Failover Cluster Support

You can use Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows operating in the managed mode (within the Veeam Agent management scenario) to protect data processed by a failover cluster. Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows supports Windows Server Failover Clusters running Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 and later.

Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows supports data backup and restore for the following types of clusters:

• Windows File Server Failover Clusters
• Windows Server Failover Clusters that run the following applications:

• Microsoft SQL Server 2008 SP4 or newer (SQL Server Failover Cluster Instances and AlwaysOn Availability Groups are supported.)
• Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 or newer

Failover Cluster Backup

To process a cluster with Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows, you must complete the following tasks:

1. In Veeam Backup & Replication, create a protection group that includes Active Directory objects and add to this protection group one of the following types of objects:

• Cluster account of the failover cluster whose data you want to back up
• Active Directory container that includes this cluster account

To learn more, see Creating Protection Groups.

2. In Veeam Backup & Replication, configure a Veeam Agent backup job for a failover cluster. To add a failover cluster to the backup job, do the following:

1. At the Job Mode step of the New Agent Backup Job wizard, select Failover cluster.
2. At the Computers step of the wizard, add to the job the cluster account that you added to a protection group at the step 1. Alternatively, you can add to the job a container or protection group that includes this cluster account.

To learn more, see Creating Agent Backup Job for Windows Computers.

Backup of Microsoft Exchange Database Availability Groups

You can use Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows to process Microsoft Exchange Database Availability Groups (DAGs). The procedure of adding a DAG to a Veeam Agent backup job differs depending on the type of the DAG that you want to process:

• For a regular DAG, the backup job configuration procedure is the same as for any failover cluster. To learn more, see Failover Cluster Backup.
• For an IP Less DAG (a DAG without an Administrative Access Point), the backup job configuration procedure is similar to the same procedure for standalone servers. To process an IP Less DAG, you must create a Veeam Agent backup job for servers in the Veeam backup console and add to this job all nodes of the IP Less DAG. To learn more, see Creating Agent Backup Job for Windows Computers.

During the backup process, Veeam Backup & Replication will detect that servers in the backup job are part of a DAG, and create transactionally consistent backup of Microsoft Exchange databases running on these servers.

Limitations for Failover Cluster Support

Failover cluster support in Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows has the following limitations:

• Backup of failover clusters is supported in Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows managed by Veeam Backup & Replication only. You cannot process a failover cluster by Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows operating in the standalone mode.

• Backup of CSV (Cluster Shared Volumes) is not supported. Cluster disks used as CSV are automatically excluded from backup.
• AlwaysOn Availability Groups based on SQL Server Failover Cluster Instances are not supported.

• AlwaysOn Clusterless Availability Groups are not supported.
• Clustered Storage Spaces are not supported.
• Backup of Storage Replica log volumes is not supported. Such volumes are automatically excluded from backup because of Microsoft VSS limitations. To learn more, see Microsoft Docs.