Powershell script for snapshot and exporting(backup) Virtual Machines

June 1, 2008 18:30 by author

Powershell script for creating snapshots

The script creates a snapshot for each VM on the Hyper-V server.
Then it removes all snapshots older than 6 days (except the ones made on a Sunday).

CreateVmSnapshots.ps1 (1.01 kb)

Powershell script for exporting(backup) Virtual Machines

The script exports all the VM's to a given backup location.
It pauses each VM if it's running, exporting and turn the VM back on if it was running before.

CreateVmBackups.ps1 (1.75 kb)

Task Scheduling

Combine these two scripts with the Task Scheduler and you have a fully automated backup system!
To run a Powershell script in Task Scheduler enter Powershell as program and "& 'C:\Hyper-V\CreateVmSnapshots.ps1'" as argument.

PS: Run the scripts once to see that they work before adding them to the Task Scheduler, as no errors will be shown if they fail in the Task Scheduler.

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July 11. 2008 22:20

Awesome! thanks for posting these scripts. I have been looking for something to backup our Hyper-V images.

Fed

July 16. 2008 22:55

Can you discuss how a restore using your scripts would work? Is it a matter of copying the .VHD over the "broken" one?

Fed

August 13. 2008 09:07

I created a task scheduler task for your scripts and it looks like for some reason the System process is holding open handles to the .avhd files. The snapshot metadata is getting removed when it's older than 4 days but the .avhd files are stuck. I can't get rid of them because the system process is holding on. Any idea why this might be happening?

August 13. 2008 20:20

The .avhd files are not removed because the VM that the .avhd belongs to have't been turned off or in a saved state since the snapshot was removed. Try saving the state on that VM and it should start merging and removing the snapshot .avhd's.

Tore Lervik

August 28. 2008 14:48

When I execute the below command

$ListofVMs = get-wmiobject -namespace root\virtualization Msvm_ComputerSystem -filter "ElementName <> Name"

I get $ListofVMs -eq $null, but I have 5 VMs on the server.

And when I execute the command

$ListofVMs = get-wmiobject -namespace root\virtualization Msvm_ComputerSystem

it return only one element in the array which refers to the server on which the VMs are hosted.

Can you please tell me if I have to start any service to make the command work as expected.

Thanks

Shiva

September 1. 2008 16:21

I resolved the issue by opening "Power Shell" with Admin rights (open as Administrator), as in Win Server 2008, even when you are Admin on the machine, you are not really running as an Admin.

Please delete my entries if it may not be helpful to others.

Shiva

October 6. 2008 21:32

Nice scripts. I used a different PowerShell script I found out there to create a batch file for offline (non-snapshot) backups. It's different than yours in that you can specify which VMs to backup, and in what order to shutdown or power-on the virtual machines. Check it out at:
bunkerhollow.com/.../...kup-script-batch-file.aspx

Thanks for your scripts, I like being able to export all my VMs quickly and easily.

Matt

October 7. 2008 23:15

Hi Tore,
thanks for your great script!
But I have a problem. I'm loged in on my Server as local Administrator and opened the PowerShell-Windows with Run As Administrator. When I start the script, I get the error:

Exporting VM
1
Ecxeption calling "Move" with "2" argument(s): "Could not find a part of the path "C:\temp\TmpDir\TestVM'."
At C:\scripts\test\CreateVmBackups.ps1:53 char:23
+ [IO.Directory]::Move ( (((( "$dest\TmpDir\$VMName", "$dest\$VMName")
Done with TestVM

If I look in your script, I see no reason to manually create the TmpDir and VMName Folders, right?
Any Idea what could solve this error?
Regards, Pascal

Pascal

October 23. 2008 17:43

please delete my comment, it was a mistake...

pascal

October 24. 2008 11:33

Before run script install SCVMM

Get-pssnapin -registered | add-pssnapin
Get-VMMServer -ComputerName NameServer
Get-VM | where { $_.Name -eq "NameVirtualMashine" } | New-VMCheckpoint

where
NameServer - Host-PC
NameVirtualMashne - VM

Enjoy ))

ups

November 18. 2008 09:07

Hi, you saved me a lot of time on searching an self-writing a script!

I tweaked your procedure a little my usage, using our secondary SAS-Disks of the Server for export. This way "down-time" of each VM can be put down to a minumum, while afterwards the exported files are backed up to a slower NAS. - Without need for an expensive SAN because we only have one Hyper-V Host.

mathew

November 18. 2008 21:36

I'm having the same problem as Pascal said above. However, he edited his saying it was a mistake. What am I doing wrong? I'm getting the "Could not find part of the path" error as well. I've tried several machines and all do the same.

On another note, in case anybody wants to know, it's pretty easy to filter for certain machines in this script. For instance, I changed the end of line 7 from...

-filter "ElementName <> Name"

to...

-filter 'ElementName LIKE "%Production%"'

This filtered the script to only do my machines that have the word "Production" in the name (that's how I name my production versus testing VM's).

Robert

November 18. 2008 21:53

Nevermind, I figured it out now. I was probably doing the same as Pascal. I was trying to use the $dest directory as a mapped network drive. This is not allowed per the ExportVirtualSystem...it must be a local drive.

Robert

December 12. 2008 23:33

When trying to run the vmbackups script, if the path is not local, it fails. I wanted to backup to a nas device, but it won't let me. Any thoughts?

Karl

December 16. 2008 14:00

I'm also looking for a way to backup to a non-local path, i.e. a UNC path. Any ideas how I could best do this?

Many thanks!

Dave

December 16. 2008 15:10

Hi Dave,
I don't think the export function in hyper-v support a non-local path.

Tore Lervik

December 16. 2008 15:59

Tore, thank you for your response.

What I'm looking for is something fairly simple. It would be sufficient if I could shut down a VM (even if I have to name this manaully in the script), copy the VHD to a file share (I also don't mind adding the path to the file directly) and then restart the VM. I could simply duplicate this for each VM on the host only having to change the name of the VM each time.
I'm not much of a scripting person and have been searching the web for a solution.

Any pointers would be really appreciated.

Cheers,

Dave

December 17. 2008 20:34

Dave,
See in the backup script how I backup to one location and then move the finished backup to another folder.
That move command can be used between shares and other paths, so you should be able to modify the script to backup to a local path and then copy the files to a share.

Tore Lervik

December 18. 2008 04:02

Hi,

I run VM's on a W2008 core edition.
I would like to remotly run the scripts to backup my vm's ... is there any changes in my case (cannot making it work) ?

Thank you for helping,

hasdou

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January 7. 2009 02:28

About

Tore Lervik

My name is Tore Lervik and i'm from Oslo in Norway
I'm currently working on my Bachelor of Computer Science at Oslo University College.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

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Powershell script for snapshot and exporting(backup) Virtual Machines

Powershell script for creating snapshots

Powershell script for exporting(backup) Virtual Machines

Task Scheduling

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