Acronis Backup Advanced: Installation

Created - March 5, 2014; Updated - November 14, 2014;

Installation how-to

This article applies to:

Acronis Backup Advanced
Acronis Backup for Windows Server Essentials

Introduction

Acronis Backup Advanced is our backup solution designed for medium and large business where a large number of machines should be backed up, preferably centrally.

These are Acronis Backup Advanced products:

Acronis Backup Advanced for PC
Acronis Backup Advanced for Windows Server
Acronis Backup Advanced for Exchange
Acronis Backup Advanced for SQL
Acronis Backup Advanced for SharePoint
Acronis Backup Advanced for Active Directory
Acronis Backup Advanced for Linux Server
Acronis Backup Advanced for VMware
Acronis Backup Advanced for Hyper-V
Acronis Backup Advanced for RHEV
Acronis Backup Advanced for Citrix XenServer
Acronis Backup Advanced for Oracle

Acronis Backup for Windows Server Essentials is installed in the same way. Installation guide for other Acronis Backup editions you can find in this article:Acronis Backup: Installation.

To download the installation file for Acronis Backup Advanced:

Log in to your account on the Acronis website.
If you do not have an account and have not registered your copy of the product, you will need to create the account first - see Registration at Acronis Website.
Download Acronis Backup Advanced from My Products & Downloads:

Description

Run the installation file and press Install Acronis Backup:
If you accept the License Agreement, check I accept the terms of this agreement box and click Next:
On the next step you are offered to choose between pre-configured installation scenarios and custom installations:

Back up this machine's data: Agent Core, Agent for Windows (if Windows operating system detected), Agent for Hyper-V (if Hyper-V role detected), Agent for Exchange (if MS Exchange detected), Agent for SQL (if MS SQL Server or MS SharePoint detected), Agent for Active Directory (if Active Directory detected), Management Console, Command-Line Tool
Centrally monitor and configure the backing up of physical and virtual machines: Management Server, License Server Management Console, Components for Remote Installation, Command-Line Tool
Store the backups of other machines: Storage Node, Command-Line Tool
Connect to remote machines: Management Console, Components for Remote Installation, Command-Line Tool, Bootable Media Builder
You can also select components manually:

Select the components that you want to install:

(!) Components that require license keys are marked by "key" icon. Components for centralized management can be installed without providing the licenses.
You can highlight components to see their description and purpose.
If you selected the components requiring license keys, select Add licenses or start a free trial: we offer you 15 days of free evaluation. In the trial mode the product is fully functional (with these limitations: Acronis Universal Restore is not available, under bootable media only recovery is available, you cannot commit changes in Acronis Disk Director). After purchasing a full license you will not need to reinstall Acronis Backup, only license change will be required. All settings will be kept (this means no need to recreate backup plans or vaults).
If you already have a license purchased, select Add licenses:

Select a License server if alredy installed on another machine. If it is the initial installation, provide the license keys by pasting them in the available field or browse for the text file containing the keys. License keys will be automatically added to the License Server:

Check license assignment/select licenses and click on Next:
Select where to install the selected components:
Specify credentials for the Acronis services. You can create a new account for Acronis services or use an existing account. Selecting an existing user make sure it has sufficient permissions. For more information see: Acronis Backup & Recovery: Adding Necessary Rights. The necessary rights will be added automatically to a new user created in this step.
Installing on a domain controller, specify an existing domain user that has "Log on as a service" privilege.
Installing Aconis Management Server specify the SQL servers that will be used by AMS:
Select whether you want to register the Agent and the Storage node on the Management Server:

If you select to register component during installation, specify credentials for connecting to Acronis Management Server.
You can also register them later.
Specify user accounts to be added to the Acronis Remote Users security group. If you don't know what users should be added, leave the default list as is and press Next:
On the next step you can enable Management Server Web page and specify port for it:
Select whether you would like to be a part of Acronis Customer Experience Program (ACEP) and click Next:
Review the installation summary and click Install to start the installation:

Wait untill the installation completes. Now you can use Acronis Backup Advanced and install Acronis Agents on other machines in the network.
Prepare remote machines for installation:
! Make sure you have ports 445, 9876 and 25001 open, see Using telnet to Test Open Ports; Installing on a Linux machine make sure that TCP port 22 is opened and that the SSH daemon is running.
! Disable Simple file sharing on the remote machine:
Windows XP: Control panel -> Folder options -> View -> Use simple file sharing
Windows Vista or later: Control panel > Folder options > View > Use Sharing Wizard
! Enable File and Printer Sharing on the remote machine:
Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Windows 2003 Server: Control panel > Windows Firewall > Exceptions > File and Printer Sharing
Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, or Windows 7: Control panel > Windows Firewall > Network and Sharing Center > Change advanced sharing settings
! Disable User Account Control (UAC) if the remote machine is not a member of an Active Directory domain.
Configuring Acronis Backup Advanced for backing up virtual machines, choose between agent-based and agent-less backup.

Agent-based backup means an Acronis Management Agent needs to be installed inside the guest operating system of a virtual machine you want to backup.
Choose agent-based backup, when:
- virtualization platform is RHEV, Citrix XenServer, Oracle;
- you have an SQL Server, a SharePoint Server or Active Directory and want to perform application-aware backup;
- you need to overcome limitations of agent-less backup.
Procees with the installation as described further in this article.

Agent-less backup means you can install the Acronis Management Agent (Agent for Hyper-V, Agent for VMware) on the host without installing any agent inside the guest operation system of the VMs.
You can choose agent-less backup, when:
- virtualization platform is VMware or Hyper-V.
In both cases you will only need 1 Acronis Backup Advanced VMware/Hyper-V/RHEV/Citrix XenServer/Oracle license per host.

For installation of Virtual Appliance (Agent for VMware), connect to the Management server, right-click on Virtual machines, then click Deploy Agent for VMware.

For installation of Agent for Hyper-V proceed as described further in this article.
Run Acronis Management Console and click Install Acronis components:
Specify the machines where you would like to install Acronis components.

Specify credentials to access remote machines. The user should be a member of Local administrators group on the target machine.
Select the components to install on the remote machine(s):
Specify the License server and licenses that should be used for installation or add them manually:
The installation will analyze licenses available in the specified License server:
On the next step you can change the installation options:
To centrally manage your machines you need to register them on the Management Server. You can confirm it during installation or add later manually:
Select whether you would like to be a part of Acronis Customer Experience Program (ACEP) and click Next:
Review the installation summary and click Proceed to start the installation:
Wait until installation completes:

Now you can use Acronis Backup Advanced.

More Information

On the Management Server, you can see all registered machines under Machines with agents -> All machines with agents:

You can connect to each remote machine:

or:

To view registered Storage Nodes, check status or add new ones, navigate to Storage nodes:

Here you can create and manage your centralized vaults:

Find more information about centralized vaults in our Web Help.

To create and manage centralized backup plans, validation and recovery tasks, navigate to Backup plans and tasks:

More information about backup plans see in our Web Help.