Licensing & Agents for Exchange & Virtual Servers

[Steven_Rodrigue]

Hello,

I have a few questions regarding System Recovery.

1)    Backup Exec System Recovery edition appears to be specifically designed to support virtual server.  However, I can’t find any resources regarding the licensing required for individual virtual servers.  Do we need a separate license for each virtual server or can we back up the whole lot using the license on the host server?  I’m guessing that we just need the one license, but I'd like to be sure.

2)    There doesn’t seem to be any agents available for System Recovery; the only options I see is for a console, Sharepoint and Exchange – all options require a full server license as a base.  So, what is the recommended setup and required licenses in the case of an Exchange server running on a virtual server?

3)    Continuous server protection support for the above – it make sense to me that continuous protection should backup the whole lot, but what if we want granular restore capabilities for Exchange?  Where would the option be installed?  I can’t see installing it on the host – I think it (the Exchange option) should be installed on the virtual server hosting the Exchange server, but again, I have no idea how the licensing would work in such a case.

Thanks in advance to anyone who can assist!

[David_F]

For further clarification of licensing you may wish to contact Symantec Licensing department @ 1-888-727-8671 and/or enterprise sales which can be contacted from their webpage located here: http://www.symantec.com/business/contact_sales.jsp

To assist in answering your question, you will need a separate license for each virtual (guest) server and a license on the host server if it too has its drives being backup; any system who’s drives are to be imaged will require a license be it a physical system or a virtual one.

Agents, that which performs the backup, can be install separately from their console; console(s) are that component use to administrate the agent jobs and gather various job histories. Between the BESR console(s) and its Agents it administers, it is the agents that are licensed with the exception of any additional BESR option purchased.

Unlike the BE product, where there is a separate agent for Exchange and Sharepoint, there is only a single agent use for the actual backup process even if Exchange or Sharepoint is installed on the system.

The other licenses that are needed for the BESR product are for its ‘options.’ These options only enhance the usability of the images that are created and/or offer additional means of administering the actions performed by the agent.  In the case of option Backup Exec Exchange Retrieve (BEER) the UI is what gets licensed. In the option Backup Exec Recovery Manager (BESRM) it is the Manager server component not its console that gets the licensed.

I will not be able to assist on the Continuous server protection (CPS) support at this time. With Backup Exec Exchange Retrieve (BEER) option note the product is able to ‘retrieve,’ mailboxes and mail messages off-line from your recovery point images made of your Exchange 2003 server. If you want granular 'restore' capabilities back to your 'live' Exchange server you will need to discus this requirement with your enterprise sales rep; the BEER product at this time will not be able to assist you in performing such task. With that being said, The BEER option typically is NOT installed on the Exchange server host system itself, but more often on an admin workstation class system that is permitted to run Outlook.