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Using ISO boot to import VM

Using ISO boot to import VM

Use case

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Virtual machine ISO boot can be used to repair a broken OS with SystemRescue. However, this feature is also useful for importing a VM that has been backed up with Veeam from some other platform.

How-to

Pre-requisite

Have some VM (let’s call it xyz-website) running on some platform with Veeam agent and backup configured.

Have a Veeam backup of xyz-website available somewhere online. See Veeam documentation for available options.

Create target VM

Create the VM that will be xyz-website, let’s call it xyz-website-imported. Create an empty VM, make sure it has enough disk space to fit the original xyz-website.

It is important to have a public IP address for the VM so it can be connected to and more importantly, it can connect to Internet to download the backup.

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Boot to Veeam recovery

Open VM details, click on ISO boot and choose a suitable Veeam recovery image.

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Once running, click on Terminal to start the recovery in Veeam.

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Veeam recovery

Linux

Veeam will automatically start an SSH server, it is recommended to log in with SSH to continue with the recovery. Use the VM public IP address shown in VM detail view, Veeam does not know it and doesn’t show it in SSH Connection Info.

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Get username and password for SSH
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Get public IP address for SSH

Log in to the VM with the provided credentials.

ssh veeamuser@<PUBLIC_IP_ADDRESS>

You will be presented with the Veeam recovery user interface.

Windows

In the Windows image, it is probably needed to install storage and network drivers first. The drivers are included but they are not automatically installed. Click on the network icon on bottom right that shows a broken network connection. Install all the missing drivers.

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Ethernet should appear under Local Area Connection, default configuration should be fine and after clicking OK, network connection should be up and running.

Actual recovery

This is not in the scope of this document, refer to Veeam documentation for more information.

Recovery completed

Once the recovery has completed successfully, shut down the Veeam recovery process OS.

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Then press Stop for the VM, this is an important step that removes the ISO from being the boot device of this VM.

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Then finally you can Start the VM and if all went well, the restored virtual machine should now be up and running.

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