Transport modes

[glum]

Hi.

I have been using transport mode SAN for making backups of virtual machines up until recently.
The backup jobs stopped working completely (due to a problem with VMware, it seems), and Dell told
me it was because you need a special license for running jobs with tranport mode SAN.

I switched to transport mode NBD, but I get exactly the same error. My question is whether there
is any specific license related to transport mode SAN, or if the Dell representative was just guessing.
Even though the jobs fail due to the VMware-issue, it takes them much longer to fail with NBD.

Thanks in advance!

[CraigV]

Hi,

No additional license required other than the AVVI agent. That's it...the Dell rep was either guessing or doesn't have a clue.

What error are you receiving?

Thanks!

[ZeRoC00L]

No, there are no specific licenses for SAN transport method. If you have the Vmware Agent, (and your backup server has access to the LUNs) you should be able to do a SAN transport backup method.

Can you post exact error or job log ?

[glum]

The error I am getting (in vCenter) is: An error occurred while quiescing the virtual machine.

If I try to take a snapshot of this particular virtual machine from within vCenter, and I uncheck
"Snapshot the virtual machine's memory", but check "Quiesce the guest file system",
it works 1 out of 3 times. The load on the particular machine is nearly nothing, and I have
restarted VMware tools on it.

Side question: When a job with multiple machines fails, isn't there a way to see which particular
machine the job failed on? Now I look at the log, write down the names of those that were "verified"
and then compare that to my selection list to see which one is missing.

[ZeRoC00L]

Check this technote for quiesce problems: http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH129724

[CraigV]

...as well as the TN below:

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&pmv=print&impressions=&viewlocale=&id=TE...

[glum]

Thank you, but I already had a look at that one. I have categorized my backup jobs into
groups of operating systems, and my Windows-machines fail, my Linux-machines fail
as well as my FreeBSD-machines. E.g. the Linux-machines don't even have VSS at all.

[ZeRoC00L]

What ESX/vSphere version do you have ?

[glum]

I have ESXi 5.0.0 and vSphere 5.0.0.

[ZeRoC00L]

Install all available patches for ESXi After installing patches, make sure to update the vmware tools on the clients. Also install all available patches/updates for BE2010.

[Colin_Weaver]

Actually there are specific licenses that can mess with the Transport modes but these are not BE licenses they are VMware ones. However so far I have only seen an issue  that means you could not use HotAdd transport because of the wrong license level.

In your case if NBD is also broken I doubt it is a licensing problem.

[glum]

I think I will follow this advice before I proceed with further troubleshooting. Thank you, I will get back to this thread once this is complete.