Veritas™ System Recovery 23 User's Guide
- Introducing Veritas System Recovery
- Installing Veritas System Recovery
- System requirements for Veritas System Recovery
- Supported file systems, disk types, disk partition schemes, and removable media
- Feature availability in Veritas System Recovery
- About the trial version of Veritas System Recovery
- Installing Veritas System Recovery
- Uninstalling Veritas System Recovery
- System requirements for Veritas System Recovery Manager
- Installing Veritas System Recovery Manager
- Ensuring the recovery of your computer
- Creating a new Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Welcome Panel
- Creation Options
- Download and install Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK)
- Languages Options
- Veritas System Recovery Disk Storage Media/Destination Options
- Licensed Features Options
- Storage and Network Drivers Options
- Startup Options
- Network Options
- Setup LightsOut Restore Options
- Customizing an existing Veritas System Recovery Disk
- About restoring a computer from a remote location by using LightsOut Restore
- Testing the Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Creating a new Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Getting Started
- How to use Veritas System Recovery
- Starting Veritas System Recovery
- Configuring Veritas System Recovery default options
- Setting up default general backup options
- Improving your computer's performance during a backup
- Enabling network throttling
- Setting default options for the Windows notification area
- File types and file extension
- Removing or changing the unique name for an external drive
- Configuring default FTP settings for use with Offsite Copy
- Logging Veritas System Recovery messages
- Enabling email notifications for product (event) messages
- Setting up your first backup using Easy Setup
- Home page
- Status page
- Tasks page
- Tools page
- Advanced page
- Using Veritas System Recovery RESTful Application Programming Interfaces (APIs)
- 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
- Adjusting the speed of a backup
- Stopping a backup or a recovery task
- Verifying that a backup is successful
- Viewing the properties of a backup job
- Editing backup settings
- Enabling event-triggered backups
- Editing a backup schedule
- Disabling or enabling a backup job
- Deleting backup jobs
- Adding users who can back up your computer
- Configuring access rights for users or groups
- Backing up remote computers from your computer
- Monitoring the status of your backups
- About monitoring backups
- Icons on the Home page
- Icons on the Status page
- Configuring Veritas System Recovery to send SNMP traps
- Customizing the status reporting of a drive (or file and folder backups)
- Viewing drive details
- Improving the protection level of a drive
- About using event log information to troubleshoot problems
- Managing and Monitoring the backup status of remote computers using Veritas System Recovery Manager
- About
- Configuring Windows firewall exceptions for Veritas System Recovery Manager
- Starting Veritas System Recovery Manager
- Icons on the Veritas System Recovery Manager console
- Configuring Veritas System Recovery Manager default options
- Viewing Veritas System Recovery Dashboard
- Adding a remote computer to All Computers
- Searching a remote computer from All Computers
- Modifying the logon credentials for the remote computers
- Running or Deleting Backup Jobs for the Remote computers
- Removing a remote computer from the All Computers
- Viewing the backup protection status of a remote computer
- Viewing the backup protection status for a remote computer
- Viewing the Protection Status report
- About Backup Tasks
- Creating Backup Jobs
- Editing Backup Jobs
- Removing Backup Jobs
- Applying Backup Jobs
- Exploring the contents of a recovery point
- Managing backup destinations
- About backup destinations
- Differences between drive-based backups and file and folder backups
- Cleaning up old recovery points
- Deleting a recovery point set
- Deleting recovery points within a recovery point set
- Copying recovery points
- About managing file and folder backup data
- Automating the management of backup data
- Moving your backup destination
- About support of OneDrive for Business
- Managing virtual conversions
- Defining a virtual conversion job
- Running an existing virtual conversion job immediately
- Viewing the properties of a virtual conversion job
- Viewing the progress of a virtual conversion job
- Editing a virtual conversion job
- Deleting a virtual conversion job
- Running a one-time conversion of a physical recovery point to a virtual disk
- Managing cloud storage
- Direct to cloud
- Downloading OpenStorage Files
- How Offsite Copy works for cloud storage
- 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
- About the Cloud Instance Creator Utility
- Recovering files, folders, or entire drives
- About recovering lost data
- Recovering files and folders by using file and folder backup data
- Recovering files and folders
- Recovering a secondary drive
- Recovering a drive
- Exploring files and folders on your computer by using Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Recovering files and folders by using Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Recovering a computer
- About recovering a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI)-based computer
- Booting a computer by using the Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Preparing to recover a computer by checking the hard disk for errors
- Recovering a computer
- Recovering a computer from a virtual disk file
- Recovering a computer with different hardware
- About using the networking tools in Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Viewing the properties of a recovery point in the Veritas System Recovery Disk
- Viewing the properties of a drive within a recovery point in the Veritas System Recovery Disk
- About the Support Utilities
- Copying a hard drive
- Using the Veritas System Recovery Granular Restore Option
- About the Veritas System Recovery Granular Restore Option
- Best practices when you create recovery points for use with the Granular Restore Option
- Starting the Granular Restore Option
- Starting Granular Restore Option and opening a specific recovery point
- Restoring a Microsoft Exchange mailbox
- Restoring a Microsoft Exchange email folder
- Restoring a Microsoft Exchange email message
- Restoring files and folders using 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 23 and Windows Server Core
- Index
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 23 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 23, 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
Lets you specify the location of command files. 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
Lets you specify the user name to a command file folder that is located in a network path.
Password
Lets you specify 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