General Limitations
[For VMware integration] The following limitations apply to all storage systems supported by Veeam Backup & Replication:
- Backup infrastructure
- Backup from Storage Snapshots
- Snapshot Orchestration and Backup from Storage Snapshots with Snapshot Retention
- Veeam Explorer for Storage Snapshots
Backup infrastructure for storage snapshots has the following limitations:
- CHAP authentication is not supported for storage systems working over iSCSI.
- SAS connections are not supported.
- Veeam Backup & Replication does not display volumes and snapshots with the 'VeeamAUX' prefix in the storage hierarchy. Such volumes are used for service purposes and are filtered out.
- [For Huawei OceanStor] Huawei UltraPath software for storage connection redundancy and load balancing is not supported. It is recommended to use the Microsoft Multipath I/O (MPIO) feature instead.
Backup from storage snapshots has the following limitations:
- Backup from storage snapshots does not support vRDM disks. vRDM disks are skipped from processing.
- Backup from storage snapshots cannot be used for VMs whose disks are located on VVol datastores.
- VMs that you plan to back up or replicate must not have VMware vSphere snapshots. VMs with snapshots are skipped from processing.
- If you enable the Enable VMware tools quiescence option in the job settings, Veeam Backup & Replication will not use Backup from Storage Snapshots to process running Microsoft Windows VMs that have VMware Tools installed.
Snapshot Orchestration and Backup from Storage Snapshots with Snapshot Retention
- If you remove or re-add a storage array that is already associated with a snapshot job, Veeam Backup & Replication will restart the retention cycle. You will need to manually remove old snapshots that are no longer needed.
- You cannot configure a job to create storage snapshots on arrays of different storage vendors.
- [For HPE 3PAR Peer Persistence] You can use backup jobs to create a snapshot chain either on a primary or on a secondary storage array, but you cannot configure snapshot creation on both storage arrays at the same time.
- For IBM Spectrum Virtualize:
- When you add IBM Spectrum Virtualize storage systems with HyperSwap function to the backup infrastructure, Veeam Backup & Replication, by default, works with primary storage volumes. If you want to select secondary storage volumes as a data source for backup, use registry keys. For more information, contact Veeam Support Team.
- You can use backup jobs to create a snapshot chain either on a primary or on a secondary storage array, but you cannot configure snapshot creation on both storage arrays at the same time.
- If a VM added to the job has several disks that reside on the same volume, you cannot exclude specific VM disks from the backup as Veeam Backup & Replication creates snapshots at the volume level.
- Veeam Backup & Replication does not support guest file indexing for snapshot-only jobs.
- You cannot perform backup of VMs residing on a VMware datastore that comprises several LUNs.
Veeam Explorer for Storage Snapshots
Veeam Explorer for Storage Snapshots has the following limitations:
- You cannot perform any kind of restore operation (Instant VM Recovery, VM guest OS files restore and application items restore) when a VMware datastore comprises several LUNs.
- Veeam Explorer for Storage Snapshots does not support VMs whose disks are located on VVol datastores.
- The restored VM will have only those VM disks that are hosted on the same datastore as the VMX file.
- You will be able to restore VM guest OS files or application items only from those VM disks that are hosted on the same datastore as the VMX file.
- You will not be able to restore VM disks that contain the absolute path in the VMX file.
- [For HPE Nimble and NetApp] You will not be able to perform Instant VM Recovery and restore VM guest OS files to the original location from snapshots on secondary storage arrays.
- If you remove or re-add a storage array to the backup infrastructure, you will be able to restore data only from those VM disks that are hosted on the same datastore as the VMX file.
- You cannot restore data of a VM whose disks are hosted on storage systems of different storage vendors.