Veritas™ System Recovery 21 User's Guide
- Introducing Veritas System Recovery
- Installing Veritas System Recovery
- Installing Veritas System Recovery
- Ensuring the recovery of your computer
- Creating a new Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Creation Options
- Storage and Network Drivers Options
- Customizing an existing Veritas System Recovery Disk
- About restoring a computer from a remote location by using LightsOut Restore
- Creating a new Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Getting Started
- Setting up default general backup options
- File types and file extension
- Best practices for backing up your data
- Backing up entire drives
- Backing up files and folders
- Running and managing backup jobs
- Running an existing backup job immediately
- Backing up remote computers from your computer
- Monitoring the status of your backups
- About monitoring backups
- Monitoring the backup status of remote computers using Veritas System Recovery Monitor
- Adding a remote computer to the Computer List
- Exploring the contents of a recovery point
- Managing backup destinations
- About managing file and folder backup data
- Managing virtual conversions
- Managing cloud storage
- Direct to cloud
- About creation of Amazon Machine Image (AMI) in Amazon from Veritas System Recovery backups
- About S3-Compatible Cloud Storage
- About Veritas System Recovery supporting Veritas Access
- Recovering files, folders, or entire drives
- Recovering a computer
- Booting a computer by using the Veritas System Recovery Disk
- About using the networking tools in Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Copying a hard drive
- Using the Veritas System Recovery Granular Restore Option
- Best practices when you create recovery points for use with the Granular Restore Option
- Appendix A. Backing up databases using Veritas System Recovery
- Appendix B. Backing up Active Directory
- Appendix C. Backing up Microsoft virtual environments
- Appendix D. Using Veritas System Recovery 21 and Windows Server Core
Running a one-time backup from Veritas System Recovery
You can use One Time Backup to quickly define and run a backup that creates an independent recovery point. You use the One Time Backup wizard to define the backup. The backup runs when you complete the wizard. The backup definition is not saved for future use. You can use the independent recovery point later.
This feature is useful when you need to back up your computer or a particular drive quickly before a significant event. For example, you can run a one-time backup before you install new software. Or, you can run it when you learn about a new computer security threat.
You can also use Veritas System Recovery Disk to create one-time cold backups.
To run a one-time backup from Veritas System Recovery
- On the Tasks page, click One Time Backup.
- Click Next.
- Select one or more drives to back up, and then click Next.
Note:
Veritas System Recovery 21 is able to display the drives from a GPT disk even if one of the GPT headers is corrupted or if there is a disk signature collision.
- If the Related Drives dialog box is displayed, set the appropriate option, and then click Next. Otherwise, skip to the next step.
Add all related drives (recommended)
Lets you select and include all related drives in the backup definition.
Edit the list of selected drives
Lets you select or clear the related drives that you want or do not want to include in the backup definition.
Do not add related drives
Lets you deselect (not include) all related drives in the backup definition.
- In the Backup Destinations panel, select the appropriate options.
Folder
Indicates the location where you want to store the recovery points.
You can browse or enter a Microsoft OneDrive location as the primary destination.
See About support of OneDrive for Business.
You can specify a hidden drive as a location where you want to store the recovery points in the following format:
DiskNo-PartitionNo\
For example, If 2 is the disk number and 3 is the partition number, you must specify 2-3\ as the location.
Note:
By default, this check box is not selected.
If Veritas System Recovery detects that this location does not have enough available space, it alerts you. You should choose another location that has more space.
Show only hidden drives
Select this check box and click Browse to only see a list of the hidden drives.
You can select a hidden drive as a location where you want to store the recovery points.
The hidden drives are displayed in the following format:
DiskNo-PartitionNo\
For example, a hidden drive is displayed as: 2-3\. Where 2 is the disk number and 3 is the partition number.
Note:
By default, this check box is not selected.
Browse
Lets you browse to locate a backup destination that you want to use.
Browse for OpenStorage Destination
Lets you browse to select a cloud storage destination that you want to use for backups.
Destination Details
Displays the type of destination path. If you add a network path it also displays the user name.
Recovery points are not automatically encrypted.
Veritas recommends that you create permissions for the backup destination to prevent unauthorized access to any data contained in the recovery points. For more information, refer to the following link:
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc732880(v=ws.11).aspx
Note:
Veritas recommends that you use AES encryption when defining a backup to prevent unauthorized access to any data contained in the recovery points.
Edit
Lets you enter the user name and password for access to the network that is specified in the Folder field. This option is available only if you selected a backup destination that is on a network and if you want to save the recovery point on a network share.
Customize recovery point file names
Lets you rename the recovery point.
Default file names include the name of the computer followed by the drive letter.
You can also save recovery points to a unique subfolder.
Enable USB Disk Rotation. Backup files to any USB disk inserted at this location
Select this check box to enable the USB disk rotation feature for USB disks.
See USB disk rotation.
Add
Lets you add up to two Offsite Copy destinations.
Offsite Copy automatically copies your latest recovery points each time a backup completes to either a portable storage device, such as an external drive, or to a remote server either through a local area network connection or to a remote FTP server.
- Click Next.
- On the Options panel, select the appropriate options, and then click Next
Recovery Point options
Advanced options
Divide into smaller files to simplify archiving
Splits the recovery point into smaller files and specifies the maximum size (in MB) for each file.
This option is selected by default when you specify a Microsoft OneDrive location as your primary destination. A recovery point that is larger than 10 GB is automatically split into smaller files of less than 10 GB. You can split the size of the recovery point into smaller recovery points.
Disable SmartSector™ Copying
Copies that are used and unused hard-disk sectors. This option increases process time and usually results in a larger recovery point.
SmartSector technology speeds up the copying process by copying only the hard-disk sectors that contain data. However, in some cases, you might want to copy all sectors in their original layout, whether or not they contain data.
Ignore bad sectors during copy
Runs a backup even if there are bad sectors on the hard disk. Although most drives do not have bad sectors, the potential for problems increases during the lifetime of the hard disk.
Perform full VSS backup
Lets you perform a full backup on the VSS storage and send a request for VSS to review its own transaction log. This option is used for Microsoft Exchange Server only.
Exchange VSS determines what transactions are already committed to the database and then truncates those transactions. Among other things, truncated transaction logs help keep the file size manageable and limits the amount of hard drive space that the file uses.
If you do not select this option, backups still occur on the VSS storage. However, VSS does not automatically truncate the transaction logs following a backup.
Note:
This option does not appear if you create a recovery point using the Back Up My Computer wizard feature in Veritas System Recovery Disk.
- In the Security Options panel, set the password, select the level of encryption for the one-time backup, and then click Next.
Sets a password and enables AES encryption on the recovery point when it is created.
This check box is selected by default.
Password
Lets you specify a password for the backup. Passwords can include standard characters. Passwords cannot include extended characters, or symbols. (Use characters with an ASCII value of 128 or lower.)
You must type this password before you restore a backup or view the contents of the recovery point.
Confirm password
Lets you retype the password for confirmation.
AES encryption
Encrypts recovery point data to add another level of protection to your recovery points.
If you upgrade from a previous version to Veritas System Recovery 21, for older backup jobs where only password protection is defined, you need to edit the jobs to select the AES encryption level. If you do not edit the older backup jobs, they continue to run without AES Encryption. Veritas recommends that you edit the job and select AES encryption level.
Note:
If the Use Password check box is selected, you must define AES encryption.
Choose from the following encryption levels:
Standard 128-bit (8+ character password)
Medium 192-bit (16+ character password)
High 256-bit (32+ character password)
- If appropriate, in the lists, select the command files that you want to run during a particular stage in the recovery point creation process. Then, specify the amount of time (in seconds) that you want the command to run before it is stopped.
If you added the command file to the Command Files folder, you may need to click Back, and then Next to see the files in each stage's list.
Command files folder
Specifies the location of command files if you want them to be located in a place other than the default location. You can also specify a location on a per-job basis, as well as specify a location that can be shared among several computers. If you specify a network location, you are prompted for network credentials.
Browse
Lets you browse to locate a folder for any command files that you want to use.
User name
Specifies the user name to a command file folder that is located in a network path.
Password
Specifies the password to a command file folder that is located in a network path.
Run before snapshot creation
Indicates that you can run a command file after a backup has started and before a recovery point is created. You can run a command during this stage to prepare for the recovery point creation process. For example, you can close any open applications that are using the drive.
Note:
If you use this option, be sure that the command file has an error recovery mechanism that is built into it. If the computer has one or more services that must be stopped at this stage, and the command file does not contain any form of error recovery, one or more of the stopped services may not be restarted. For example, stopping a non-VSS aware database or a resource-intensive application. An error in the command file can cause the recovery point creation process to stop immediately. No other command files can run.
Run after snapshot creation
Indicates that you can run a command file after a snapshot is created. Running a command during this stage is a safe point to allow services to resume on the drive while continuing the recovery point creation.
Because the snapshot takes only a few seconds to create, the database is in the backup state momentarily. A minimal number of log files are created.
Run after recovery point creation
Indicates that you can run a command file after the recovery point file is created. You can run a command during this stage to act on the recovery point itself. For example, you can copy it to an offline location.
Timeout (applies to each stage)
Lets you specify the amount of time (in seconds) that a command file is allowed to run.
- Click Next.
- Click Finish to run the backup.
More Information