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This post will discuss new functionality in Microsoft Azure that allows you to backup running Azure virtual machines. I will also show you how to protect virtual machines with this new feature.
Until recently, there has not been a way to backup running Azure virtual machines, other than installing a backup agent into the guest OS. That was not an optimal way of doing things. For example, if you were to do this with System Center 2012 R2 Data Protection Manager:
It was astonishing that the Azure cloud could not provide a per-virtual machine storage level backup system for running virtual machines as you have been able to deploy with vSphere and Hyper-V for many years. How could Azure be the future of IaaS?
Microsoft officials might quote the ‘treat your servers like cattle’ line, but in reality, both large and small business have many services that run on one or a few machines, and losing one is catastrophic. Azure needs a way to restore valuable machines from a backup.
Microsoft announced that Azure Backup will now support backing up running Azure virtual machines. Windows virtual machines will have application level consistency, thanks to VSS running in the guest OS, and Linux will have file system consistency.
The backup mechanism is described by Microsoft as agentless. It is true that you don’t install an agent, but the process of protecting a virtual machine will deploy an Azure backup extension. You don’t have to deploy any infrastructure or backup software; you will deploy a backup vault and start protecting virtual machines.
Backup is deployed and managed from the Azure management portal. You discover and protect virtual machines from this portal, and create a policy-driven backup schedule. You can also perform on-demand (manual) backups. And you can track the success, failure, and progress of backups.
Microsoft has designed some efficiencies into the backup process. Azure maintains change tracking and performs incremental backups; this should make the storage of Azure Backup for virtual machines very efficient. A fabric as big and complex as Azure will have transient errors, so Microsoft built in retry mechanisms in the event of a backup failure.
You first need to create a backup vault. Log into the Azure management portal, and click New > Data Services > Recovery Services > Backup Vault > Quick Create. Name the backup vault and select the same Azure region as the virtual machines that you want to protect.
Browse into the new vault after it is created, and then into Registered Items. You must first discover your virtual machines by clicking the Discover button at the bottom of the screen.
Note: At this time, the feature is in preview and Discover has been a little temperamental. Retry the discovery after waiting a few minutes if it fails.
Click Register in Registered Items to select which virtual machines you want to protect. Note that the registration process requires virtual machines to be in a running state to succeed.
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