If you see the above error when your “Veeam Agent Backup” jobs try to run, then you need to make a change to your Veeam database (on the Veeam server).

This is perfectly mentioned in this KB4421 – but if you are using Microsoft SQL (embedded with Veeam) and have no SQL management studio installed – here is a quick guide on how to fix the above problem – just using OSQL.exe (included with SQL embedded)

Locate the OSQL.EXE executable – I found it here: “C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\110\Tools\Binn”

Using command prompt (cmd.exe) run the executable with:

osql.exe -E -S <SERVERNAME>\<DATABASE>

Replace SERVERNAME and the database name (ex. “osql.exe -E -SVEEAMBACKUP\VEEAMSQL2012”). When OSQL prompt is ready for input type the following:

use VeeamBackup;
go
update dbo.[Backup.Model.EpHosts] set os_version='0.0' where os_version=''
go
exit

That should be it – try to run your “Veeam Agent Backups” again!

You are not very likely to bump into Windows 2003 physical servers anymore – but nevertheless that just happened to me a week ago. The task was clear – this server needs to be virtualized into a vSphere 7 environment, running vSAN.
The problem with this task is that to convert (P2V) a 2003 server you need to install vCenter Converter 6.2 on it, since the latest release 6.3 simply doesn’t work on 2003 servers (It won’t install).
Next problem is that vCenter Converter 6.2 doesn’t work with vSAN 7 – only “traditional storage” can be used as target – but in this case there were no other storage than vSAN that could be used as target.
What to do? – read on…

Continue reading

update installation failed, vCenter Server is non-operational
Problem: update installation failed, vCenter Server is non-operational

I recently ran in to this error upgrading my homelab vCenter from 7.0.0.10400 to 7.0.10600:

vCenter: update installation failed, vCenter Server is non-operational

Luckily, the fix was easy – all I needed to do was to delete the file “/etc/applmgmt/appliance/software_update_state.conf”

So you just need to SSH to your vCenter and execute this command:

rm /etc/applmgmt/appliance/software_update_state.conf
The fix: rm /etc/applmgmt/appliance/software_update_state.conf

A few days ago, I decided to update my vCenter server to version 6.7 U2c – normally this is an easy task with the update section in the VAMI interface. But this time I just encountered this error message when I tried to search for the update:

Error in method invocation ({‘default_message’: ‘Manifest verification failed’, ‘id’: ‘com.vmware.appliance.update.manifest_verification_failed’, ‘args’: []}, ‘Verification Failure\n’, ”)

Continue reading

I’ve just seen this in the release notes for VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 Update 1b:

Removing a virtual machine folder from the inventory by using the vSphere Client might delete all virtual machines


In the vSphere Client, if you right-click on a folder and select Remove from Inventory from the drop-down menu, the action might delete all virtual machines in that folder from the disk and underlying datastore, and cause data loss.

This issue is resolved in this release.

I’ve just checked this in my lab on the 6.7 U1b release – when I delete a VMfolder with a VM inside – the VM gets removed from inventory but not deleted on the datastore!

If I delete a VMfolder containing a VM, in vCenter 6.5 the VM gets deleted in the datastore!

Be careful when deleting virtual machine folders!

This error is seen when you open the Veeam Backup and Replication console “Failed to check certificate expiration date”

Its seems like there is a bug in Veeam Backup and Replication that hits you 11 month after you install or upgrade to 9.5 U3 – luckily Veeam is already aware of it and some helpful URLs has been revealed in Anton Gostev weekly newsletter that can assist in solving this error:

Veeam KB2806

Veeam Helpcenter