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Looking for Step by Step upgrade doc for BE 2012 (to 2016)

mtbDad
Level 2

Hi Everyone,

I have inherited a BE2012 environment, which I now need to upgrade to BE 2016 so we have a supported environment (2012 is now fully out of support).

Can anyone please advise if there is a ste-by-step document available?

I did see a url on a previous post for 2012 to 2015, but the url is no longer valid.

Although I have pretty good experience of other backup products, I don't have much BE, and so want to make sure everything is fully checked off.

Issues I will be particularly keen to understand include -

License requirements

Compatability issues (HCL \ SCL etc)

Migration of 2012 DB - IS this straightforward?

Job Histories - Do these come across ok with the in-place upgrade?

Thanks in advance 

 

 

3 REPLIES 3

Colin_Weaver
Moderator
Moderator
Employee Accredited Certified

Firstly are you aware that Backup Exec 16 goes End of Standard Support in April next year as such you should really be looking more at Backup Exec 20.  (although as you cannot do a direct inplace upgrade from BE 2012 to BE 20.x that does add complexity as you would have to upgrade to BE 16, possibly as a trailware installation, first.)

 

As regards licensing, you will need licenses for the new version that match your current licenses, although if currently using "a-la-carte" individual licensing you could consider a Capacity Based Edition instead. As BE 16 is NOT the current version you would have to work with your reseller about whether BE 16 licenses are available - we do eventually stop selling licences for older versions. Useful links for licensing guides etc are here: https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/article.000109494

As for compatibility you have to look at your environment and then look at the relevant compatibility list for the version of Backup Exec you are going to - typically anything 32bit, or older than Exchange 2010 or Windows 2008R2 is likely to be an issue going forwards (even if BE 16 currently still supports it, if Micrsosoft no longer suppirts something then you might eventually see problems that we cannot resolve due to the age of the products in your environment.)

An in place upgrade will ensure that all jobs, job histories, media information etc is maintained. If moving to a different servers  and not performing an in-place upgrade then the steps are more complicated but the same result can be achieved.

This link gives guidelines for upgrading from BE 2014 or later to BE 20.x (and the compatibility link within it takes you to infor for all BE versions, not just BE 20.x) https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/article.100044372

Note: the guidelines documents (and the step by step info) for BE 2014 to BE 20.x are very similar to those required from BE 2012 to BE 16 (with only very minor differences.

Hi Colin,

Thanks for such a detailed response.

A couple of replies are here, and a bit more info which will hopefully explain everything.

Upgrading to BE2016 - Yes, I did see that standard support ends next April, although extended support will go beyond that. It is likely our organisation will find this an acceptable outcome for the time being.

Licensing is interesting. I have been passed a group of licenses from the person who previously looked after BE2012. However, I am wondering how I woule be able to verify these are correct? Is it as simple as checking what licenses I see in BE2012 and making sure there is a corresponding BE2016?  A second issue would be formal verfification, perhaps from Veritas themselves?

Yes - I will be attempting an in-place upgrade, although the server is pretty old but part of this upgrade project may only be an interim measure until a bigger migration project can be scoped and costed for next year.

I do have one more question, which relates to support, and my ability to raise support cases.I noticed yesterday that I am not approved to use "chat", or raise a support case. Do you know how I can make this happen? I am hoping ownership of the new BE2016 licenses can help.

Thanks again

 

Colin_Weaver
Moderator
Moderator
Employee Accredited Certified

Yoi can phone the support number (for you region) and speak to customer care about both your entitlement to receive support and queries about your licenses. I am not sure what details they will need from you in order to confirm your status though.