Protect Hyper-V Virtualization Platforms, Both Windows and Linux

At the end of the past week, Microsoft announced the availability of System Center Data Protection Manager 2007 Service Pack 1. With the release of SP1, the Redmond company enhanced the protection capabilities available for SQL Server 2008, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, Exchange Server 2007, but also its latest virtualization solution, namely Hyper-V.

The protected workloads collection DPM 2007 has been extended with the introduction of SP1 to encompass Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V and the company's Hyper-V Server and its virtualization platforms, including  Windows and Linux.

“Easily one of the most anticipated features of Service Pack 1 for DPM 2007 is our protection for Hyper-V. DPM 2007 already protected Virtual Server 2005 R2, but as Microsoft customers have been moving towards Hyper-V, they wanted to continue the all-Microsoft backup & recovery solution for their Microsoft hypervisor,” Jason Buffington, senior technical product manager Windows Storage Solutions & Data Protection, stated.

Via SP1, DPM 2007 is capable of running on the Hyper-V host, and in this manner it functions as a self-contained solution. By providing support for Hyper-V with DPM 2007 SP1, Microsoft has answered customer needs involving a backup solution for platforms virtualized with its hypervisor.

“DPM does not require a SAN to snap and remount VHDs elsewhere - it can use DAS, or any other locally mounted disk, on the Host, as well as the DPM server. DPM does not require 3rd-party backup software, even after the VHD is secured – it's a complete solution on its own. DPM does not leave the VM dormant during the entire backup – if it has to hibernate the VM, it brings it down, snaps it, and brings it right back up again. But for most Windows guests, it can protect with no downtime at all,” Buffington added.