VizionCore esxReplicator (vReplicator) vs Veeam Backup & Replication

After a week of testing and fuzzing with both VizionCore vReplicator originally known by esxReplicator as well Veeam Backup & Replication, I was able to be one of the contributor to the new comparison at ITComparison.com.

The comparison titled VizionCore vReplicator (esxReplicator) vs Veeam Backup & Replication covers many important aspects of the two products. It has been well crafted to help IT professionals find out which product is better for their enviornment. I was glad all this collaboration with other virtualizaiton professionals has met up with success & the comparison was released to the public yesterday.

It was fun to have to test all these aspects for these two leading Replication products. It was even more fun to discuss the results & compare them with other members involved in the comparison. Get to know how other people though about a point to be positive and other just vote against it.

Ah more fun of all the team had put a blog post at VizionCore vReplicator vs Veeam Backup & Replication blog post, which will allow other members in the virtualization community to comment on the comparison & try to debate it. Ah it is even open to the vendors to prove the finding is wrong or leave an update of upcoming fixes or development.… Read More

Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for database Virtual Machines

This post is the third part of the “Vizioncore vRanger Quiescing & VSS Setting for image backup of Virtual Machines.” to start from the beginning of the series please start at: Vizioncore VRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Recommended Settings. Or if you are looking for the recommendation for virtual machines which does not run a database application then check out the second part of this series: Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for non-database Virtual Machines. If how to setup Vizioncore vRanger Quiescing & VSS for database virtual machines is your aim, then you are at the correct part of this series.

As mentioned earlier, Quiescing is recommended to be disabled for virtual machines running a database application to avoid problems which seems to often occur when quiescing virtual machines that run a database application. In addition, for database servers which support VSS (MS SQL Server, MS Exchange, Active directory, and so on) it’s recommended to enable VSS to obtain a transactionally consistent backup image. As that backup can go over SAN using VCB, or over LAN using vRanger directly below is the required changes for both cases:

Over LAN:

Ensure that Quiescing for vRanger backup is disabled (“disabled by default”).… Read More

Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for non-database Virtual Machines:

This post is the second part of the “Vizioncore vRanger Quiescing & VSS Setting for image backup of Virtual Machines.” to start from the beginning of the series please start at: Vizioncore VRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Recommended Settings. Or if you are looking for the recommendation for virtual machines which run a database application then check out the second part of this series:Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for database Virtual Machines. If how to setup Vizioncore vRanger Quiescing & VSS for none database virtual machines is your aim, then you are at the correct part of this series.

As mentioned earlier, for non-database virtual machines enabling Quiescing is recommend to get a file system level consistent images. In addition, VSS is not required for non-database servers backup. As that backup can go over SAN using VCB, or over LAN using vRanger directly below is the required changes for both cases:

Over LAN:

To enable Quiescing for vRanger backup which is done over LAN you will have to remove the check mark “Disable Guest Quiescing”

Vizioncore vRanger ensable quiescing

Using VCB:

As VCB has Quiescing enabled by default, and not affected by the “Disable Guest Quiescing setting in vRanger you have nothing to do assuming that the Filesystem Sync Driver which installed as a part of VMware Tools by default is installed on the VM you want to backup.… Read More

Vizioncore VRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Recommended Settings:

I have been always hit by customers who have a problem taking an image backup of virtual machines that run a database application. Another repeated question is “when & when not to use Quiescing & VSS with VCB & vRanger”. For that I have decided to write this set of posts hoping to answer these questions. The answer will have the instruction of how to do this as step by step for Vizioncore vRanger, which is a great & easy backup software for VMware, but the explanation apply for any other image level backup software used with VMware, though you will have to adapt the instructions to the backup tool of your choice.

vRanger provides support for Quiescing the virtual machine before it start to backup that VM. The purpose of Quiescing is to ensure that no file system writes are pending when the snapshot is taken, allowing for file system level consistency. Although Quiescing has always been proved to be a great method to backup normal virtual machines, it seems to cause issues for virtual machines which is running a database.… Read More