Lab 18 – Backup & Recovery

Objectives

1. Create a Recovery Services vault
2. Configure and run a VM backup, then restore a file/disk
3. Configure Azure Site Recovery (overview/concepts)
4. Understand backup policies, retention, and soft delete for vaults

Prerequisites

1. A VM (small size to minimize backup time/cost)
2. Signed in at portal.azure.com

Estimated time

45 minutes (initial backup can take a while to complete — plan for waiting)

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Part 1 – Setup

1. Search for Resource groups > Create. Name: rg-az104-lab18,

region: East US. Create.

1. Create a VM:

- Virtual machines > Create > vm-backup01, Ubuntu 22.04 LTS,

Standard_B1s. Create.

1. Search for Recovery Services vaults > Create.

- Resource group: rg-az104-lab18

- Name: rsv-az104lab18

- Region: East US

- Create.

Part 2 – Enable backup with default policy

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Backup (under Getting started).
2. Where is your workload running?: Azure
3. What do you want to backup?: Virtual machine
4. Select VMs to backup: check vm-backup01 > Enable backup.

- Uses the DefaultPolicy (daily backup at 10:00 AM, retention 30 days).

Part 3 – Review/customize backup policy

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Backup policies (under Manage).
2. Select DefaultPolicy — review daily retention, weekly/monthly/yearly tiers.
3. To create a custom policy:

- + Add > VM backup policy

- Policy name: custom-policy

- Daily backup: enabled, time 11:00 PM

- Retention: daily 30 days, weekly 12 weeks

- Save.

Part 4 – Trigger an on-demand backup

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Backup items (under Protected items) >

select vm-backup01.

1. Backup Now (top toolbar):

- Retain Backup Till: set to 30 days from today

- OK.

The backup job begins. Backup jobs (under Manage) shows progress. This

can take 15–30+ minutes for the first backup.

Part 5 – Recovery Services vault settings: soft delete & redundancy

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Properties (under Settings).
2. Backup configuration:

- Storage replication type: Locally-redundant (LRS) or Geo-redundant (GRS) — GRS replicates to a secondary region for DR.

- Soft delete: Enabled by default on new vaults — protects backup data for 14 days after accidental/malicious deletion.

Part 6 – Azure Site Recovery (concepts, no full deployment)

ASR provides VM-level disaster recovery by continuously replicating VM disks

to another region. Workflow:

1. Enable replication for a source VM to a target region/VNet.
2. Configure replication policy (RPO threshold, retention of recovery points).
3. Test failover (non-disruptive, isolated network) to validate DR readiness.
4. Planned/unplanned failover moves the workload to the target region.
5. Failback once the primary region is healthy.

To explore in the Portal (without full setup):

1. rsv-az104lab18 > Replicated items (under Protected items) — shows

VMs being replicated via ASR (empty until configured).

Part 7 – Restore (after backup completes)

Once the backup job finishes:

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Backup items > select vm-backup01.
2. Restore VM (top toolbar):

- Restore point: select the latest recovery point

- Restore configuration:

- Restore type: Create new virtual machine

- Virtual machine name: vm-backup01-restored

- Resource group: create new or select existing

- Virtual network: select a VNet

- Subnet: select a subnet

- Restore — creates a new VM from the backup.

Alternative: Restore disks to restore individual disks to a storage

account for file-level recovery.

Validation

1. [ ] Recovery Services vault created
2. [ ] VM backup enabled with a backup policy
3. [ ] On-demand backup job completes successfully (check Backup jobs)
4. [ ] Recovery point listed in vm-backup01's backup items
5. [ ] Can describe ASR failover/failback workflow and RPO/RTO concepts

Cleanup

1. Go to rsv-az104lab18 > Backup items > select vm-backup01 >

Stop Backup (top toolbar).

1. Delete Backup Data: Yes (delete retained backups) > Stop Backup.
2. Resource groups > select rg-az104-lab18 > Delete resource group.

Exam Tips

1. Backup is item-level (VM, files, SQL, etc.) for operational recovery; ASR is DR-focused, replicating entire VMs to another region for failover.
2. Vault soft delete retains deleted backup data for 14 days — protects against ransomware/accidental deletion.
3. RPO (Recovery Point Objective) = acceptable data loss window; RTO (Recovery Time Objective) = acceptable downtime — ASR lets you configure/test against these.
4. You must disable protection (and optionally delete backup data) before a vault can be deleted.