The Veeam Cookbook Series

A simple step by step no frills approach to achieving your goal

Recipe: Restoring files with Guest OS File Recovery (FAT, NTFS, ReFS)

Expected deliverables:

One or more guest OS files and folders restored from backups, replicas, storage snapshots and Nutanix AHV snapshots, without restoring the entire VM.

Time to complete: 5 minutes

Ingredients:

You can restore files only from supported File Systems: FAT, NTFS and ReFS (it requires Veeam is installed on Microsoft Windows Server 2012 or later)
An account with Local Administrator permissions to start the Veeam Backup & Replication console and to connect to the backup server. The account also must have “SeBackupPrivilege” and “SeRestorePrivilege” privileges to connect to the Veeam backup server and start the restore process.
You can restore VM guest OS files from a backup or replica that has at least one successfully created restore point.

Before you start:

If you want to restore the files to the original location, then the mount server must have access to the VM guest OS (if file-level restore is performed over the network) or vCenter Server and ESXi host where the target VM runs (if file-level restore is performed over VIX API/vSphere Web Services). In addition, VMware Tools must be installed on the target VM. You cannot restore files from a backup created in the reverse incremental mode if the backup job is being performed. You cannot restore VM guest OS files from a running replica or if the replication job with the necessary VM is being performed

Assumptions:

It’s assumed that you already have a Veeam Backup Server fully working in your environment.

Method:

On the Home tab, click Restore > VMware vSphere > Restore from backup > Guest files restore > Microsoft Windows or Restore from replica > Guest files restore > Microsoft Windows.
At the Machine step, select the VM whose guest OS files you want to restore. In the Machine list, expand the necessary backup and select the VM. Click Next.
At the Restore Point step, select a restore point from which you want to restore VM guest OS files.
At the Reason step, enter a reason for restoring VM guest OS files.
At the Summary step, review details of the restore task. Click Browse to close the wizard and open Veeam Backup browser.
After the wizard is closed, Veeam opens the Veeam Backup browser with the file system tree of the restored VM. From here you can:
- Restore files and folders to the original location.
- Save files and folders to a folder on the backup server or network shared folder.
Once you have restored the required files or folders it is recommended that you close the Veeam Backup browser in order to prevent issues with the Job protecting the VM.

Links to Resources: