Create Backup Task

To back up VMs, you must configure a backup task, which defines how, where, and when to back up VM data. One backup task can be used to process one VM or more. You can configure a backup task and start it immediately or save the task and run it later. This section will guide you through how to create backup tasks step by step.

Contents

  1. Before You Start
  2. Launch the Backup Wizard
  3. Backup Wizard: Choose Your Backup Destination and VMs
  4. Backup Wizard: Configure Task Settings
  5. Backup Wizard: Set Up Backup Schedule
  6. Backup Wizard: Set Up Retention Policy
  7. Backup Wizard: Configure Privilege Settings
  8. Backup Wizard: Apply and Backup

Before You Start

Before you start, please check if there are existing VMs. If not, please follow the following steps to add the vCenter Server or vSphere Hypervisor (ESX / ESXi) to have VMs available.

  1. Click Manage VMware vSphere > Add to connect to VMware vSphere.
  2. Fill in the server address and account information to connect to VMware vSphere.

Note:The storage space of the backup destination and the volume where the package is installed has to be at least 8G to perform backup tasks.

Apart from adding VMware vSphere, you can also edit / delete the vCenter Server or vSphere Hypervisor (ESX / ESXi) in Manage VMware vSphere:

Launch the Backup Wizard

Backup Wizard: Choose Your Backup Destination and VMs

After the backup wizard is opened, select a shared folder which is in the Btrfs file system as the backup destination, specify a name for the backup task, and select virtual machines for this backup task.

Note:

For users who have already done the selection in the virtual machine view, the selected VMs will be automatically displayed on the page.

Backup Wizard: Configure Task Settings

Note:

  1. By setting up the script and enabling the VM script execution, the credential of VM is required. An error message will be displayed if the credential is missing.
  2. VMware Tool is required to be installed to execute pre-post script.
  3. For free ESXi, CBT is required to be manually enabled.  
  4. Synology Virtual Machine Manager is required to be installed to enable backup verification

Backup wizard: Set Up Backup Schedule

Backup Wizard: Set Up Retention Policy

To strike the balance between Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and storage efficiency, you may set up your own retention policy to meet your business needs.

For example, if you want to keep all versions for the first 30 days and the latest version of each day for the second 30 days . You should insert 30 days for Keep all versions for how many days and insert 30 days for Keep the last one version of the day for how many days.

Backup Wizard: Configure Privilege Settings

Privilege settings is configurable when creating the backup task. To ensure only eligible users can have access to restore backed-up files and versions of the backup task, privilege settings can be configured during task creation. You can always edit the task to change the privilege settings.

Check the user/group that can browse and restore backed-up versions of the task.

Administrators group/users are default eligible to restore the backup task.

Backup Wizard: Apply and Backup

    After configuring all the backup settings, a backup summary will be displayed. Please follow the instructions below to finalize the backup after confirming your settings:

  1. Click Apply to create the backup task and a pop-up window will appear.
  2. Click Yes if you would like to run the backup immediately, or you may click Backup on the task list if you want to run the task afterwards.