Please, consult the manual at:
https://33hops.com/xsibackup-dc-full-manual-home.html
It's constantly updated and contains explanatory videos.
/!\ Read this post to learn how to execute (c)XSIBackup in (c)ESXi >=8.0
https://33hops.com/xsibackup-backup-virtual-machines-in-esxi-8.html
CONSTRAINTS
Duplicate disk names can't be handled in the --replica action. It doesn't matter
if the disks are distributed across multiple datastores, disk names must be unique
for a given virtual machine at the time to perform a replica.
In case of the --backup action support is limited to detecting the duplicate disk
and renaming by prepending the datastore name. The .vmx file will have to be
manually edited to arrange the paths after restoring.
INSTALLATION
1 - Copy the .zip package to the /tmp folder in your ESXi server.
2 - Unzip it.
# cd /tmp;unzip XSIBackup-DC_*.zip
3 - Apply execute permission to the install file.
# chmod -R 0700 install
4 - Run the install process.
# ./install
5 - Change dir to the installation path (default is /scratch/XSI/XSIBackup-DC)
# cd /scratch/XSI/XSIBackup-DC/
6 - Run xsibackup
# ./xsibackup --help
6 - Generate a new request.key file
# ./xsibackup --request-key
7 - Upload the request.key file to your user panel.
8 - Wait some minutes and download the license.key file. You have to
rename the file to license.key and place it in the installation root.
9 - Then check the license to verify everything works as expected.
# ./xsibackup --check-license
You may watch our video on installation in out youtube.com channel.
https://youtu.be/ecFaJi0rpMk
SILENT INSTALLATION
Run:
./install '/scratch/XSI' -y -s
The first argument is the base install path. Please note that XSIBackup-DC
will always be added to it.
-y | performs an unattended installation
-s | silent, avoids any output, check result via return code
MANUAL INSTALLATION
Even easier than using the ./install script. Just unzip the main file
and then the xsibackup-dc.zip file inside of it, copy the xsibackup file
to the bin folder, then apply permissions.
# unzip XSIBackup-DC_*.zip
# unzip xsibackup-dc.zip
# cp xsibackup bin/
# chmod -R 0700 xsibackup* bin gui
# rm -rf *.zip
And run:
# ./xsibackup-gui
AUTOMATED DEPLOYMENT
We have created (c)XSIDirector software to allow to deploy (c)XSIBackup-DC
to many servers at the same time. It features not only installation and license
deployment, but running centralized commands on all servers, deploying
configuration files or a centraliced GUI.
Download from:
https://33hops.com/xsidirector-esxi-management-deployment.html
Man page:
https://33hops.com/xsidirector-man-page.html
TRIAL VERSION LIMITATIONS
Trial versions are limited to 100 GB backing up to local datastores once the
unlimited trial time is over.
All other actions are fully enabled without limits: --check, --restore,
--repair, --info, --prune, etc...
The ./bin/xsifs binary allows to mount any restore point in a (c)XSIBackup-DC
repository in a Linux host, it's free to use without any limitation.
You may use a trial version as a fully enabled server in any SSH
enabled host. It's only the client that is limited by the the trial
version license limits.
ABOUT TRANSFER SPEED.
(c)XSIBackup Datacenter has been tested on commodity hardware and
on many different chipsets. It is a low level piece of software
aimed at reaching the hardware theoretical limit.
If you want to achieve close to gigabit LAN speeds (80-90 MB/s),
in effective data throughput, you need hardware which is capable
of reaching that speed and sustain it for a long period of time.
We recommend that you always use Intel NICs. There may be other
brands that manufacture quality NICs, but Intel NICs are the only
ones from our experience that always offer maximum performance.
We'll put it the other way around. If you use Realtek NICs and
TP-Link switches, you can't expect to achieve more than 15-20 MB/s
of effective throughput, it doesn't have anything to do with (c)ESXi
being limited in speed or (c)XSIBackup not being fast enough, it's
your network hardware.
You can buy decent gigabit switches al bargain prices from
manufacturers like Microtik, Aruba, Ubiquiti... If you can afford
HP Pro-curve or Cisco great, but you don't really need to spend
that much to get something that works.
In regards to the above mentioned manufacturers (Realtek and TP-Link)
don't get us wrong, they manufacture awesome hardware for its cost. We
use those brands, but we use them to browse the Internet and read
e-mails, not to transfer terabyte virtual disks.
