Skip to main content

vmProtect 8 and vCenter 5.1 - Backing up to external hard drive

Thread needs solution

Hello.

I was wondering if someone could point me the right direction... Last week I was trying to backup to an external hard drive from vmProtect 8. I plugged the external hard drive in to the host machine and then connect it to the virtual machine. ESXi could see the hard drive but when trying to set up my backups it was unable to detect the external hard drive.

Is this possible? If so, what are the steps to do this. I am hoping that I have missed something.

Thank you for your help.

0 Users found this helpful
frestogaslorastaswastavewroviwroclolacorashibushurutraciwrubrishabenichikucrijorejenufrilomuwrigaslowrikejawrachosleratiswurelaseriprouobrunoviswosuthitribrepakotritopislivadrauibretisetewrapenuwrapi
Posts: 22
Comments: 3800

Hi Cliff,

Currently the scheme you describe is not supported. The USB drive connected directly to ESXi host won't be recognized by vmProtect virtual appliance due to architectural specifics. The possible workarounds are:

1) Install vmProtect as Windows Agent onto some VM and attach the USB drive to it in order to use it as backup repository
2) Attach the USB drive to some Windows machine and use vmProtect Virtual Appliance to back up to this drive over network (i.e. present this drive as a UNC share).

We are planning to improve USB drives support (which are directly connected to ESXi host) in the next version.

Thank you.
--
Best regards,
Vasily
Acronis vmProtect Program Manager

Hi Vasily,

Your post is dated 2009-03-30. It's now 2015. Should I conclude that Acronis will never fix this issue?

If so, what external storage does the appliance support?

Thanks,

Tom

frestogaslorastaswastavewroviwroclolacorashibushurutraciwrubrishabenichikucrijorejenufrilomuwrigaslowrikejawrachosleratiswurelaseriprouobrunoviswosuthitribrepakotritopislivadrauibretisetewrapenuwrapi
Posts: 22
Comments: 3800

Hi Tom,

2009-03-30 is actually the registration date of my forum account, while the topic was started at much later time :)

This topic is related to specific case when you attach an external USB drive _directly_ to ESXi host machine. And the good news are that we're implementing this feature in the next version of Acronis Backup for VMware (coming later this year). With the new version you will be able to add a USB device to Acronis virtual appliance and map it to external USB drive attached to the ESXi host, thus making it available as backup storage.

Thank you.
--
Best regards,
Vasily
Acronis Virtualization Program Manager