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After I figured out how to install SQL Server Express using BoxStarter, I was able to finish my BoxStarter scripts. Currently these scrips allow you to install Veeam Backup & Replication (VBR) and Veeam Backup for Office 365 (VBO). Veeam One (VONE) soon to come.

There are many ways possible to have an unattended installation for the Veeam products. One of those ways are my Chocolatey packages for VBR and VBO. However the Chocolatey packages them self do not support reboots between the packages. Here is where Boxstarter comes into play. Boxstarter could use Chocolatey packages to install software.

The veeam-boxstarter GitHub repository that I created contains scripts to install and update a VBR or VBO environment for you. Whether you would use this for your Lab, PoC or your Production environment is up to you.

In this series of blog posts, I am going to guide you through the process to install Veeam Backup & Replication, Veeam Backup for Office 365 and Veeam One using BoxStarter. Starting with Veeam Backup for Office 365.

During this series, I’ll be using an Vagrant environment to demonstrate the process. The Vagrantfile is added to my Github repository. I’m testing this on my own Windows 10 machine with Vagrant v2.1.5 and VirtualBox v5.2.36. The boxes are using a Windows Server 2016 box created by Stefan Scherer.

Setting up your test environment

You’ll need a machine that would be able to run Vagrant and VirtualBox. Any system should work, however I am going to assume you have an Windows system.

System Requirements

You need a computer with:

  • A 64-bit processor and OS
  • Intel VT-x enabled (usually not an issue if your computer is newer than 2011). This is necessary because we are using 64 bit VMs.
  • Hyper-V needs to be disabled for VirtualBox to work properly.
  • At least 20 GB of free space on your system disk.
  • At least 8 GB of free memory.

Note: The default location of Vagrant and VirtualBox are on your system drive. This can be changed.

Vagrant, change the VAGRANT_HOME environment variable
VirtualBox change The Machine folder in settings

Installation

You’ll need to install Chocolatey on your system if you have not done so already. Installation of Vagrant and VirtualBox could be done manually, but I would like to advise you to use Chocolatey. Now you can install Vagrant and VirtualBox using these commands from an elevated Command Prompt or PowerShell window:

choco install vagrant --version=2.1.5
choco install virtualbox --version=5.2.36

I would like to advice you to install the Sahara plugin and download the Box before the next blogpost. Downloading the box can take a while. You can do so by executing these commands:

vagrant plugin install sahara
vagrant box add StefanScherer/windows_2016

If you have installed the Sahara plugin we will use it to make a snapshot of your Vagrant environment. That way you can always go back to a known state. I’ll explain this in the next post.

Continue with the next part, VBO