Hyper-V VM backup confusion - VSS Hardware Provider?

Hello All,

I am having issues performing a restore of a VM Guest back into a failover Hyper-V Cluster.

Current Setup:
DPM 2012 R2
Windows Server 2012 R2 (Physical Server)
DPM is connected to a Tape Library and Dedicated LUN on a SAN for backups
3 Hyper-V Hosts configured with Failover Clustering

I installed the DPM agent on all 3 hosts, performed a backup of a VM Guest which displays "Online\Servername". I deleted the server from the failover cluster then removed from Hyper-V Manager. I then proceeded to perform a restore of the server but it does not give me an option to restore to original location so it can be re-integrated into the failover cluster.

What am I doing wrong here? I am not an expert in Hyper-V so when I looked at the prerequisites for Hyper-V backups of VMs on CSV it stated a VSS Hardware Provider needs to be installed. I didn't setup the VMHosts so I am not sure if or what it is.

I did run vssadmin list providers on one of the hosts so I am assuming I have one?

C:\Windows\system32>vssadmin list providers
vssadmin 1.1 - Volume Shadow Copy Service administrative command-line tool
(C) Copyright 2001-2013 Microsoft Corp.

Provider name: 'Microsoft CSV Shadow Copy Helper Provider'
   Provider type: Software
   Provider Id: {26d02d81-6aac-4275-8504-b9c6edc5261d}
   Version: 1.0.0.1

Provider name: 'Microsoft CSV Shadow Copy Provider'
   Provider type: Software
   Provider Id: {400a2ff4-5eb1-44b0-8a05-1fcac0bcf9ff}
   Version: 1.0.0.1

Provider name: 'VSS Null Provider'
   Provider type: Software
   Provider Id: {8202aeda-45bd-48c4-b38b-ea1b7017aec3}
   Version: 4.2.1338.0

Provider name: 'Microsoft File Share Shadow Copy provider'
   Provider type: Fileshare
   Provider Id: {89300202-3cec-4981-9171-19f59559e0f2}
   Version: 1.0.0.1

Provider name: 'Microsoft Software Shadow Copy provider 1.0'
   Provider type: System
   Provider Id: {b5946137-7b9f-4925-af80-51abd60b20d5}
   Version: 1.0.0.7

Provider name: 'VSS Null Provider'
   Provider type: Fileshare
   Provider Id: {f4a69dd4-f712-40e3-a6b3-faeff03cb2b8}
   Version: 4.2.1338.0

Any guidance would greatly be appreciated. Thank you!

September 3rd, 2015 1:41pm

The VSS Hardware Provider is not required.  The VSS Null Provider now handles the snapshot within the vm.

It sounds as though you don't have the option to restore to the original location because you removed the cluster resource for the vm.  You'll need to restore to an alternate location and re-add the vm to the cluster.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/library/hh757981.aspx

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September 3rd, 2015 2:01pm

Well that is good news and bad news. I performed a restore on a previous date so I would assume that the option to recover to original location would be present.

I have looked over that article you linked but I just don't see option 1 when performing a recovery on any of my 3 VM Guests.

On the "Select Recovery Type" only "Copy to a network folder" is displayed. Nothing else.

September 3rd, 2015 2:32pm

Were all three of your vm's removed from the cluster?  You can use the Get-ClusterGroup cmdlet to check if the resource groups for the vm's still exist on the cluster.

Get-Clustergroup -Cluster %your_cluster_name% | ft name

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September 3rd, 2015 2:59pm

Yes they still exist on the cluster except for the one I was testing a restore on. I did check the recovery option for one of the VMs still on the cluster and it didn't give me the option to restore to original location.
September 3rd, 2015 4:52pm

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