System Center

Free Webcast: Whats New in DPM 2012

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Microsoft DPM MVP Robert Hedblom will be hosting a free webcast covering what the new features are in DPM 2012. Here is the information from his blog: Interested in DPM? Want to know the new features in DPM2012? At the 13/10 1PM GMT+1 I will host a webcast (Live meeting) that addresses the new features … Read more

DPM Admin Console on Client Computers

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DPM 2012 Beta is out. One of the new features of DPM 2012 is that you can install the DPM Administrator Console on other servers or workstations and manage your DPM 2012 and even DPM 2010 servers remotely without having to logon to the DPM server. The cool part is that you can manage existing DPM 2010 servers. This is done through applying a hotfix to your DPM 2010 server and installing the console on your workstation or server from the DPM 2012 beta software.

In this blog post we are going to walk through setting this up. It is a simple two step install installing the hotfix on the DPM 2010 server first and then the console on the workstation. Here is the process:

First download the DPM 2010 Interoperability patch for DPM 2012 Beta hotfix (DataProtectionManager2010-KB2581742) and DPM 2012 Beta.

Copy the DPM 2010 Interoperability patch hotfix for DPM 2012 Beta  to your DPM 2010 server.

Make sure your DPM 2010 is all up to date. Once DPM 2010 is up to date install the beta hotfix.

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Open up DPM 2010 after the hotfix and verify it is still working.

Now the DPM 2010 server is ready lets install the console on the client machine.

Here are the steps:

Navigate to the DPM 2012 Beta install and chose 32 or 64Bit depending on what your workstation is.

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Launch the DPM 2012 Beta install on your local workstation.

Select “DPM Central Console” to begin.

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Publish DPM Alerts to Windows Event Viewer

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I recently ran across a thread on DPM TechNet forums with a topic on how to access DPM alerts.   They wanted to monitor DPM errors and events. You can use a third party tool to do this or you can use System Center Operations Manager/Essentials . If you have the option to use System Center … Read more

Microsoft Data Protection Manager 2012 Beta

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Data Protection Manager 2012 Beta is Now Available! You can download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=897a604a-cace-42b9-944d-4c690917f989 For more information about DPM 2012 visit: http://blogs.technet.com/b/dpm/archive/2011/09/01/system-center-data-protection-manager-2012-beta-now-available.aspx and Whats new in DPM 2012 Screencast by DPM MVP Mike Resseler http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/edge/Video/hh285690

Install and Configure System Center Essentials 2010 Part 2

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~ How to Configure System Center Essentials 2010 ~

We already covered How to install System Center Essentials 2010 (SCE2010) in part  1:

https://www.buchatech.com/2010/09/install-and-configure-system-center-essentials-2010-part-1.

It has been a while as I had to find the time to draft this post. In part 2 we will cover basic configuration of SCE2010. As you already know SCE2010 is a combination of several System Center products so there are a fair amount of settings that need to be configured. When you first open up SCE2010 a wizard opens that you use to configure it. Here is the list of what is in the initial configuration:

  • Group Policy Settings (Use Local or Domain Group Policy)
  • Computer Discovery (A scheduled job that adds new computers to SCE2010.)
  • Email Notifications (What email server and account is used to send out notifications.)
  • Proxy Server
  • Monitoring Configuration
  • Error Monitoring and Forwarding

and

  • Microsoft Updates (Update Languages, Update Classifications, and Update Deployment)

Here is a screenshot of the initial configuration wizard.

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In this post we will basically go through the options in the wizard and some other basic settings you may want to configure.

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A deeper look into dBeamer!DPM for DPM 2010

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dBeamer!DPM is a third party tool that is added to your DPM to extend its functionality. dBeamer!DPM was made by a company called Instavia Software Inc. Instavia creates virtualization and availability tools. dBeamer!DPM can be used to add your DPM as a part of your High Availability (HA) infrastructure by increasing your RTO to near 0. dBeamer!DPM allows you to recover data even if your DPM services or DPM database is down and gives you the ability for the data to be used the minute it starts being restored.

We are going to take a look at dBeamer!DPM its capabilities and how to get this working with DPM. We are also going to test accessing a Hyper-V virtual machine while the virtual machine is being restored from DPM using dBeamer!DPM.

AT A GLANCE:

  • Overview of dBeamer
    • Overview of the technology behind dBeamer, what it does and how it works.
  • Overview of dBeamer!DPM.
  • Deployment of dBeamer!DPM
    • dBeamer!DPM install on DPM Server.
    • dBeamer install on a Protected Server.

  • Real world dBeamer!DPM test
    • Test recovery of Hyper-V virtual machine and use while it is running.

Overview of dBeamer

dBeamer is the technology underneath dBeamer!DPM. dBeamer uses an operation called BEAM that allows you to copy data such as files, folders, virtual machines and database to a different location and this data is made available instantly. Another example is that you could start a BEAM of a video and begin playing it while it is still copying over. So for example a user could start reading or modifying Microsoft Word documents or a live database while the data is still being copied. dBeamer BEAM technology works regardless of the size of data that you are copying.

dBeamer has a pause and resume operation to head of loss of data during a BEAM. For example if data is being beamed over a network and network connectivity is lost dBeamer will pause and then resume when connectivity is restored. dBeamer is integrated right into Microsoft windows through a windows explorer extension. dBeamer also has a scripting and command line tool so that you can automate the initiation of a BEAM operation.

You can start the dBeamer BEAM operation one of three ways:

1. Beaming right from Windows Explorer

2. Beaming from command shell

3. Using the dBeamer application itself

dBeamer runs on NTFS and requires 4GB RAM minimum to run. dBeamer uses a large amount of RAM to perform the BEAM operations and that is why there is a requirement of at least 4GB of ram. The more RAM that is allocated on machines that are beaming the better performance you will get. dBeamer is supported on these following operating systems:

· Windows 2003 with SP2 (x86 and x64)

· Windows 2003 R2 with SP2 (x86 and x64)

· Windows 2008 with SP2 (x86 and x64)

· Windows 2008 R2 (x64)

· Windows 7 (x86 and x64)

Enough about dBeamer itself let’s look at how this technology actually works. This is what happens when dBeamer performs a BEAM operation:

Step 1: A BEAM is initiated to copy data from one location to another.

Step 2: dBeamer creates a virtual local file view of the data that is being beamed on the destination.

Step 3: Once the virtual local file is completely created in the destination it can immediately be used.

Step 4: On the destination when portions of the data that is being Beamed is needed dBeamer then fetches the needed data blocks on demand allowing for continues access of data that has not even been transferred yet.

Step 5: dBeamer continues to simultaneously copy the data content in a sequential fashion without overwriting the modified contents of the virtual local file, once the BEAM is complete dBeamer stops and the data in the destination is completely beamed over as a whole.

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Backing up Applications with DPM

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We all know that DPM can protect basic Windows Servers 2003 through 2008 R2 including files, folders, and critical server components like system state and do BMR’s of servers. DPM can also protect Windows application specific workloads. I often see confusion or questions in forums about the applications that can be protected natively by DPM. In this post I will set out to list the applications DPM protects natively and list resources to other common applications and where to get the information on properly backing them up.

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