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Table Of Contents
Image-Based Backup and Restore
of a vCenter Server Environment
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You can use vSphere APIs with a third-party product to back up and restore a virtual machine that
contains vCenter Server.
You can perform a full image backup of a virtual machine that contains vCenter Server. The virtual
machine must use a fully qualified domain name (FQDN) with correct DNS resolution, or the
hostname must be configured to be an IP address.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n Considerations and Limitations for Image-Based Backup and Restore
n Restore a vCenter Server Image-based Environment
Considerations and Limitations for Image-Based Backup and
Restore
When you restore a vCenter Server environment, take into account these considerations and
limitations.
Note Restoring a vCenter Server instance with DHCP network configuration results in changing
its IP address. The changed IP address prevents some vCenter Server services from starting
properly. To start all vCenter Server services successfully, after the restore, you must reconfigure
the IP address of the restored vCenter Server instance to the IP address that the instance was set
to when you performed the backup.
Synchronizing Clocks with NTP Time Synchronization Prior to Backup
Before creating a backup of your vCenter Server deployment, verify that all components on
the vSphere network have their clocks synchronized using NTP time synchronization. See
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.
Configuration
After a restore, the following configurations revert to the state when the backup was taken.
n Virtual machine resource settings
n Resource pool hierarchy and setting
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