Export old backups

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DeBuurman

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Jan 16, 2024
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I need to keep yearly backups for 7 years. I don't want to keep them on my PBS : is there a way to export the backup so I can store it offline on some storage ?
 
There was a recent discussion on the German forum ( use something like deepl to Translation):
T

Thread 'Sicherung von Sicherungen'

gibt es womöglich eine Möglichkeit raw-Sicherungen in einen PBS zu ziehen/schieben?

Ich sichere häufig platt auf schnellen, internen Medien um Netzwerkengpässe zu umgehen und im Zweifel schnell restoren zu können. Die jeweils letzte Sicherung möchte ich zusätzlich gerne gemütlich und ohne Zeitdruck auf einem PBS ablegen können (pull wäre am schönsten...).

P.S.: Ich will die raw-Sicherung einfach nicht koplett an den Nagel hängen, sondern als Zwischenstufe behalten.

Basically you can export the discs and config of a vm from a snapshot with the backup-client, afterwards you create a vma file with the vma tool. The vma file can then be reatored with qmrestore for vms or pct restore for containers:

https://pve.proxmox.com/pve-docs/qmrestore.1.html
https://pve.proxmox.com/pve-docs/pct.1.html
https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/VMA
https://pbs.proxmox.com/docs/backup-client.html
 
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DeBuurman said:
I think I found a solution : https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/smb-azure-storage-as-backup-pool.60205/
Click to expand...
Network storage (especially over a WAN connection like to a cloud storage) isn't a good option for a PBS datastore:
D

[TUTORIAL] Thread 'Datastore Performance Tester for PBS'

This is a performance tester for datastores of your PBS.

-> Intended before you setup a production PBS. <-

Bash: 
apt-get update
apt-get install git
git clone https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test.git
cd pbs-storage-perf-test
# replace datastore-dir with your own directory
./create_random_chunks.py /datastore-dir
rm -rf /datastore-dir/dummy-chunks

- Read how/what/and why we test in this way: https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test/blob/main/README.md
- Our results: https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test/blob/main/results.md
- Our conclusion...
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For VMA backups it might work, but for an export from PBS you will still need to do the backup-client->vma dance.

Alternatively you could create additional backup jobs to the smb share. This would use the regular vzdump/vma backups instead of pbs. I do this myself in my homelab. You will loose the dirty bitmap (needed to record which data on the vm was already backed up to PBS) of the vm though so the next backup to PBS will take longer. For large amounts of data this might not be what you want.

Alternatively you could use the native features of PBS for offsite backup:
- Another PBS on an offsite location (e.G. family member/friends place for homelab, another office of your company, cloud vserver or managed PBS instance (companys like tuxis.nl and Inett provide such services for around 20€ /TB or 0,02 € per GB, there are more providers!). Then create a pull-sync on the offsite PBS to pull the backups from your local PBS
- Use tape backups or a removable datastores (aka USB discs) to store copies of the datastore outside of your place
- Use the new S3 feature to replicate copies to a cloud storage. Please note, that S3 support is still "technology preview" and has some quirks, so don't use it as sole long term storage

All of the native features will still need a PBS for restore though.
 
Johannes S said:
Network storage (especially over a WAN connection like to a cloud storage) isn't a good option for a PBS datastore:
D

[TUTORIAL] Thread 'Datastore Performance Tester for PBS'

This is a performance tester for datastores of your PBS.

-> Intended before you setup a production PBS. <-

Bash: 
apt-get update
apt-get install git
git clone https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test.git
cd pbs-storage-perf-test
# replace datastore-dir with your own directory
./create_random_chunks.py /datastore-dir
rm -rf /datastore-dir/dummy-chunks

- Read how/what/and why we test in this way: https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test/blob/main/README.md
- Our results: https://github.com/egandro/pbs-storage-perf-test/blob/main/results.md
- Our conclusion...
  • Like

For VMA backups it might work, but for an export from PBS you will still need to do the backup-client->vma dance.

Alternatively you could create additional backup jobs to the smb share. This would use the regular vzdump/vma backups instead of pbs. I do this myself in my homelab. You will loose the dirty bitmap (needed to record which data on the vm was already backed up to PBS) of the vm though so the next backup to PBS will take longer. For large amounts of data this might not be what you want.

Alternatively you could use the native features of PBS for offsite backup:
- Another PBS on an offsite location (e.G. family member/friends place for homelab, another office of your company, cloud vserver or managed PBS instance (companys like tuxis.nl and Inett provide such services for around 20€ /TB or 0,02 € per GB, there are more providers!). Then create a pull-sync on the offsite PBS to pull the backups from your local PBS
- Use tape backups or a removable datastores (aka USB discs) to store copies of the datastore outside of your place
- Use the new S3 feature to replicate copies to a cloud storage. Please note, that S3 support is still "technology preview" and has some quirks, so don't use it as sole long term storage

All of the native features will still need a PBS for restore though.
Click to expand...
Thanks Johannes for your reply. As these backups only need to be kept for 7 years, it will be a once-a-year thing. But I expect there will be more servers that need to be kept for x-years so a managed PBS would make sense. Besides that, a backup needs to restored if required, so the easier it can be done the better. I will check what our friends from Tuxis offer.
 
1st) I would make a "dummy" restore on a other Server.
2nd) and after that, i can use the PVE integrated vzdump backup to store a 100% copy of your VM on a external device.
 
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