Blogs and Podcasts

I recently stood up a new Nutanix cluster and needed it protected with Veeam before workloads went live. If you are used to doing this with VMware or Hyper-V, the Nutanix AHV workflow in VBR v13 feels different. The proxy model is different, and the old AHV proxy appliance is no longer part of the setup.This walkthrough covers the adding the Nutanix environment, configuring AHV workers, running the first backup, and proving both full VM and file-level restores. What you should have before you start VBR v13 with the Veeam Plug-in for Nutanix AHV installed on the backup server. Veeam documentation currently lists VBR 13.0.1.1071 or later with AHV plug-in 13.9.0.212+ as the supported baseline. Nutanix AOS 6.8.1.6+ Prism Central pc.2022.6 through pc.2024.3.1.10, or pc.7.3+. Versions 7.3.1.2, 7.3.1.3, and 7.5.0.0 are explicitly excluded.

During the upgrade of Veeam Backup & Replication to version 13.2.29, I encountered the following warning during the Configuration Check phase:Trusted hosts hardeningYour remote host trust option is set to Manual. After the upgrade, open a backup console and make sure all your backup infrastructure servers are trusted. At first glance, this message may seem concerning, but it is important to note that it is not a blocking issue and does not prevent the upgrade from completing successfully.Why Does This Warning Appear?Starting with recent Veeam releases, the platform has introduced additional security controls to strengthen communication between backup infrastructure components.In my environment, the Remote Host Tru

  Back in the days...Do you remember the Matrix screensavers from back in the day? Green characters cascading down your screen while your PC idles away. Everyone had one at some point. And somehow — it was just cool.The idea hit me during one of those moments where you should really be doing something else: What if the characters weren't random glyphs, but instead IMMUTABILITY, RANSOMWARE RECOVERY, ZERO-TRUST RESILIENCE and VEEAM DATA CLOUD VAULT?As some of you may know, I have absolutely no clue about coding — but every now and then I get crazy ideas. This one is for you.     From One Idea to Almost 100 Versions

...don't let them drift apart With Veeam Backup & Replication v13 and the new Veeam Software Appliance (VSA), many of us are enjoying the convenience of components that keep themselves up to date. The VSA is deployed and updates itself automatically — convenient, right? Yes, mostly!But there's a catch that just bit me in my lab environment, and I wanted to share it quickly before it trips someone up in production. The ScenarioImagine you already have one or more Veeam VSA appliances deployed. They update themselves — in this case to 13.0.2. So far so good.But not everything in your environment is an appliance. Your Veeam Backup Enterprise Manager might still be running on a Windows server (it happens). Enterprise Manager was therefore not automatically u

One consequence of the market changes resulting from Broadcom VMware's new positioning of its software solutions and licenses is that the topic of “hypervisors” is now being analyzed in greater technical detail than ever before.In search of more realistic alternatives that fit IT departments’ budgets, organizations are turning their attention to market options.On the other hand, there is the open-source software community. I truly have a great admiration for the thousands of programmers, engineers, and software architects who dedicate their efforts to free software communities.Today, alternatives to the VMware hypervisor are solutions built on a stack of open-source projects, with varying degrees of customization and architectural differences.The purpose of this post is to analyze how a generic hypervisor architecture, based on QEMU and KVM, handles disk write I/O requests.It´s a fascinating topic (at least for me).Let’s explore the rational

I enrolled in a Veeam 13 subscription course, but the lab setup instructions appear to be based on a 2023 recording and an older ESXi licensing model. Because of that, the setup options shown in the course no longer work as presented, which makes it difficult or impossible to complete the home lab as expected. On top of that, I can clearly see the training is v12 = false advertising. The reason for the failure comes when I install VCSA. The error shows the license used in ESXi is invalid however I followed the instructions in the training and the instructor downloaded the same software as I. Conclusion is the material and training is old but sold as some new amazing thing. I contacted support by email, used the chatbot, and reviewed the help section, but I have still not received a response after 78 hours.My concern is not just the delay in support, but that this course is still being sold even though the lab guidance appears outdated. At minimum, this should be

Hey everyone! 🎉I know many of you have been waiting for this, and I am really happy to finally share with the Veeam Community that VMCE+ is officially live Woo-hoo!!! 🎉 🎉 🎉VMCE+ is the first certification aligned to v13 and a real step up from VMCE. It goes beyond backup and recovery fundamentals to validate advanced skills across the full Veeam Data Platform. If you have been working with Veeam at an advanced level, this one is built for you.What you need to get certifiedTo earn VMCE+, you complete three trainings:Veeam Backup & Replication: Configure, Manage, and Recover (VBR) Veeam Data Platform: Monitor, Manage, Analyze (Veeam ONE) Veeam Data Platform: Scale, Automate, Secure (Veeam Orchestrator)The courses are available through the Veeam University PRO eLearning subscription, with instructor-led options available only for the Backup & Replication course. There may be an option to have the V

This blog comes with a high level video overview, written piece is below the video!  Blog/Written Form Avoiding egress fees is a critical factor when considering any data migration. Hyperscalers typically have bandwidth charges for pulling data out in large volumes, as is often the case with backup data. So what are the options? How can you reduce, or eliminate these costs entirely?Let’s take a look at the options, but first - Why Migrate to Veeam Data Cloud Vault v2?Veeam Data Cloud Vault v2 provides a first-party solution that integrates deeply with the Veeam Data Platform. It simplifies cloud storage with all-inclusive pricing, covering storage, transactions, and egress at one predictable rate—no surprises. There are a couple of editions to choose between, Foundation or Advanced Edition, with the Advanced Edition offering “12 nines” of reliability using Azu

One of the most common things I notice during Veeam deployments, health checks, training that I deliver and customer workshops is that email notifications, Syslog and SNMP integration are often left unconfigured.The backup jobs work. The repositories are available. The backups complete successfully.But when I ask about notifications or centralized logging, the answer is frequently:"We haven't configured that yet." Why This MattersVeeam provides native integration with email systems, SNMP and Syslog servers, allowing administrators to receive immediate visibility into backup activities, warnings, and failures.These integrations are not just operational conveniences, they are important security controls.When a backup job finishes, Veeam can automatically send a notification email. Likewise, relevant events can be forwarded to a SNMP and Syslog server for centralized monitoring, retention, and correlation

The ultimate test of cyber resilience: recovering when all you have left are your backup files  Most organizations spend significant time and effort protecting their backup data.They implement:Immutable repositories Air-gapped storage Tape archives Object storage with Object Lock The 3-2-1-1-0 or 3-2-1-2-0 ruleAs a result, they feel confident that their data is safe.But let me ask a different question:What if your Veeam Backup & Replication server no longer exists?What if ransomware, a hardware failure, human error, or even a disaster destroys:The Veeam Backup Server The configuration database Enterprise Ma

In today’s threat landscape, backup and management platforms have become prime targets for cyberattacks, particularly in multi-tenant service provider environments. Ensuring the security and integrity of these systems is no longer optional—it is a critical operational requirement.Recently, a critical vulnerability (CVE-2026-32998) with a CVSS v3.1 score of 9.4 has been identified in Veeam Service Provider Console (VSPC) version 9 builds. This vulnerability can potentially allow remote code execution (RCE) through specific features such as alarm script execution, exposing service providers to severe risks including unauthorized access, system compromise, and lateral movement across managed infrastructures. [commun

When IT professionals discuss availability, business continuity, and data protection, the conversation usually focuses on backup software, immutable storage, disaster recovery plans, and cybersecurity.Those technologies are critical.However, some of the most dangerous Data Center Risks have nothing to do with software, storage arrays, or backup systems.Sometimes, the real threat is much closer than we think.Recently, I was called onsite to investigate an issue involving a tape library. One of the drives had grabbed a tape cartridge and failed to release it properly. The task seemed simple: remove the tape, validate the drive, and confirm everything was operating normally.A routine service call.At least, that's what I thought.What I discovered that day had very little to do with backup infrastructure a

Recently, a customer asked me:“Hey — is it possible that VMware tag backup isn’t working?”The reason: After a Full VM Restore (Restore to original location), the VM’s VMware tags were suddenly gone. In the restore log it basically said:“These tags were not present at the time of backup — so I’m removing them.” And that’s despite the fact that the tags were definitely set in production (otherwise the customer wouldn’t have been able to pick up the VM in their jobs using tag-based selection in the first place). A test with another VM showed the same behavior. At that point it was clear: this wasn’t a one-off. So how does Veeam get the idea that a VM has “no tags” — even though it does? What is a VMware Tag (and why is it re

​@Rick Vanover  announced (thanks Rick!) during today’s Weekly Recap the new #EmpowHerVMCE+ Accelerator, and I can’t describe how proud I am. A lot of people worked on this initiative, but special recognition goes to ​@ertelle1, who first had this idea and whose drive, vision, and collaboration made this happen.I took part in leading the 2023 edition of EmpowHer VMCE+, and I saw firsthand how this program was an opportunity to change trajectories. Participants did not just become better technical professionals, they strengthened their confidence and sense of empowerment. They confidently stepped into the room and proved that they belong in this industry, and that they have a place on the front line.And that

 Yesterday, I published an article on #CloudCity about my FinOps journey.Check here: FinOps in Practice: Optimizing Cloud Value with AWS, CloudCheckr, and VeeamI'd like to highlight some key initiatives that helped my team strengthen data protection while improving cost control and reducing expenses associated with backup infrastructure assets. Resilience, Backup & High Availability - by CLOUDCHECKRCloudCheckr identifies risks related to data protection and business continuity, ensuring workloads are prepared for failures, accidental deletions, and downtime.Examples of recommendations:• EBS volumes without snapshots (direct data loss risk)• EBS volumes without recent snapshots (

I recently worked on another project with a major customer where we unfortunately reached the limits of Veeam Backup & Replication’s out-of-the-box features for Scale-Out-Repositories and had to find a workaround. Our ChallengeOur challenge: The customer has over 100 scale-out repositories, each with different permissions depending on the application and operating system. We had to migrate the VBR server to a new Windows Server. However, this also meant that the users created locally on the old server were no longer available. In principle, this wasn’t a problem—we simply recreated the same users on the new server.However, this is where the problem comes in. The SOBR permissions include the old user as “OLDSERVERNAME\USERNAME,” which we then have to replace with “NEWSERVERNAME\USERNAME.” If we didn’t replace these, our Enterprise Plugins would no longer have permissions to write their backups.Unfortunately, there is no function

Some days your job is just plain fun! No ifs or buts!This morning I had the immense pleasure to talk with 3 pillars of the Veeam Community, Senior Community Manager Nikola Pejkova ​@NikolaPejkova , Mr. Community himself Rick Vanover ​@Rick Vanover  and of course Vanguard/Legend/Object First Ace, author of Mastering Veeam Backup & Replication Chris Childerhose ​@Chris.Childerhose  !This is a conversation that could have lasted all morning, never a dull moment.Also courtesy of a fresh of the press Rickatron quote a potentially fantastic new title for a DR horror movie! I can see it now:  coming soon to a theater near you: “Agents gone wild”! Tune in to find out what it is like to write a book and the fun these three folks had collaborating together on this new edition!  

I finally had some time to wire in the Veeam Ports MCP server into GPT. It works but has a number of steps in the process. If you are like me you watch the token burn in Claude for projects like these.  This started with EdxH’s post on the Veeam Ports MCP server introducing the project & GitHub repo.The repo is @ https://github.com/shapedthought/veeam-ports-mcp. I wanted to see what it took to make that same idea work /w GPT.Claude Desktop can launch a local MCP server /w STDIO. The Veeam Ports MCP repo already shows that path well. GPT expects an MCP endpoint instead. On my end that meant I had to put a bridge and a tunnel in the middle before GPT could make use of the tool correctly.Once that was running, I could describe a VBR v13 layout in plain language and get back firewall rules, topology output, and a Magic Ports import file (yea).The painful part was useful as well. I learned that a topology JSON and a Magic Ports import JSON are not t

Throughout this tape series, I explored installation, troubleshooting, tape cleaning procedures, advanced diagnostics, and real-world operational scenarios involving Veeam tape environments.But there is another side of tape infrastructure that usually only receives attention when something starts going wrong: tape library administration.And many times, the problem is not directly related to the backup job itself.Issues often appear around: media movement firmware inconsistencies robotics communication tape-out operations media rotation hardware lifecycle operational mistakes In enterprise environments, tape infrastructure eventually becomes much more than just a backup target.It becomes an operational platform that requires maintenance, organization, validation, and process consistency.

TL;DROn May 14, 2026, the PostgreSQL Global Development Group released security updates for all supported branches (18.4, 17.10, 16.14, 15.18, 14.23), fixing 11 CVEs, several rated CVSS 8.8. If you run VBR on Windows with PostgreSQL as your configuration database, you are affected. Veeam does not auto-update PostgreSQL. You have to do it yourself! Here is what you need to know and what to do about it. Why this matters for VBRSince VBR v12, PostgreSQL has been the default (and recommended) configuration database. VBR v13 GA ships with PostgreSQL 17.6, and the latest cumulative update (13.0.1.2067) bumps it to 17.9.1. Both versions are below the patched 17.10 and therefore vulnerable to all 11 CVEs disclosed on May 14 (PostgreSQL release announcement).If you are still on

In my latest blog article part 2 of Integration  Veeam with CrowStrike, I'll walk through the steps of a recent implementation & integration of CrowdStrike with Veeam backup servers. Cyberattacks continue to target backup infrastructure because attackers know backups are often the last line of defense. Traditional antivirus solutions are no longer enough to protect modern backup environments, especially when ransomware actors specifically target backup repositories, backup servers, and privileged accounts.That’s where integrating CrowdStrike with Veeam Software can significantly improve your security posture.By combining Veeam’s ransomware detection and secure recovery capabilities with CrowdStrike Falcon’s endpoint protection and threat intelligence, organizations can better detect, contain, and recover from cyber incidents.In this lab guide, I’ll walk through the steps to implement and configure CrowdStrike integration with Veeam and explain

Hi all,I had a customer who needed a way to obtain Veeam Software Appliance (VAS) updates within a closed OT/dark site/closed environment.However, the challenge was that they lacked Linux experience and would prefer to do everything in native Windows, without using WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux). If you have no idea what I am talking about, read this section of the Veeam help center: https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/vbr/userguide/update_appliance_configure_updates.html?ver=13#setting-up-custom-update-configurationSo my idea was to build/configure two components:1) A PowerShell script that can be run in Windows to download the necessary files from repository.veeam.com to a computer with internet access and

 Every now and then you get customer requests that initially knock you off your feet — because you can tell right away: this isn’t described anywhere in the documentation. Then it’s time to truly understand the problem, clarify the requirements properly (does the problem even exist in that form, or can it be solved differently?), research internally, potentially review a feature request including the use case — and finally think about how to help the customer pragmatically in the short term: the good old “workaround” or “self-fix.”That was the case here as well. A customer is using the standalone Veeam Plug-in for Oracle RMAN and wants to install the Veeam plug-in — however, in the customer’s environment it is intentionally used as

 Veeam Backup & Replication 13.0.2 dropped yesterday — and if you manage a smaller environment where a single Windows Server hosts all the things (Proxy, Mount Service, vPowerNFS, Guest Interaction Proxy, you name it), you may have hit an annoying moment when tried to open the console after upgrading the VBR server. You open up the Veeam Backup & Replication console, enter your server's name, click Connect — and instead of the familiar dashboard, you get this: