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Backing up a VM with Hystax Acura Backup

Written by
Updated at February 17, 2025

You can create VM backups automatically and recover them in your cloud infrastructure using Hystax Acura Backup in Yandex Cloud.

A VM with Hystax Acura Backup manages backup and recovery. VM backups are saved to an Object Storage bucket. Recovery involves an auxiliary Hystax Cloud Agent VM. It creates a new VM with a certain recovery point objective (RPO) at a random point of time in the past. Backup recovery time objective (RTO) depends on the amount of source data.

To back up and recover a VM using Hystax Acura Backup:

  1. Get your cloud ready.
  2. Create a service account.
  3. Configure the network traffic permissions.
  4. Create a bucket.
  5. Create a VM with Hystax Acura Backup.
  6. Make the VM IP address static.
  7. Configure Hystax Acura Backup.
  8. Prepare and install an agent on the VM.
  9. Create a VM backup.
  10. Create a disaster recovery plan.
  11. Run the recovery process.

If you no longer need the resources you created, delete them.

Get your cloud ready

Sign up for Yandex Cloud and create a billing account:

  1. Go to the management console and log in to Yandex Cloud or create an account if you do not have one yet.
  2. On the Yandex Cloud Billing page, make sure you have a billing account linked and it has the ACTIVE or TRIAL_ACTIVE status. If you do not have a billing account, create one.

If you have an active billing account, you can go to the cloud page to create or select a folder for your infrastructure to operate in.

Learn more about clouds and folders.

Note

Note that both the Hystax Acura Backup infrastructure and all recovered VMs will be charged and counted against the quotas.

  • A Hystax Acura Backup VM uses 8 vCPUs, 16 GB of RAM, and a 200-GB disk.
  • The auxiliary Hystax Cloud Agent VMs use 2 vCPUs, 4 GB of RAM, and a 10-GB disk. A single Hystax Cloud Agent VM can serve up to six replicated disks at a time. If there are more than six disks, additional Hystax Cloud Agent VMs will be created automatically.

For detailed system requirements, see the Hystax deployment reference.

The cost of resources for Hystax Acura Backup includes:

Create a service account and access keys

Hystax Acura Backup will run under a service account.

  1. Create a service account named hystax-acura-account with the editor and marketplace.meteringAgent roles. Save the service account ID. You will need it later.
  2. Create an authorized key for the service account. You need an authorized key to perform operations in Yandex Cloud under a service account. Save the ID and private key. You will need these later.
  3. Create a static access key. A static key is required to access a bucket as a service account. Save the ID and secret key. You will need them later.

Configure the network traffic permissions

Configure the network traffic permissions in the default security group.

Add the following rules to it:

Traffic
direction		 Description Port range Protocol Destination name /
Source		 CIDR blocks
Inbound http 80 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound https 443 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound https 4443 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound vmware 902 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound vmware 902 UDP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound iSCSI 3260 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound udp 12201 UDP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Inbound tcp 15000 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound http 80 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound https 443 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound vmware 902 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound vmware 902 UDP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound iSCSI 3260 TCP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0
Outbound udp 12201 UDP CIDR 0.0.0.0/0

Save the security group ID. You will need it later.

Note

Auxiliary Hystax Cloud Agent VMs are created automatically in the default security group. If you created a dedicated group for the Hystax Acura Backup VM, move the auxiliary Hystax Cloud Agent VMs to this group after their creation.

Create a bucket

  1. In the management console, select the folder where you want to create a bucket.
  2. Select Object Storage.
  3. Click Create bucket.
  4. On the bucket creation page:

    1. Enter a name for the bucket according to the naming requirements.

    2. Limit the maximum bucket size, if required.

      If the value is 0, the maximum size is not limited and is similar to the enabled No limit option.

    3. Select the access type:

      • Object read access: Restricted
      • Object listing access: Restricted
      • Read access to settings: Restricted

    4. Select the storage class: Standard.

    5. Click Create bucket to complete the operation.

  5. Save the bucket name. You will need it later.

Use the create REST API method for the Bucket resource or the BucketService/Create gRPC API call.

Create a VM with Hystax Acura Backup

To create a VM with a recommended configuration and a boot disk from the Hystax Acura Backup image:

  1. In the management console, select the folder where you want to create your VM.

  2. From the list of services, select Compute Cloud.

  3. In the left-hand panel, select Virtual machines.

  4. Click Create virtual machine.

  5. Under Boot disk image:

  6. Under Location, select an availability zone where your VM will reside.

    Save the availability zone ID. You will need it later.

  7. Under Disks and file storages, enter 200 GB as the boot disk size.

  8. Under Computing resources, select the 8 vCPU and 16 GB configuration.

  9. Under Network settings:

    • In the Subnet field, enter the ID of a subnet in the new VM’s availability zone. Alternatively, select a cloud network from the list.

      • Each network must have at least one subnet. If there is no subnet, create one by selecting Create subnet.

      • If you do not have a network, click Create network to create one:

        • In the window that opens, enter the network name and select the folder to host the network.
        • Optionally, enable the Create subnets setting to automatically create subnets in all availability zones.
        • Click Create network.

    • If a list of Security groups is available, select the one whose network traffic permissions you previously configured. If this list is not there, all inbound and outbound traffic will be enabled for the VM.

  10. Under Access, select SSH key and specify the VM access credentials:

    • In the Login field, enter a username, e.g., yc-user.

    • In the SSH key field, select the SSH key saved in your organization user profile.

      If there are no saved SSH keys in your profile, or you want to add a new key:

      • Click Add key.
      • Enter a name for the SSH key.
      • Upload or paste the contents of the public key file. You need to create a key pair for the SSH connection to a VM yourself.
      • Click Add.

      The SSH key will be added to your organization user profile.

      If users cannot add SSH keys to their profiles in the organization, the added public SSH key will only be saved to the user profile of the VM being created.

  11. Under General information, specify the VM name: hystax-acura-vm.

  12. Under Additional, select the hystax-acura-account service account.

  13. Click Create VM.

If you do not have the Yandex Cloud CLI yet, install and initialize it.

The folder specified in the CLI profile is used by default. You can specify a different folder through the --folder-name or --folder-id parameter.

Run this command:

yc compute instance create \
  --name hystax-acura-vm \
  --zone <availability_zone> \
  --cores 8 \
  --memory 16 \
  --network-interface subnet-id=<subnet_ID>,nat-ip-version=ipv4,security-group-ids=<security_group_ID> \
  --create-boot-disk name=hystax-acura-disk,size=200,image-id=<Hystax_Acura_Backup_image_ID> \
  --service-account-id <service_account_ID> \
  --ssh-key <public_SSH_key_file_path>

Where:

  • --name: VM name, e.g., hystax-acura-vm.
  • --zone: Availability zone, e.g., ru-central1-a. Save the availability zone ID, as you will need it later.
  • --cores: Number of vCPUs the VM has.
  • --memory: VM RAM size.
  • --network-interface: VM network interface description:
    • subnet-id: ID of the subnet to connect your VM to. You can get the list of subnets using the yc vpc subnet list CLI command. Save the subnet ID. You will need it later.
    • nat-ip-version=ipv4: Connect a public IP address.
    • security-group-ids: Security group. Use this parameter in case you previously configured a group. You can get the list of groups using the yc vpc security-group list CLI command. If you skip this parameter, the system will assign the default security group to the VM.
  • --create-boot-disk: Create a new disk for the VM:
    • name: Disk name, e.g., hystax-acura-disk.
    • size: Disk size.
    • image-id: Disk image ID. Use image_id from the product description in Cloud Marketplace.
  • --service-account-id: ID of the previously created service account. You can get the list of accounts using the yc iam service-account list command.
  • --ssh-key: Path to the public SSH key file. The default username for SSH access is yc-user.

Use the create REST API method for the Instance resource or the InstanceService/Create gRPC API call.

Convert the VM IP address to static

VMs get a public dynamic address when created. Since a VM with Hystax Acura Backup may reboot, you need to make its IP address static:

  1. In the management console, open the page for the folder you are using.
  2. Select Virtual Private Cloud.
  3. Go to the IP addresses tab.
  4. Click in the row with the address of your Hystax Acura Backup VM.
  5. In the menu that opens, select Make static.
  6. In the window that opens, click Change.
  7. Save the IP address, as you will need it later.

If you do not have the Yandex Cloud CLI yet, install and initialize it.

The folder specified in the CLI profile is used by default. You can specify a different folder through the --folder-name or --folder-id parameter.

  1. See the description of the CLI commands for updating the address attribute:

    yc vpc address update --help

  2. Get a list of available addresses:

    yc vpc address list

    Result:

    +----------------------+------+-----------------+----------+------+
|          ID          | NAME |     ADDRESS     | RESERVED | USED |
+----------------------+------+-----------------+----------+------+
| e2l46k8conff******** |      | 84.201.155.117  | false    | true |
+----------------------+------+-----------------+----------+------+

    The false value of the RESERVED parameter means the IP address with the e2l46k8conff******** ID is dynamic.

  3. Convert this address to static by using the --reserved=true key and IP address ID:

    yc vpc address update --reserved=true <IP_address_ID>

    Result:

    id: e2l46k8conff********
folder_id: b1g7gvsi89m3********
created_at: "2023-05-23T09:36:46Z"
external_ipv4_address:
  address: 84.201.155.117
  zone_id: ru-central1-b
  requirements: {}
reserved: true
used: true

    Now that reserved is true, the IP address is static.

  4. Save the IP address, as you will need it later.

Use the update REST API method for the Address resource or the AddressService/Update gRPC API call.

Configure Hystax Acura Backup

  1. In the management console, open the page of the Hystax Acura Backup VM and find its public IP address.

  2. Enter the VM public IP address in your browser. This will open the initial setup screen.

    Note

    Booting the Hystax Acura Backup VM for the first time will trigger an installation process which may take over 20 minutes.

    By default, a Hystax Acura VM has a self-signed certificate.

  3. On the page that opens, fill out the following fields:

    • Organization: Name of your organization.
    • Admin user login: Administrator username.
    • Password: Administrator password.
    • Confirm password: Re-enter the administrator password.

  4. Click Next.

  5. Specify the Yandex Cloud connection settings:

  6. Click Next.

Hystax Acura Backup will automatically check whether it can access your cloud. If the configuration is correct, you can log in to the control panel using the previously set username and password.

Prepare and install an agent on your VMs

To install an agent on the VMs you need to back up:

  1. Open the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. Click the Hystax logo.

  2. On the left-hand panel, click Download agents.

  3. Select the agent type for the OS you need:

    • VMware
    • Windows
    • Linux

  4. Click Next.

  5. Download and install an agent on the VMs you need to back up:

    1. From the drop-down list, select an instance group to set up agents for, such as Default.

    2. Select New VMware vSphere and fill out the fields:

      • Platform Name.
      • Endpoint: Public IP address of the ESXi host where the replication agent will be deployed.
      • Login: User login (the user must have the administrator permissions).
      • Password.

      Click Next.

    3. Click Download Agent and wait until the download is complete.

    4. Deploy the downloaded OVA agent file in your cluster on the VMs you need to back up.

    5. Start the VMs with the agent.

    1. From the drop-down list, select a group of VMs to set up agents for, such as Default.
    2. Click Next.
    3. Click Download Agent and wait until the download is complete.
    4. Unpack the archive and install the agent from the hwragent.msi file on the VMs you need to back up.
    1. From the drop-down list, select a group of VMs to set up agents for, e.g., Default.
    2. Select the Linux distribution type:
      • CentOS/RHEL (.rpm package): CentOS or Red Hat-based.
      • Debian/Ubuntu (.deb package).
    3. Select the driver installation method:
      • Pre-built: Install a driver binary.
      • DKMS: Compile as you install.
    4. Click Next.
    5. You will get commands for installing the agent on the VM. Run these commands following the instructions for your distribution kit and installation method.

A few minutes after the agent is installed, the VMs will appear in the target group of the Hystax Acura Backup control panel.

Create a VM backup

After the agent is installed on the VMs under protection, they will appear in the list as Unprotected.

To enable VM protection:

  1. Open the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. Click the Hystax logo.
  2. Under Machines Groups, deploy an instance group, e.g., Default.
  3. In the VM list on the right, click .
  4. In the** Edit replication settings** menu, set up a replication schedule for the instance group by hour, day, or week, or select continuous protection. Under Volume type, specify the drive type for VM recovery: network-hdd, network-ssd, or network-ssd-nonreplicated.
  5. In the Edit retention settings menu, set the backup retention period. For more information, see the Hystax tutorials.
  6. Select Start Protection.

This will start VM replication. A VM replica will include all the data of the original VM. Therefore, replication can take a while (depending on the original VM disk size). The replication status will be displayed in the Status column under Machines Groups. After the replication is complete, the VMs will change their status to Protected.

Create a disaster recovery plan

The DR plan includes a VM description and the network settings. The plan defines which VMs will be recovered to your cloud and specifies the VM configuration, subnet, and IP address. You can have a plan generated automatically or create one manually:

  1. Open the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. Click the Hystax logo.

  2. Check the VMs you need in the list, click Bulk actions, and select Generate DR plan. You can also generate a plan for an instance group by clicking in the group title.

  3. In the Name field, enter Plan-1.

  4. In the Subnets section on the right, set the parameters of the subnet where the the recovered VMs will start:

    • In the Subnet ID field, enter the subnet ID.
    • In the CIDR field, specify the subnet CIDR.

  5. Expand the VM description and edit the Flavor name field containing the parameters of the VM being restored as follows: <platform>-<cpu>-<ram>-<core_fraction>, e.g., 3-8-16-100.

    Where:

    • platform: VM platform, such as 1, 2, or 3.
    • cpu: Number of vCPUs.
    • ram: Amount of RAM.
    • core_fraction: vCPU performance level.

  6. In the Port ip field, enter a new IP address for the VM from the selected subnet.

  7. Click Save.

  1. Open the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. Click the Hystax logo.

  2. Click Add DR Plan.

  3. In the Name field, enter Plan-1.

  4. Under Devices & Ranks, click . In the menu that opens, click Add machine. Select a VM group, e.g., Default. Select the VM to add to the DR plan. Repeat the steps for all VMs you need recovered.

  5. In the right-hand Subnets section, set the properties of the subnet where the recovered VMs will start:

    • In the Subnet ID field, enter the subnet ID.
    • In the CIDR field, specify the subnet CIDR.

  6. Expand the VM description and edit the Flavor name field containing the parameters of the VM being restored as follows: <platform>-<cpu>-<ram>-<core_fraction>, e.g., 3-8-16-100.

    Where:

    • platform: VM platform, such as 1, 2, or 3.
    • cpu: Number of vCPUs.
    • ram: Amount of RAM.
    • core_fraction: vCPU performance level.

  7. In the Port ip field, enter a new IP address for the VM from the selected subnet.

  8. Click Save.

Warning

Make sure you specified a valid IP address for each VM.

Run the recovery process

To recover a VM from a backup, Hystax Acura Backup will create a new VM with a Hystax Acura Cloud Agent in your cloud. This VM will perform all operations in the cloud.

To recover a VM from a backup:

  1. Open the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. Click the Hystax logo.

  2. Under DR plans, select the plan you created previously. Expand and edit the plan, if required.

  3. Click Run Recover.

  4. In the Cloud Site Name field, enter a name, such as Cloud-Site-from-Plan-1.

  5. Make sure all the required resources are there in the Final DR plan list and click Run Recover.

    You will see the Cloud Sites section in the Hystax Acura Backup control panel. The VM recovery may take a while. The recovery status will be displayed in the Status column under Machines. Wait until it changes to Running.

  6. Open the management console and make sure this restored all required resources.

How to delete the resources you created

To stop paying for the resources you created:

  1. Delete the Hystax Acura Backup VM.
  2. Delete the auxiliary Hystax Cloud Agent VMs.
  3. Delete the recovered VMs.
  4. Delete the bucket.
  5. Delete the service account for Hystax Acura Backup.
  6. Delete the public static IP address you reserved.
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