VMware vVols Integration

HPE Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) works with the HPE Storage vCenter Plugin to provide application consistent snapshots of virtual volumes (vVols). You must configure the Windows guest operating system and the virtual machine (VM) to enable VSS to take snapshots of the vVols containing Microsoft Exchange Server or Microsoft SQL Server data.

VSS lets you to create a backup of an application without having to create a backup of an entire VM. Having a more granular backup simplifies the application restore operation. You only need to restore the VVol containing the application data, not the entire VM.

To use VSS, you must have the following environment:

  • An array running array OS release 5.0.1.0 or later
  • HPE vCenter Plugin
  • A guest OS running Windows 2008 R2 or later with the following requirements:
    • VMware Tools installed
    • Toolkit 5.0.0 or later installed
    • Either Microsoft Exchange Server or Microsoft SQL Server installed
    • For iSCSI arrays, iSCSI network access from within the guest VM to the array required
    • A VM that uses the VSS-enabled storage policy and is synchronized with the guest OS so that the array OS can communicate with the toolkit

      The toolkit provides VSS and the tools necessary to integrate with the vCenter Plugin.

  • A storage policy that has VSS enabled
    The vCenter Plugin uses VSS when the storage policy for the VM has application synchronization enabled and either Microsoft Exchange Server or Microsoft SQL Server selected.
    NOTE: It is a good practice to create one storage policy that applies to the VM's operating system disks and another storage policy that applies to the data disks associated with the guest OS. The schedules must match exactly so that the vVols are all placed in a single volume collection.
  • The user account used to configure vVols must be a domain administrator.

    This account is only used for the initial configuration.

For information about setting up the VM to support VSS, refer to the VMware Integration Guide.