{"id":516164,"date":"2024-06-05T17:35:48","date_gmt":"2024-06-05T21:35:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commvault.com\/?post_type=cmv_glossary&p=516164"},"modified":"2024-06-05T17:35:49","modified_gmt":"2024-06-05T21:35:49","slug":"vm-backup","status":"publish","type":"cmv_glossary","link":"https:\/\/www.commvault.com\/glossary-library\/vm-backup","title":{"rendered":"Virtual Machine Backup"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Virtual machine backup (VM backup) is the process of backing up the virtual machines (VMs) running in an enterprise environment. VMs usually run as guests on hypervisors that emulate a computer system, and allow multiple VMs to share a physical host hardware system. The most popular hypervisors are VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V, with other available hypervisors including cloud-based virtual machines. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As enterprises increasingly rely on virtualization, VMs have become a vital part of enterprise IT environments. Business applications databases, and even containerized workloads run on VMs and generate vast amounts of data that need to be protected using a robust data protection solution. The applications that enable companies to backup and restore all the files that comprise entire virtual machines are called VM backup software.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Virtual machine backup is a data protection solution for VMs that performs similar functions to traditional backup solutions that are used physical servers. Virtual machine backup applications can perform a full backup of all files in a VM, an incremental backup, or differential backup. The vm backup software needs to run frequently and periodically to protect VM files, configurations, and continuously changing data. Modern vm backup software will utilize enhancement capabilities available through the hypervisor that allow for quicker backups with less impact on the virtual machine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The following are essential concepts to understand the concepts of the vm backup procedures:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Similar to backing up physical servers, vmbackup protects all the items that are associated with a VM. Virtual machine backups can be performed in many ways, either through a backup agent installed in the guest operating system, or by way of integration from the hypervisor that allows for agentless backups. Regardless of the virtual machine backup process destination, follow careful steps to ensure proper backup and data protection. The main stages of vmbackup include,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Because a virtual machine is just like a physical machine, it can be backed up in the same manner as a physical machine using backup software running inside the virtual machine. With this method, the backup agent performs quiescing of the virtual machine being backed up. This is typically used for file-level backup of the data stored on the disk of the virtual machine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This method has advantages and disadvantages. Advantages can be there are no procedural changes or skills required since the backup agent is similar process to that of a physical server backup. This method can help with consistency of application data for some business critical workloads like databases. A disadvantage could be higher usage of the hosts resources as the backup operation is being carried out. However, computer resources today are more capable and the backup software is less resource intensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n