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Hi;

I am working on a server where the Host OS was corrupted so I had to reinstall it. I do not have a backup of the VMs with me.

The old files were placed in Windows.old and I can see them the problem is that it seems that all of the changes to the VM are scattered rather than in one VHD. So I can make the previous VHD the HDD but I only get data within the first week of creating the original VMs. I see other HRU,HRL and AVHDX files in the folder which have a much more current date but I cannot access them.

The replica server is at another location and went down at the same time so I can’t use it right now.

Any idea how to get a current VM up and running would be appreciated.

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you can spin up a new VM and attach the VHD’s, that’ll give you access to the data but if there are OS level configurations required then you’ll have to redo those.

You may also want to get backups working as tools like veeam or unitrends could have had you back up and working in minutes.

@Veeam_Software

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Sounds like you have been running on a snapshot (the avhdx file) which are not easily movable to another server. Not to pile on, but it is never a good idea to run your VM off snapshots and snapshots are definitely not a backup.

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^^ agreed!

You should also add Altaro VM Backup to the list too if you’re looking for a new VM backup product :slight_smile:
With Altaro VM backup you would easily be able to restore your VMs back up to a new/reinstalled host much quicker in such scenarios

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It is not microsoft supported, but here is a link on manually recovering those VM’s and snapshots.

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Paul - Gary & David gave you some great advice as to how to recover from your current scenario. Many IT Pros don’t realize how using snapshots in place of backups can impact their ability to recover their data until they’re in a scenario similar to yours.Being able to recover the OS and the data separately, and restore back to a specific point in time before an OS corruption can be critical in terms of quick recoveries, and these kinds of restores require more than just a snapshot.

Once you’ve gotten your environment back on its feet, you may want to look at other options to protect these VMs. It’s not entirely clear how much data you’re trying to protect, but if you have less than 1.5TB of VM data in your environment, you may want to take a look at Unitrends Free . It protects VMware & Hyper-V clients with ease & includes features like deduplication, instant recovery of your VMs, and advanced backup scheduling. Please let me know what questions you may have.

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Paul- If you’re looking at using a backup solution, you can also try out Veeam Backup Free Edition- it contains 13 features including VM file level restores and full VM restores. http://www.veeam.com/virtual-machine-backup-solution-free.html

Let me know if I can answer any questions.

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Hi

Thanks everyone. I already downloaded Veeam free. Trying to do some reading on getting it up and running. Will also look at the other articles mentioned.

Kirsten- I actually wanted to use Veeam and contacted someone who I had spoken to a few weeks ago but he didn’t return my email. When we spoke I was unclear of how Veeam actually works. Although I am still not totally clear an associate recommended it and gave me some scenarios in which he uses it. Hence the reason I was ready to recommend it to this client. However, after I did not get a response- I delayed. Would be great to get some clarity from you or someone else from Veeam so that I can properly integrate it with Azure where we will be storing the backups going forward.

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Hi Paul-

Feel free to PM the best way to get in contact with you and your location -

Additionally, Veeam Backup & Replication operates in the virtualization layer and uses an image-based approach to VM backup. When the backup is being taken, Veeam leverages the VMware snapshot capabilities, so when the backup starts a snapshot is taken to create a point-in-time copy of a VM – Veeam then uses this snapshot and creates an image based backup with all the VM data included in the backup file.

Regarding integration with Azure, this WP may be helpful: Veeam: Free Virtualization White Papers

Let me know- Thanks !