VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V guest image backups now available

Support for Offsite Backups of Gust Virtual Machines (GVM) running on VMware and Microsoft HyperV is now available.

The VMware VM backup module is supported for the following VMware ESXi / ESX versions:

VMware ESXi 3.5

VMware ESXi 4.0

VMware ESXi 4.1

VMware ESX 3.5

VMware ESX 4.0

VMware ESX 4.1
 
The VMware VM backup module is supported for the VMware Server 2.0
The Microsoft VM Module is supported for Microsoft Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V Server enabled 

Windows 2008 MWSB Backup - Different from SystemState

1. MS Windows System backup for Windows 2008 server

   Microsoft Windows 2008 backups are different from past Windows backups. With the MS Windows System backup module, you can backup all critical volumes, rather than only backing up system state data, this module backs up the selected volumes entirely. Detailed instruction for how to perform MS Windows System backup can be found in Chapter 15.
   
   When you backup the critical volumes on a domain controller with the MS Windows System backup module, the backup includes all data that resides on the volumes that include the following:
   
   

   • The volume that hosts the boot files, which consist of the Bootmgr file and the Boot Configuration Data (BCD) store
   • The volume that hosts the Windows operating system and the registry
   • The volume that hosts the SYSVOL tree
   • The volume that hosts the Active Directory database (Ntds.dit)
   • The volume that hosts the Active Directory database log files
   
   Notes:
   A volume is considered critical if any system state file is reported on that particular volume.
   
   
   
2. MS Windows System State backup for Windows 2008 server -
   
   Unlike System State backup in previous version of Windows (e.g. 2000, XP, 2003, which can be performed with the OBM built-in System State backup module), System State backup in Windows 2008 is performed through a command line backup utility called WBAdmin.
   
   Instruction for how to perform system state backup on a Windows 2008 server can be found in the manual.
   
   When performing system state backup, the system components that are included in the system state data depend on the server roles that are installed on the computer. A system state backup includes at least the following data, plus additional data, depending on the server roles that are installed:
   
   
   • Registry
   • COM+ Class Registration database
   • Boot files
   • Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS) database
   • Active Directory database (Ntds.dit)
   • SYSVOL directory
   • Cluster service information
   • Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) metadirectory
   • System files that are under Windows Resource Protection
   
   Due to the change from NTBackup to WBAdmin, the System State backup of a Windows 2008 server is considerably larger than the same backup on a Windows 2003 server, the average size is around 11GB.
   
   Furthermore, WBAdmin creates the dump files and folders with distinct names during each backup. For every backup job, the file/folder names of the dump are different and also the file/folder names have to be preserved as created by WBAdmin for the backup data to be restorable. Thus, please be reminded that no In-file Delta can be applied onto the System State data

How to Create an .iso image on a Mac

1. Insert CD/DVD source

2. Fire up a Terminal, you can then determine the device that is you CD/DVD drive using the following command:

$ drutil status
Vendor   Product           Rev 
MATSHITA DVD-R   UJ-835E   GAND
Type: DVD-ROM              Name: /dev/disk1
Cur Write:    8x DVD       Sessions: 1
Max Write:    8x DVD       Tracks: 1
Overwritable:   00:00:00   blocks:        0 / 0.00MB / 0.00MiB
Space Free:   00:00:00     blocks:        0 / 0.00MB / 0.00MiB
Space Used:  364:08:27     blocks:  1638627 / 3.36GB / 3.13GiB
Writability: 
Book Type: DVD-ROM

3. Umount the disk with the following command:

$ diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk1
Disk /dev/disk1 unmounted

4. Create the ISO file with the dd utility (may take some time):

$ dd if=/dev/disk1 of=file.iso bs=2048

5. Test the ISO image by mounting the new file (or open with Finder):

$ hdid file.iso

6. The ISO image can then be burnt to a blank CD/DVD.

Bits vs. Bytes

The basic unit used in computer data storage is called a bit (binary digit). Computers use these little bits, which are composed of ones and zeros, to do things and talk to other computers. All your files, for instance, are kept in the computer as binary files and translated into words and pictures by the software (which is also ones and zeros). This two number system, is called a "binary number system" since it has only two numbers in it. The decimal number system in contrast has ten unique digits, zero through nine.

But although computer data and file size is normally measured in binary code using the binary number system (counted by factors of two 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, etc), the prefixes for the multiples are based on the metric system! The nearest binary number to 1,000 is 2^10 or 1,024; thus 1,024 bytes was named a Kilobyte. So, although a metric "kilo" equals 1,000 (e.g. one kilogram = 1,000 grams), a binary "Kilo" equals 1,024 (e.g. one Kilobyte = 1,024 bytes). Not surprisingly, this has led to a great deal of confusion.

In December 1998, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) approved a new IEC International Standard. Instead of using the metric prefixes for multiples in binary code, the new IEC standard invented specific prefixes for binary multiples made up of only the first two letters of the metric prefixes and adding the first two letters of the word "binary". Thus, for instance, instead of Kilobyte (KB) or Gigabyte (GB), the new terms would be kibibyte (KiB) or gibibyte (GiB). The new IEC International Standards, which are not commonly used yet, are included below.

Here's a few more details to consider:

• Although data storage capacity is generally expressed in binary code, many hard drive manufacturers (and some newer BIOSs) use a decimal system to express capacity.
• For example, a 30 gigabyte drive is usually 30,000,000,000 bytes (decimal) not the 32,212,254,720 binary bytes you would expect.
• Another trivial point is that in the metric system the "k" or "kilo" prefix is always lowercase (i.e. kilogram = kg not Kg) but since these binary uses for data storage capacity are not properly metric, it has become standard to use an uppercase "K" for the binary form.
• When used to describe Data Transfer Rate, bits/bytes are calculated as in the metric system
• Kilobits per second is usually shortened to kbps or Kbps. Although technically speaking, the term kilobit should have a lowercase initial letter, it has become common to capitalize it in abbreviation (e.g. "56 Kbps" or "56K"). The simple "K" might seem ambiguous but, in the context of data transfer, it can be assumed that the measurement is in bits rather than bytes unless indicated otherwise.

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