Using Virtual Servers for Backups - windows

I have three server machines inbound and I have hosted following services on them
Active Directory
DHCP
DNS
File Server
Web Server
I have access to a virtual server too. I want to ask how wise it would be to use that Virtual server for backups in disaster recovery point of view?

Yes it is definitely a good way to backup your data backup on VMs, however you have question of size of your storage where you keep your backups.
More importantly you can go for snapshot options for Vms and bare metal recovery for physical windows Vms.
I hope the answer will be useful..Thanks..

Related

Can you have a single domain across 2 servers within Hyper-V Manager?

I am running a Hyper-V lab for a client to test the functionality of a Powershell script and due to memory constraints, I would like to move my file and database VM servers off of my main desktop PC to my laptop. I set up Hyper-V on the laptop, and successfully exported/imported the VM's into the other Hyper-V server. I can boot them, all the configuration and files are intact however, I am predictably having trouble reconnecting to the domain they were a part of prior to the move. I understand I need an External virtual switch to handle that communication, as internal and private will not reach outside of the Hyper-V server they reside in. Obviously I would prefer to not use an external, but this is strictly to continue testing. I've trouble-shooted entering different DNS server values from the client machine's IPv4 properties and changing the virtual switch to External for the existing Hyper-V server, and re-register the DNS records on the DC. All result in the same error when I try to connect to the domain: "(error code 0x0000232B RCODE_NAME_ERROR) The query was for the SRV record for _ldap._tcp.dc."... "The DNS SRV records required to locate a AD DC for the domain are not registered in DNS".
In summary, I want to move a VM from the first server listed to the second, and then re-connect to the domain they were part of previously. Both machines are just running Windows 10, not Windows Servers, if that matters. Another note, I can do remote sessions from the desktop to the laptop just fine which would lead to believe this is not related to a firewall. Thanks!
The best it to set up a VLAN. If you can't do that, change the network class of your AD lab machine (192.168.55.x ?) to another in order to avoid conflicts.
Your DNS server has to be AD to make your machines connecting to it.
And last but not least, if you're on 2 different hyperV servers, you have to use external switch in hyperV:
https://redmondmag.com/articles/2018/05/04/hyper-v-private-networks.aspx

Difference speed between physical machiner/virtual machine for a LDAP connection in VBA

I'm currently working on a access project in which I have to search different users and groups in a LDAP server. I use vba code to do that.
To test my application I ran it with Access 2013 in a physical machine and in a virtual machine.
I noted that my VM is 3x faster than my physical machine to establish a connection with the LDAP server (This is an Active Directory).
Do you have any ideas why ?
My VM run with VMware Workstation.
Thanks
My first idea would be that it does not take the same network route to reach the LDAP server.

Hosting dns nameserver on windows azure (VM)

I'd like to host my own DNS name server to have total control on the DNS settings.
Is it a good idea to create a Windows 2012 VM (Iaas) on Windows Azure and use it as a DNS name server?
Problems I forsee:
Windows Azure SLA requires at least two instances? Not really a problem if the VM is down for < 20min since DNS should be cached downstream.
Azure VM Size? Extra small should do.
Changing IPs? Once you have the VM set up, Azure should not change your IP address unless you delete it.
Reverse DNS? I don't think hosting a nameserver requires a reverse IP DNS lookup.
Anything else? not really knowledgeable about hosting a DNS server, but I think it should work!
What am I missing?
Azure IaaS VMs have an SLA with a single instance, so you wouldn't need to worry about that.
Don't use extra-small for anything except development and testing. Network performance is erratic, ranging from very poor to non-existent.
The IP address will remain constant while the VM is deployed, yes.
However...
Are you talking about an internal DNS server, or a public nameserver? If the latter, hosting in a cloud datacenter is probably not the best approach. You'd be better off using a dedicated DNS provider like Zerigo.

Amazon EC2 - seeing files between instances

I've set up 2 instances of Windows Server 2008 on EC2. I want one to act as the database server and the other as the client. For the client app to work it needs to be able to connect to the server instance with ALL of these things:
IP address of the database instance
access through a given UDP port
server name e.g. \\MyServer
an actual physical path through to its database e.g. \\UNC\SharedFolder\MyDatabaseFolder
I'm a complete novice with EC2. Is there anyway I can set this up?
Many thanks
At least three of the four are completely possible and I have worked with similar setups. Maybe someone else knows more about the UDP bit.
IP address of the database instance
That is standard on EC2. All instances have two network interfaces, one EC2 internal and one to the outside world. For communication between instances use the internal one. Data traffic over these interfaces is free.
Access through a given UDP port
I have never tried UDP communication in EC2, but if it works you should probably keep it within a local network of your own, i.e. a virtual private cloud (VPC).
Server name e.g. \MyServer
This kind of host name lookup does not need a name server, although you certainly could run one (preferably within a VPC). If you put the server name and (internal) IP into your hosts file (%systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts) you don't need a name server, though.
An actual physical path through to its database e.g. \UNC\SharedFolder\MyDatabaseFolder
Folder sharing should work the same as with any other Windows machine, but even that should probably be kept within a VPC.
Setting up a VPC can be a little steep to start with, but the documentation is good and the hard bits are often not needed (such as VPN tunnels). Have a look at the example scenarios and follow the one best matching your needs.

How do I connect up my Amazon EC2 instances without manually modifying config files?

I have a three-tier Windows-based web application bundled into 3 AMIs on Amazon EC2 that I use for load testing.
An ASP.NET web application on IIS
An .NET application server
SQL Server
After I launch them, the config files of each tier needs modifying to update the IP addresses.
At the moment I am doing this manually: I connect to the webserver instance via remote desktop and modify the config file to point to the new IP of the application server instance. Then I do the same with the application server to change the IP in the connection string.
This must be a common requirement and I must be missing something obvious. There must be a better way!
I could use Elastic IP addresses, but these machines are only provisioned for a couple of hours at a time, and I would be charged for the addresses when they were NOT in use (which would be most of the time).
Is there some way of persistently naming the machines? Can I somehow get all the machines on the same network and use machine names instead of IP addresses?
I could write some nifty PowerShell script that would perform the modifications remotely. Is there an example somewhere?
I could use a dynamic IP address service. I'm not sure if this would have any negative effect on performance or availability... Are there any downsides to this approach?
I could install some sort of self-configuring service on each machine (which connects to S3? SNS? SimpleDB?) to publish/retrieve the addresses of the other machines and update the config files automatically. Is there an example somewhere?
What is best practice?
You could use Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC). You have a private subnet where you can assign an IP address to an instance, but it may require launching an instance from command line to assign IP. VPC is charged the same way as EC2.

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