hello, I have been tearing my hair out on this, what we currently do is
we backup the system state of our main DC and upload this to the cloud (Amazon s3) via a piece of software called Cloud berry system state / bare metal addition. the backup is of course a VHD file.
the software integrates with windows server backup and creates a backup image, it then takes that and places it on the cloud as is, without altering it from what I can see.
I want to test the process of restoring a domain controller so if we have a disaster here in house we can get up and running as quick as possible also making sure that the backups are functional.
I created a VM running 2008 R2 in Vmware workstation 10, I then copy the VHD to the new system but cant get it to recognise it via the windows server backup, whether in windows server backup - restore or via the repair your computer options on boot.
do I need to make the machine identical to the original DC that was backed up as in run DC promo and set ,domain name, FQDN, IP address as the it was on the original?
or do I need to place the VHD file in a certain area?
I have read some blogs and guides and watched a fair few youtube vids but I keep getting the same issue I cant get the server to see the backup VHD system image file.
any help would be most welcome.
Many Thanks
Bpdzenith