How to safely unmount veeam datastore that is mounted for backup in vCenter

I have often seen an NFS datastore left over from Veeam Restores in the vCenter. If no VM is running on it, you can unmount the datastore without any problems, otherwise the vCenter would not allow it anyway. So just right-click and unmount

@apple0529 Hello and Welcome to Veeam :)

As you have posted in our Hands on Lab section and are new to our product, can I suggest you run one of our On Demand Hands on Labs, which will take you through various data protection scenarios. 

If you are looking to restore data (from your question) - can I suggest the “Test Drive Veeam Recovery Scenarios” Hands on Lab, available here > https://go.veeam.com/hands-on-lab-experience

Thank you, 

Ian

If its one of the VeeamBackup_%VBRSERVER% name they are safe to unmount. Just check there are no restores in progress that are using it.

We periodically go through and unmount these as they can cause havoc with our monitoring.

Hi @apple0529 -

As others have shared, you can simply unmount the (NFS) datastore from the ESXi Host it’s connected to. Per the User Guide, NFS datastores are used for:
- Surebackup / SureReplica jobs
- Instant Recovery
- Instant Disk Recovery
- U-AIR
- Multi-OS guest file recovery
..among a few other things. 

Take note also from the Guide that “The vPower NFS datastore stays mounted to the ESXi host. Each time you start an operation from the list (what I just shared above), Veeam Backup  & Replication checks whether vPower NFS datastore is mounted to the Host. If you manually unmounted the datastore or the datastore was unmounted by other causes, Veeam Backup & Replication remounts the datastore.”

Once you complete the restore operation you’re doing, the NFS datastore is no longer needed and can safely be unmounted. If you don’t manually unmount it, it’ll stay connected. But, keeping it mounted makes the next restore session which requires the NFS datastore take less time to complete. Your choice 😊

Hope this helps.

Hi, @MarkBoothman 

Thank you for your comment.

My Veeam datastore’s name is “VeeamBackup_gn1bhch01”. Is this name ok to safely unmount?

I just want to make sure the name is proper to unmount.

Thank you

Assuming gn1bhch01 is the name of your VBR server...yes. And, it should only be attached to 1 ESXi Host. If you're still worried about unmounting it, you can click on the datastore, go to Files and verify nothing is in it. Also check in the VBR Console to make sure none of the restore job types I shared above are currently running. 

Hi, @coolsport00 

Thank you so much for the quick reply, I appreciate it. 

yes gn1bhch01 is the VBR server name. I will check the steps that you mentioned on the comment before unmounting. 

Thank you.

Sure thing @apple0529 ..keep us posted. And, just in case you needed unmounting assistance, here’s VMware’s KB on unmounting datastores:
https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/2004605