Altaro VM Backup – VMware review

Page content

Altaro VMware Backup Logo

One of many VMware vExpert benefits besides recognition in community is possibility to work with different companies. Quite recently I was contacted by company called Altaro - well-known company offering backup software for Hyper-V and VMware.

After few months of hard work Altaro is introducing backup software as well for VMware vSphere products. I tested Altaro VM Backup - VMware and I am more than happy to share few words about it.

Software specification

At the beginning few words about supported versions and backup management.

Versions of VMware supported:

  • VMware vSphere 5.0, 5.1, 5.5 and 6.0
  • VMware vCenter 5.1, 5.5 and 6.0
  • VMware ESXi 5.0, 5.1, 5.5 and 6.0

To manage backup configuration and jobs from a separate machine, you can install the BETA on these OS’s:

  • Windows Server 2008 R2, 2012 and 2012 R2
  • Windows 7 (64-bit),8 (64-bit) and 10 (64-bit)

First steps

Altaro VM Backup - VMware Beta requires installation on Windows Server. I had a small problem with installation on Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 for unknown reasons. I contacted Altaro Support and they quickly suggested to extract installer from **.exe ** installer and this worked fine. This is what I like and how support should looks like 🙂

This is the problem I faced.

Altaro VMware Backup - 1

Altaro VM Backup - VMware Beta initial setup

Like with every software you have to configure source (what you want to back up) and destination (where do we backup).

  1. In order to do this let’s launch Altaro VM Backup first.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 2

  2. In console simply select This Machine and click connect.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 3

  3. Altaro did well by simplifying initial setup which is done in three steps. In step one we click Add Hyper-V / VMware host.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 4

  4. Select VMware ESXi or VMware vCenter Server. I will go with vCenter Server - select it and click next.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 5

  5. Provide vCenter Server IP or FQDN name, user credentials with administrative rights and password. At the end click Test Connection.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 6

  6. Last screen shows you summary of your environment - in my case it is just four ESXi hosts. Click Finish.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 7

  7. Next step is to select what do we want to back up. Click on dashboard and select Step 2 - Choose Where to Store Backups.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 8

  8. You can select Physical Drive (USB, eSata, iSCSI or Internal Drive) or Network Path (Network Drive, NAS or other Network Location). In my case I will test backup to local disk.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 9

  9. Click Finish and let’s go to third and last step.
  10. Let’s finish with initial setup by taking first backup. Select Take First Backup.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 10

  11. Now click on Click here to configure Virtual Machines.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 11

  12. Choose which host and all of it virtual machines should be back up or select particular virtual machine. I selected one nested ESXi to be protected. Simply drag and drop virtual machine on backup location.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 12

  13. When you selected all virtual machines to be backed up click Save Changes.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 13

  14. Click on Virtual Machines section and select virtual machine to back up.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 14

  15. My first backup finished with errors, but this is due to nested ESXi itself and not Altaro VM Backup 🙂

    Altaro VMware Backup - 15

  16. Once backup is taken you can see it on very informative dashboard.

    Altaro VMware Backup - 16

Summary

After a week of testing I can say that Altaro VM Backup for VMware is solid software. If  you would like to test program here is the product link: http://www.altaro.com/vm-backup/

You can check as well Quick Start guide available here Altaro VM Backup Quick Start Guide.