify criteria to look for subject "love"

Backup On-Premise Exchange Server and Office365

In this post, we are looking on how to backup on-premise exchange server & office365 using Veeam backup for office365 v1.5 (VBO)

v1.5 is latest release which support hybrid environment. In below video, you can see how to configure
a) backup office365 mailbox
b) backup on-premise exchange server
c) Configure policy to backup entire mailbox or selected mailbox
d) exclude user mailbox that you do not want to backup
e) exclude mailbox folder from backup (example:-draft, deleted items, junk email, outbox, sync issue. in-place hold items & litidation hold items

the best part v1.5 able to support multi tenancy to backup different email domain.You can add new backup proxy and add multiple backup repository. The concept is sound familar like using Veeam Backup & replication. Service provider can now use this product as new service besides than BaaS or DraaS.

v1.5 also included with powershell and Restful API.

Public folder is now supported.

Lastly VBO v1.5, extended support include Office 365 U.S. Government (DoD and non-DoD), Office 365 Germany and Office 365 China.

Feel free to check below video:-


My lab scenario:-
a) On-premise exchange server running Exchange 2013
b) Office365 - domain:- ms4ucloud.info

Slide:- 1 Availability, Any App, Any Data, Any Cloud

During Microsoft Hybrid Cloud Launching event @Malaysia, i have session on Cloud Infrastructure Track. During 45 minutes, i've talked about different scenario on

a) To the cloud

Scenario on move backup data to MS Azure & Migrate on-premise workload to MS Azure

b) From the cloud

Protecting Office365 using Veeam Backup for Office365 & sharing on latest version 1.5 which support multi-tenancy & hybrid environment:- Office365 & Exchange on-premise.

c) Within the cloud

Monitoring environment using System Center Operation Manager & MS OMS

Backup & Recovery Azure Virtual Machine

Centralize Monitoring

Backup & Recover MS Azure Stack

Pictures

#1 Availability, Any app, Any data, Any cloud from Lai Yoong Seng