TSM on ESX Server...?

[chris_magic]

Hi everybody,

I believe that it is not possible to install TSM on an ESX Server because the SCSI connections are not seen by TSM.

Can you confirm that to me? And if not, there is a means to do it?

Thanks for your help.

Christophe

 

[chad_small]

TSM server is not supported on an ESX server but the client is.

 

[annick_23]

Use a Linux client to backup the images.

If you use a 5.2 client you should not have any issues, but 5.3 you will need to add libraries: http://www-1.ibm.com/support/docvie...G7&uid=swg21239546&loc=en_US&cs=utf-8&lang=en

The link above will show you supported levels and help with setup

cheers

 

[rulan]

ESX client backup and restore on 2 TSM server

Hi
We have 2 TSM servers in our environment.
I have been asked to backup one ESX server with some of its VM backups on one TSM server and some on another TSM server. Can i please get some help on how to set up this environment, i am new to the TSM world.
Thanks

 

[cwilloug]

We just (last summer) went to virtulization - the guys who run the virtualized servers back up the servers, but not the ESX machines - their excuse - "The ESX servers are very easy to install, set up, and get configured",,,, I'm waiting for the first time several of them crash, and THEN see what they say.

Sorry for butting in... my .02

 

[neoomega]

We just (last summer) went to virtulization - the guys who run the virtualized servers back up the servers, but not the ESX machines - their excuse - "The ESX servers are very easy to install, set up, and get configured",,,, I'm waiting for the first time several of them crash, and THEN see what they say.

Sorry for butting in... my .02

as long as you running HA and have more than one VMhost, you will be fine if the VMhost crashes. But if the VMhost hang, that's another story, coz the VM can't go anywhere. You have no control of the VM. You will not able to go into console or migrate it off the hand VMhost. That happened to us TWICE......

 

[DazRaz]

We just (last summer) went to virtulization - the guys who run the virtualized servers back up the servers, but not the ESX machines - their excuse - "The ESX servers are very easy to install, set up, and get configured",,,, I'm waiting for the first time several of them crash, and THEN see what they say.

Sorry for butting in... my .02

I've never backed up the ESX servers. It takes about 30 minutes to setup from CD and have operational. Backing up the ESX host itself does not streamline the process at all. If you wanted to keep the same host certificate, there are easier ways but I don't bother with that.

Easiest way for backing up the Virtual Machines is just to install the client within the virtual machine. If your site is large, you may get benefits from looking at using VCB.

 

[cwilloug]

Yes, we do backup the VM's, but not the hosts - and I did watch a ESX install/config - and it is straight forward and simple. I was just wondering if there are any system/config files on the ESX that are important.

Yes, we do have several ESX hosts, and use Vmotion.

 

[DazRaz]

Yes, we do backup the VM's, but not the hosts - and I did watch a ESX install/config - and it is straight forward and simple. I was just wondering if there are any system/config files on the ESX that are important.

I rebuild them them following our documented config. Its important to have things like local disk partition layout, Service Console memory, network adapter config documented and the rebuilding using that documentation is simple. If you use HA, then you will need the hosts file as all the ESX servers in the cluster should be in there. And don't forget configuring the time sync.....

This is assuming of course that there are not Virtual Machines installed on a VMFS partition on local disk or any NFS shares from the ESX host (iso images and the like). If the build is kept clean, then all you need is your documentation.

When upgrading to a newer version of ESX, I usually rebuild each time rather than run the upgrade script though with Upgrade Manager, I may let that do it all from here.

 

[ALT-G]

To update the original question with an answer, I recently talked with IBM/TSM support on their position of TSM Server as a VM (the company wants to investigate it for DR). Their response was that it is fully supported with one exception, no tape library support.For file based storage pools, no problem. Actually, neither TSM or VMware supports the external library for this purpose.