Backup Windows Server 2003

Author: Kristofer Gäfvert
First Published: January 17, 2003
Last Updated: June 28, 2003
Last Reviewed: December 14, 2003
PDF: N/A
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Table of Contents
Introduction
What is backup?
Types of backups
Volume Shadow Copy Technology
Permissions
System state data
Restore system state data
Backup data
Where are the log files?
Restore data
Use the Restore and Manage Media tab
Advanced options
Recovery Console
Install Recovery Console
Remove Recovery Console
Automated System Recovery
Create an ASR set
Recover using ASR

Introduction

”Oh no, the hard disk crashed, all data is gone, what do I do now?” Recognize this? I hope not. Every administrator should have backed up all the data. And to do that we need some kind of software (ok, we can do it manually by using ctrl+c and ctrl+v, but do you want to do that?). The backup utility in Windows Server 2003 is such software. And it’s better then ever now, with things like Open File Backup (files can be accessed by users the same time it’s backed up). The storage medium can be a logical drive, such as your hard disk, a removable drive, or a library with disks or tapes controlled by a robot. Read on and find out what’s new, how you perform backups and how it works.

What is backup?

Before we start with the actually backup we must know what we are doing. This section will give you all the information you need to understand how backup works.

Types of backups

Normal backup
The normal backup is…normal (surprised?). So, what does this mean? It simply means that it copies all the files you have marked to be backed up, and marks the files as having been backed up. You also only need the most recent copy of the backup file (other types of backups requires several files, see below) to restore. This type is usually what you use the first time you backup files.
Incremental backup
The incremental backup backs up only those files that have been created or changed since last incremental or normal backup. It also marks the files as having been backed up. A combination of Normal backups and Incremental backups is common, and also a very good combination. It also requires the least amount if storage space and is fast for backing up the data. The disadvantage of this is that it’s time-consuming to recover files, simply because you need the last normal backup set and all incremental backup sets, which can be stored on several backup drives or tapes.
Differential backup
The differential backup is similar to the incremental backup and only copies files that have been created or changed since the last normal or incremental backup. No, it wasn’t a typo, it doesn’t check if a differential backup has been run. This is because differential backups does not mark files as having been backed up. A combination of differential backups and normal backups is more time-consuming concerning the backup part then the incremental + normal backups are. But on the other hand it is faster to restore data because all you need is the last normal backup and the last differential backup.
Copy backup
A copy backup copies all the files you have selected, but does not mark the files as having been backed up. This backup type is useful when you must backup single files between normal and incremental backups because it does not affect these operations.
Daily backup
The daily backup copies all the files that you have selected that have been modified on the day, without marking the files as having been backed up.

Volume Shadow Copy Technology

This is a new technology in Windows Server 2003 that did not exist in Windows 2000 Server. This technology is used to create a copy of the original volume at the time a backup is initiated. Data is then backed up from the shadow copy instead of the original volume. By doing this, all activity such as file changes, will not affect the backup, because it is using the shadow copy instead, which is not changed. So with this new feature users can access files during a backup, files are not skipped because they were in use, files open appears to be closed.

You should use Volume Shadow Copy, but you can disable it. The only time when you want to disable it is when you don’t have enough free disk space. As you can imagine you need as much extra disk space as the file you will backup uses. This consumption of disk space is however temporarily and will be free when the backup is completed.

If sufficient temporary disk space is not available Windows Server 2003 cannot complete shadow copy and the backup will skip open files.

To use this feature you must use NTFS as file system.

Volume Shadow Copy does not mean that you from now on can backup when the server usage is high. You should always backup when it’s low, for example at nights and weekends.

[Volume Shadow Copy can be used for several other things. In this text I’m covering the backup part of Volume Shadow Copy.]

Permissions

Not everyone can backup files and folders and you must have certain permission to do this. To be able to backup any file and folder on a local computer you must be an administrator or a backup operator in a local group on that computer. Likewise, to be able to backup any computer in a domain you must be administrator or backup operator on the domain or a domain with which they have a two-way trust relationship.

You can however always backup files and folders for which you have ownership of or one or more of the following permissions for the file and/or folder: Read, Read and execute, Modify, Full Control.

You can also be limited in the backup because of disk-quota restrictions that may restrict your access to the hard disk. To check this, right click the disk you want to save the data to and click Properties. Then click the Quota tab.

Good practice is to limit access to a backup file so only administrators and the owner (the one who created the backup file) is able to restore files and folders. This is available as an option during the backup wizard.

System state data

You can choose to do a System State backup, and this is very important if you want to be able to get a functional system in the event of a crash. This table shows which components that are backed up on a System State backup.

Component	Included in System State Backup
Boot files and system files	Yes
Registry	Yes
COM+	Yes
System files under Windows File Protection	Yes
Active Directory, directory service	If it’s a domain
SYSVOL directory	If it’s a domain controller
IIS Metadirectory	If it’s installed
Certificate Services database	If it’s a Certificate Services server
Cluster Service information	If it’s within a cluster

You don’t have to know which of these components to backup. The Backup Utility included in Windows Server 2003 will choose this when you perform a System State backup. Likewise you cannot choose which components to restore; all the System State data will be restored. This is due to dependencies among the components. You can however restore the System State data to an alternative location. This does not mean that you can restore it to another computer and think it will work as the one you backed up. Not all data is restored when you restore to an alternative location. Only the components System boot files, registry files, SYSVOL directory files and Cluster database information files will be restored.

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