transfer DPM 2022 to new server

Question

Hello everyone,

sorry not in our suitable category.

there is a task to transfer the DPM service to a new server, it is possible to do this correctly while maintaining all settings (protection groups, control points and everything else) the pool remains the original (ISCSI connection)

I will be grateful for the instruction, thanks

I want to do everything right

essentially the same server will be used, the OS will be reinstalled.

Answer 1

Hello @Alex_Nick Thank you for contacting us on Microsoft Q&A platform. Happy to help!

From the information you provided, I understand that you are looking for guidance on transferring a DPM server to a new server.

Here's the full steps:

This is the normal rebuild process I usually suggest (with no online backups). For online make sure customer knows the passphrase and backup the KEK file to a safe location:

Backup the DPM DB.

Take note of the FQDN from DPM Server.

Take note of DPM Version and Roll Update.

Take note of SQL Server name, Instance name, SQL version and SQL Service Pack number used for hosting the DPM Database.

If using static IP addresses take note of that information.

If performing Azure online backups, be sure you know what backup vault the DPM server is registered to and you know the Pass Phrase.

If using library sharing: Stop library sharing for the DPM server being re-installed.

If using tape encryption: Backup the encryption certificate and private key.

From Control Panel: Uninstall DPM and select retain the data. By this way the DPM Storage will be not touched and data will not be lost.

Reboot the Server.

Install DPM 201X RTM and leave this to create a new database.

Install same roll update you were before and restore the database from the backup your performed.

Once this is done you can open an elevated CMD and type: DPMSync -Sync Open DPM to make sure all is OK, such as Protection Groups and all the configuration you had before is in place.Run a consistency check on all the data sources.

If you plan to reinstall the Operating System, after finish this process (OS Reinstallation and join this to the domain with same FQDN), install same SQL and Service Pack Version used for hosting the DPM Database, if this was locally, and follow the suggestions previously.

However from our experience when online backups is part of the equation please have this in consideration:

If customer rebuild the DPM with a different name and register this on same Recovery Services Vault, this DPM will only obviously see the online backups of himself.

If customer wants to see the online backups from previous DPM Server, it will need to use a fresh DPM with a different name but same DPM Version and register on same Recovery Services Vault. Then using the Add External DPM Server option, it should see both DPM Servers and respective online backups.

If you use same FQDN, in theory, after the database is restored and DPMSync -Sync got completed and this is registered on the same Recovery Services Vault, you should be able to see the data from online from Restore Tab.

so, all have to be at same version level as before, then restore dpm db, dpmsyunc -sync and ready to go, if storage is OK then no data will be lost.

Hope this helps. Please write back to us if you have any questions!

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Answer 2

It seems that your current DPM server is a physical machine. If that is the case, probably the most efficient and quick way to transfer the DPM service to a new server and maintain all settings is to convert it into a virtual machine running on top of the Hyper-V role. That will hugely increase the portability of your backup server, making it possible to migrate the instance to different hardware easily whenever needed. You can use Microsoft Disk2VHD https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/disk2vhd or a free V2V Converter https://www.starwindsoftware.com/starwind-v2v-converter for that purpose.

Answer 3

Alex_Nick - You can follow below mentioned steps to move your DPM 2022 Server.

• Make note of DPM UR version installed on DPM 2022 Server.
• Make sure there is no backups running on DPM server.
• Disable the DPM services
• Open SSMS, take a manual backup of DPM database and keep it on another location(maybe on another machine)
• If using online backups as well then make sure you have the passphrase saved which is used to register the server on Azure Vault
• Disconnect the Storage Pool (volumes used for backups) from the server.
• Proceed with clean install of windows server 2022.
• Reinstall DPM 2022 and then upgrade it to the UR version which was installed on DPM 2022 previously.
• Attached the storage pool (volumes used for backups) with the server.
• Open SSMS, restore the DPM database backup which you have saved on another location.
• Open DPM PowerShell and run DPMsync -sync.
• All the data sources will be inconsistent and you need to run consistency check for them.
• All the other information like protection group, schedules, and other things will be intact.

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