Inherited a glob of VMware 5 and Backup Exec 2010/2012 - Help

[PhilaGovTIM]

Greetings everyone: I've inhereted a bunch of technology, after our sysadmin left, and I ask of you to help me figure out what backup resources I have and what I need to do to get things backed up so that I can go forward with the migration.

So we're in the midst of migrating our 15 Windows tower servers to virtualize everything onto a VMware vSphere 5 platform with 3 ESXi hosts and 1 Windows 2008 backup server. We have about half of the servers virtualized as guests on the ESXi hosts already. Backup Exec has NOT yet been installed at all.

Our virtualization hardware:

• (3) VMware vSphere 5.0 ESXi hosts, we haven't yet gone to 5.1 because of reported Backup Exec incompatibility
• (1) IBM TS3100 tape drive
• Various amounts of DS3000-series disk storage, some of which is apportioned for disk-then-to-tape backup
• (1) Windows Backup server to run Symantec Backup Exec

Of our Windows servers, we have:

• (3) Active Directory 2008/2012 servers
• (3) SQL Server 2008
• (1) Exchange 2003, being converted to Exchange 2013 Server
• (7) Windows 2008 servers, migrating to Windows 2012

We have Microsoft licenses for Windows 2012 for the 15 Windows servers.

We have the following Symantec Backup Exec 2010 licenses:

• (2) VMware Virtual Infrastructure "Win per host server" Standard
• (1) license for Windows server [I'm guessing this is for our Windows 2008 backup server itself were the Backup Exec program will be installed]
• (15) Agent for Windows System per server
• (1) Agent for Exchange
• (4) Agents for SQL Server
• (6) Agents for Active Directory
• (1) Deduplication Option

Because we bought Symantec essential maintenance for a year, we are/were able to upgrade to Symantc Backup Exec 2012. Apparently our Sysadmin DID contact Symantec to have the Backup Exec 2010 licenses each upgraded to their respective 2012-level Backup Exec version.

Here's what I'm trying to figure out:

1. In as far as Backup Exec 2012, what actually do/should we have as far as the "VMware Virtual Infrastructure"? Is it still the good version that will backup full ESXi servers or has the 2012 version we are upgraded to lost some functionality?

2. Obviously I definitely need to purchase a third license for VMware Virtual Infrastructure, since we have 3 ESXi hosts, right?

3. What specifically do I need to install on our Windows backup 2008 server as far as the Backup Exec program?

4. What specifically do I need to install on each of our various Windows server virtual guests that reside on the ESXi hosts? Do I need to install Backup Exec agents on each and every one, or does the VMware Virtual Infrastructure backup everything we need all in one big swoop? We wish to be able to restore Active Directory, certain SQL databases or individual Exchange emails...if need be.

5. Did we buy too many agents for the various Windows servers?

6. Did we buy the wrong Exchange/SQL agents that won't work with the VMWare Virtual Infrastructure.

7. What's the best basic steps/order I can do to get all of these backup resources into place? Backup Exec has not yet been installed at all.

I'm at a confused loss and would really appreciate your help to get me set straight so I can pick up with this migration/backup.

Thanks so much, in advance!

[teiva-boy]

1/2 - Purchase 3 VMware agents.  This will cover ALL guests running on your 3 cluster VMware vSphere config.  You will no longer need to pay for the renewals of your existing 15 RAW's licenses.

3.  BE 2012, All updates, multiple times and reboots...  Install all license keys, and I wouldn't bother with any AV software at all IMO.  Or at the base minimum, exclude the entire BE install directory, BE running processes, and future dedupe foler.

4.  With the remote agent for windows installed, you can backup the raw VMDK file, and the agent will index/catalog the files within the VMDK file.  It's also appliccation aware if you have a virtual AD/SQL/Exchange server, it wil lindex those too, so you can restore those files out of the VMDK too.  Single pass backup, multiple restore options.  Slick feature when it works.

5.  Like I said in 1/2, just don't renew the licenses you bought for the 15 windows servers.

6.  You bought what was needed.  Though, you really only need 1 AD agent for a single domain.  And you will need SQL agents for each server with SQL installed, and Exchange for each server with Exchange installled.  So your overall counts maybe a bit off.

7.  Check the documentation first.  There are also more and more support training tools being added to the support site, check those out too.