Exchange 2003 VSS Backup Solution
For IBM Storage DS8000/DS6000
And Symantec Backup Exec 11d
Page 69 David West, David Hartman
©Copyright IBM Corp. 2007

Best Practices for Using Offhost Backup

Keep source volumes and snapped volumes from sharing the same
physical disks. If this is not maintained, then any attempt to split the
snapshot volume from the original volume fails.
If the Central Admin Server Option (CASO) is installed, for jobs that use
offhost backup, you must manually select the destination device that
will run the job rather than allowing the job to be delegated by the
central administration server. Otherwise, the job could be delegated to
a media server that does not have offhost capability.
Restoring from an Exchange VSS Backup
This procedure details how to select restore job properties for Exchange, and
provides definitions for restore options specific to Exchange. For details on
how to create a restore job, and for definitions of all other restore properties,
see “Restoring data” on page 483 of the Backup Exec Administrators Guide.
Use either the Exchange System Manager utility to manually dismount any
databases that are being restored, or check Dismount database before
restore when creating the restore job.
To restore Exchange data:
1. On the navigation bar, click the arrow next to Restore.
2. Click New Restore Job.
3. On the Properties pane, under Source, click Selections.
4. In the restore selections list, select the backup sets that you want to
restore. Select the Storage Group you want to restore. For information
about restoring specific data, see “About restoring Exchange data” on
page 1256 of the Backup Exec Administrators Guide.
5. On the Properties pane, under Settings, click Microsoft Exchange.
Select the appropriate options for your environment and restore
objectives. Note that Backup Exec will always do a “no loss restore”
with VSS. The existing log files are not deleted, which results in
Exchange replaying both existing and restored transaction logs.
NOTE: If the existing log files are manually deleted before starting the
restore job, then it becomes a “point in time” restore, which restores to
the state databases and logs were in at time of VSS backup.