Unfortunately, vRanger's backup settings are valid only during the current application session, and once you've scheduled a backup, there's no way to review that schedule inside the application. If you wish to make modifications you'll need to visit the Task Scheduler and know the scripting syntax down pat, lest you foul up the job. The only other option is to reschedule entirely because the job can't be loaded back into the application for editing.
This is an inefficient process, particularly for organizations that manage a multitude of schedules over a large set of VMs. Vizioncore says it plans a service-based implementation and an improved scheduling mechanism within a few months.
When you schedule your VM backups, you'll be limited to three options: all machines, one machine, or machines in a folder. Your best bet? Divvy up your VMs into folders in VirtualCenter. You'll then be able to perform backups on groups of VMs, albeit only those in the folder you chose. Again, some additional flexibility here would go a long way to improving the product's usability. Note that if you have VMs that comprise multiple VMDK files, but you want to back up only certain ones, you'll have to do this on a VM by VM basis, and again, settings aren't preserved for the next session.
During each backup vRanger writes out to a console window and to a log file on the proxy server. Here's where you'll find success and failure information. And, after each VM backup, successful or otherwise, vRanger populates the "Notes" field for the VM in VirtualCenter. Note that vRanger does overwrite the contents of the Notes field, so if you're using it to store other information, create a custom field and call it a day.Speedy Delivery
Our tests substantiate Vizioncore's claims of fast VM backups. We achieved 67 Mbps—that's 240 Gb per hour—on a LAN-free backup scenario over a 2GB Fiber Channel backbone. You will need to use VMware's VCB for high-speed backups. We didn't test vRanger without the VCB, but interpolating our results against Vizioncore's statistics, we anticipate a rate of 93.6 Gb per hour. Not a speed you'd want to live with long-term.
Bottom line, vRanger's application interface flow, inability to preserve settings and lack of a Windows service on which to operate will hinder it in enterprise data centers. If you can master the CLI you can effectively eliminate the GUI, but most folks won't go this route. That makes improving the interface all the more imperative.
And because vRanger was so incredibly fast in our backup tests, we found ourselves wanting the interface to be so much more.
Vizioncore says vRanger is in use in some very large organizations, but based on our tests, we believe the current version is probably a better fit for a small to midsize company. Those with a few hundred VMs or more may want to wait for a better management interface.
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