Performing Backups for a VMware VM or VM Group

You can back up a VM or a VM group on demand. During the backup VMs are distributed to access nodes in a round-robin fashion.

Procedure

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

   The Virtual machines page appears.

2. Go to the VM or the VM group that you want to back up:

   • To back up a VM, on the Virtual machines tab, in the row for the VM, click the action button , and then select Back up.

   • To back up all the VMs in a VM group, do the following:

     1. Click the VM groups tab.

     2. In the row for the VM group, click the action button , and then select Back up.

   The Backup options dialog box appears.

3. For Backup type, select the type of backup to perform.

4. If you are backing up a VM, for Retention, to specify a custom retention period for the backup, do the following:

   By default, the retention period is inherited from the plan. The Retention setting is not available for VM groups.

   1. Click the edit button .

      The Edit retention settings dialog box appears.

   2. Select Retention period, and then specify the amount of time to retain the backup for.

   3. Click Save.

5. Click Submit to start the backup.