Operation Manual

13 Bare Metal Recovery of ESXi Hosts

The Acronis vmProtect 7 Bare Metal Recovery (BMR) of the ESXi host feature provides a totally

unique functionality that helps you minimize the recovery time if the ESXi server crashes, fails to start

or doesn’t work properly after a patch update. The feature allows you to restore ESXi server binaries

and patches, ESXi configuration, and missing VMs (VMs present in backups, but missing on the

datastores; VMs should be backed up separately) after the ESXi server is recovered and started.

Bare Metal Recovery supports only VMware ESXi version 4.1 and 5.0, and does not support ESX.

NOTE: Recovery of ESXi host configuration can be performed only onto local disks. Recovery to USB drives

connected to the system is not supported.

The following sections describe how ESXi host configuration backup and recovery can be configured.

13.1 ESXi host configuration backup

ESXi host configuration backup in Acronis vmProtect 7 differs from the backup of Virtual Machines.

Note that the ESXi host configuration backup will forcibly enable SSH access for the ESXi host, i.e.

its configuration will automatically be adjusted in order to enable ESXi configuration backups.

To back up an ESXi host configuration, run the New ESXi Backup Task wizard by clicking Actions-

>ESXi Backup. In the first step of the New ESXi Backup Task wizard (Select ESXi host for backup),

select the ESXi host whose configuration you want to back up. Select the ESXi host from the list of all

ESXi hosts/vCenter managed by Acronis vmProtect 7 Agent. If you don’t see the exact host that you

are looking for in the ESXi hosts list, make sure that it's added at the Configure->ESX(i) Hosts page.

Note that ESXi backup supports only ESXi servers. ESX servers cannot be selected for backup.

After selecting the ESXi host, the Enter credentials pop-up will appear. Enter the root login/password

for the selected host. In order to create a backup of ESXi binaries and patches, a connection to the

ESXi server is performed via SSH. This means that root credentials are required. You can check that

the submitted credentials are valid by clicking Test Connection. Click OK to close the pop-up.

On the right side, select the location for storing your ESXi configuration backup archive and archive

name. Click Browse to open the pop-up, select the location among one of the following and then

click OK:

 Local folders.

 Network folders.

 FTP servers.

 SFTP servers.

Select the ESXi host that needs to have its configuration backed up, the backup storage location and

then, click Next.