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It appears as if there is a large amount of conflicting or old (pertaining to Server 2008) information regarding backing up and restoring domain controllers hosted in Hyper-V.

I have two domain controllers (Both running Server 2012 R2). Let's call them DC1 and DC2. DC1 is the primary domain controller (Active Directory/DNS/DHCP) and was set up first. DC2 (Active Directory/DNS) was added as a domain controller through DCPromo to the domain running on DC1.

Both of these domain controllers are hosted in Hyper-V running on two separate physical machines both running Hyper-V and Server 2012 R2.

Some sites say I can use Windows Server Backup to backup Hyper-V and the VM and restore it as such. Other sites say I need to backup a domain controller from its own operating system (Run Windows Server Backup on DC1) and create a new VM on the Hyper-V host with similar specs and operating system and from inside that new VM, restore my domain controller.

What is the proper/best practice way to back up and restore Server 2012 R2 domain controllers running in Hyper-V?

Thanks!

Tristan V
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  • Why do you think that backing up virtualized DCs is any different than bare-metal DCs? All of the same concepts apply. – EEAA Jan 26 '17 at 23:16
  • From experience with real world WSB restores I'd recommend StorageCraft ShadowProtect or Veeam Backup & Replication. Especially for domain controllers. – Aaron Tate Jan 26 '17 at 23:17
  • My own experience with a restored DC is that you will have to keep it off the network, remove all roles, demote it, leave the domain. Then have the good DC failover any roles, remove the bad DC from the domain. Then reconnect the restored DC to the network, promote it and configure everything again. – axus Jan 26 '17 at 23:37
  • It seems like it would depend on what kind of failure you are worried about. If a single DC dies for some reason, just re-build a new one, seizing roles if required. – Zoredache Jan 26 '17 at 23:53

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