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Restoring a Full Virtual Machine In Place Using Live Recovery for VMware

You can restore a full VMware virtual machine in place using a live recovery operation.

Before You Begin

  • If a passkey is configured for restores, you must have the passkey.

  • Ensure that you are using a supported version of VMware vCenter Server. For more information, see "VMware vCenter Server Support" in System Requirements for Virtual Server Agent with VMware.

  • VMware licensing must include a license for vMotion operations.

  • The ESX server that is used to mount the NFS datastore for browse and restore operations must be able to resolve the MediaAgent (which uses 3DFS components to perform the live recovery). To ensure connectivity, create a host file entry for the MediaAgent on the ESX server.

  • The vCenter user account must have permissions set as described in Permissions for Custom User Accounts.

  • The live recovery operation uses a 3DFS cache on the MediaAgent that performs the live recovery. The 3DFS cache is circular, which means that unused data are pruned from the cache as needed. By default, 5% free space is maintained on the cache.

    For each live recovery operation, the 3DFS cache requires minimum free space that is equal to the larger of the following values:

    • 20 GB

    • 15% of the total VM size (the sum of the sizes of all VMDKs for the VM)

      Note

      For faster recovery times, host the 3DFS cache on a solid state drive (SSD) using flash memory storage.

  • If a File Recovery Enabler for Linux is configured, the restore operation will use the default File Recovery Enabler for Linux for the live recovery operation. Otherwise, the MediaAgent that performed the backup is used.

  • The same requirements that apply to a MediaAgent also apply to a File Recovery Enabler when it is used for live recovery.

  • The user performing the live recovery operation must be an owner of the virtualization client and access node used for the operation.

  • If you want to restore data using a specific MediaAgent and/or copy, review the information in MediaAgent and Copy Precedence Considerations for Virtualization Restores.

Start the Restore Wizard

  1. From the Command Center navigation pane, go to Protect > Virtualization.

    The Overview page appears.

  2. On the VM groups tab, for the VM that you want to restore, click the action button (...) and then select Restore.

    The Select restore type page appears.

  3. Click Full virtual machine.

    The Full virtual machine page appears.

  4. To choose a different MediaAgent or source copy for the restore, do the following:

    1. In the upper-right corner of the page, click Settings.

      The Settings dialog box appears.

    2. For Source, decide whether to have the Commvault software automatically select the copy of backup data or to specify the copy:

      • Automatic: By default, the restore operation searches for the requested data in the primary copy and selects a different copy if the data is not found in the primary copy.

      • To restore from a specific copy of backup data, from the list, select a backup copy.

    3. Click Save.

  5. Select the content to restore, and then click Restore.

    The restore wizard appears.

Perform an In Place Restore

  1. For Type, select In place.

  2. For Access node, select Automatic, an access node, or an access node group.

    If you are restoring multiple VMs, select Automatic to distribute the workload across the access nodes that are assigned for the destination hypervisor. The VMs are assigned to the access nodes that are present on the same host and datastore. If no host or datastore match is found, then any of the available access nodes from the selected destination hypervisor are used.

    If you select an access node group to restore VMs, the Commvault software distributes the workload across the access nodes that are available in the access node group.

  3. Click Next.

    The Virtual Machines page appears.

  4. Click Next.

    The Restore Options page appears.

  5. Specify the following settings:

    • Power on VMs after restore: Automatically start VMs after they are restored.

    • Unconditionally overwrite if it already exists: Delete an existing VM with the same name and replace it with the restored VM.

    • Notify user on job completion: Receive an email notification that the restore is complete.

    • Additional Options: Specify the following:

      • Move the Restore virtual machine using live recovery toggle key to the right, and then configure the datastore and delay restore options:

        • To specify a different datastore for redirect writes, from the Redirect writes to datastore list, select the datastore.

        • To delay the restore, in the Delay migration (in hours) box, enter the number of hours (1-12) for the delay.

          You can use the VM during the delay.

    • Transport mode, do the following:

      • To have the Commvault software automatically select the best transport mode for the environment, select Auto.

      • To specify a specific transport mode, select the transport mode.

    • Disk provisioning, do the following:

      • To retain the provisioning method that was used at the time of backup, select Original.

      • To specify a different disk provisioning method, select Thick Lazy Zero, Thin, or Thick Eager Zero.

  6. Click Next.

    The Summary page appears.

  7. Review the summary, and then click Submit to start the restore.

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