Forum Discussion

Ruska's avatar
Ruska
Level 4
13 years ago

Network setings missing from vm restore

We are currently busy performing a live DR test of all our prod servers consisting of 2003 and 2008 Windows servers. The 2003 servers restore no problem. The restore job for the 2008 servers also finish successfully. However when starting up the 2008 servers it no longer hav ethe same network settins that it had when being backed up.

We ran a similar test last year following the same procedure in which all servers restored no problem. We are currently runing BackupExec 2010 R2. In the virtual environment the only thing which changed is that we upgeaded from ESX\ESXi 4.1 U1 to 4.1 U2 at which time all NICs were upgraded to vmxnet3.

The NICs seem to have loaded with default settings. IP6 on and configured for DHCP as apposed to IP4 on with the original IP configured. Has anyone else experiance this or have an idea on how to resotre these 2008 servers without having to reconfigure all the network settings?

2010
Backup and Recovery
Backup Exec
Best Practice
Compatibility
Configuring
Dell
Recovering
Restore
System Recovery virtual conversion
  • Ruska's avatar
    Ruska
    13 years ago

    Hello guys. Some feedback on the issue mentioned. We found that when we leave the network fields blank when entering the criteria for the virtual server restore job the server is restored with it's original network settings in place. Wierd. It even has the default "VM Network" network configured on the NIC whic hwas left blank in the resotre config.

    Therefore the fix appears to be leaving the network criteria fields blank for the restore job when restoring a 2008 server.

  • Colin_Weaver's avatar
    Colin_Weaver
    Moderator
    13 years ago

    There are some scenarios within VMware where the act of recreating a VM for a DR restore means that Plug and Play within the Operating system of the VM itself makes a decision that the network interfaces are now different.

    If this happens your settings are restored but are somewhere in the registry of the server concerned and are linked to an offline network card identifier. Default operating system settings (DHCP) are then applied to the online identifier (which is different so looks like a new network interface)

    As Symantec cannot directly force Plug and Play to always identify a card as the same one present during the backup. There may be little we can do and you should always maintain basic documentation of your server settings so that you can correct the settings if needed.

    Note: In the past,  I have seen something similar when just copying virtual machines to new locations in Vmware environments and as Backup Exec was not involved in these copies it should be obvious that there are limitations relating to plug and play when machines are copied or recreated.

     

     

  • CraigV's avatar
    CraigV
    Moderator
    13 years ago

    ...the only other thing I would add is whether or not you upgraded BE with any available patches after upgrading ESX? If not, do so in any case, and then run a restore again.

    Thanks!

  • Ruska's avatar
    Ruska
    Level 4
    13 years ago

    Thanks guys. Fortunately we have documentation to refer to for the original settings. Ultimately, one wouldnt want to reconfigure eah server in a DR test. I suppose the next step would be to clone a backup server and upgrade it to the latest level. Then run a test by backing up and restoring a 2008 server to see if it makes a differance.

    I dont suppose resotring our VSphere server first and then restoring the 2008 guest server via VSphere would make a differenace as this anomaly occurs in the guest OS rather settings in the vm settings or via commands sent via the backup\restore tool.

  • Ruska's avatar
    Ruska
    Level 4
    13 years ago

    Hello guys. Some feedback on the issue mentioned. We found that when we leave the network fields blank when entering the criteria for the virtual server restore job the server is restored with it's original network settings in place. Wierd. It even has the default "VM Network" network configured on the NIC whic hwas left blank in the resotre config.

    Therefore the fix appears to be leaving the network criteria fields blank for the restore job when restoring a 2008 server.