Do SnapCenter VMware backups conflict with SnapCenter for SQL backups ?

Applies to

• SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware (SCV)
• NetApp Data Broker (NDB)
• SnapCenter Plug-in for Windows (SCW)
• SnapCenter Plug-in for SQL (SCSQL)
• SnapCenter Plug-in for Exchange (SCE)

Answer

When using SCSQL or SCE to run backups of the SQL Database residing on supported ONTAP storage, this provides application consistent backups.
However, when running backups with VM consistency from SCV or NDB on the data store of, or of that VM, the VM does not quiesce properly, with errors in the log:

An error occurred while quiescing the virtual machine. See the virtual machine's event log for details.
An error occurred while taking a snapshot. Failed to quiecse the virtual machine.
An error occurred while saving the snapshot. Failed to quiecse the virtual machine.

To be able to run data store or VM backups with VMs containing SCW without warnings, you need to deselect VM consistency in the backup policy.
The backups will then be only crash consistent and restoring the VM may require a file system check.

Additional Information

Note that the backups of the VM from SCV/NDB should not overlap with the backups of the Windows and Windows Application Plug-ins.

When using SCW without SCE, you can remove the ONTAP VSS Hardware Provider that SCW normally installs and activates, to prevent ONTAP Snapshot due to the VMware Tools triggering a VSS snapshot. However, even without the hardware provider, any VSS based VM backup will trigger VSS on database implementations.