Windows Azure Backup Setup via Powershell

This a follow on article from

http://maneffa-it.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/new-features-in-windows-server-2012-for.html

Windows Azure Backup Vault is a great way to get an incremental and compressed off site backup. In my testing of the preview over several months and 100 gb  it 'just worked', and was superior to all the other 3rd party mechanisms I tried.

Here is the PowerShell needed to set up a Windows Azure Backup policy. It is mostly self explanatory, and assumes you have already saved a certificate into the store on the local machine.

You will need to create and upload a service certificate - here is an example to create a certificate, make sure you use a recent version of makecert as some older versions I had lying about did not like the option for certificate length, but failed silently!

makecert.exe -r -pe -n CN=mybackup -ss my -sr localmachine -eku 1.3.6.1.5.5.7.3.2 -len 2048 -e 04/24/2016 mybackup.cer

Now login to the Azure portal and upload this new certificate to your Backup vault. You are now ready to set up the backup.

Firstly set up the server using the certificate and your chosen encryption password.
$cert = Get-OBCertificateListFromLocalStore
$cert

CertificateThumbprint : <thumprint>
IssuedTo              : backup
IssuedBy              : backup
ExpirationDate        : 24/04/2016 00:00:00
IntendedPurpose       : Client Authentication

$item = Get-OBRecoveryService -Certificate $cert[0]
Start-OBRegistration  -RecoveryService $item[0]

ConvertTo-SecureString -String very_long_password_goes_here -AsPlainText -Force | Set-OBMachineSetting

Now set up the backup. here we are setting a backup of the directory d:\azure_backup, which I am robocopying files into during the day and the backup takes place each night at 2 am. The files are relatively small and static so robocopy ensures we only copy updated versions.

$mon = [System.DayOfWeek]::Monday
$tue = [System.DayOfWeek]::Tuesday
$wed = [System.DayOfWeek]::Wednesday
$thu = [System.DayOfWeek]::Thursday
$fri = [System.DayOfWeek]::Friday
$sat = [System.DayOfWeek]::Saturday
$sun = [System.DayOfWeek]::Sunday

$policy = New-OBPolicy
$filespec = New-OBFileSpec -FileSpec d:\azure_backup
$sched = New-OBSchedule -DaysofWeek Monday,Tuesday,Wednesday,Thursday,Friday,Saturday,Sunday -TimesofDay 02:00
$ret = New-OBRetentionPolicy -RetentionDays 30
Add-OBFileSpec -Policy $policy -FileSpec $filespec
Set-OBSchedule -policy $policy -schedule $sched
Set-OBRetentionPolicy -policy $policy -retentionpolicy $ret
Set-OBPolicy $policy

This next line sets the machine to throttle the uplink bandwidth to 10 meg during working hours and 50 meg outside working hours. This server does not use a proxy, although you can specify a proxy if that is how your system is set up. Remember most ADSL type connections have very limited uplink bandwidth compared to this fibre connection so if you are using ADSL make sure you do not swamp the uplink bandwidth as this will dramatically affect downloading as well!

Set-OBMachineSetting -WorkDay $mon, $tue, $wed, $thu, $fri, $sat, $sun -StartWorkHour "7:00:00" -EndWorkHour "22:00:00" -WorkHourBandwidth (10000*1024) -NonWorkHourBandwidth (50000*1024)

The first backup will take a long time, but subsequent backups will be much shorter.