Rapid Recovery 6.4 - Installation and Upgrade Guide

You must close all Microsoft Management Console (MMC) windows before you begin upgrading the Core.

Caution: Due to a Microsoft defect, if any MMC window is open when running the Core Installer, even after a successful installation, the Core service may be deleted after restart.
You must first pause any existing protection and replication, and cancel or finish any running jobs. You can accomplish this by temporarily stopping the Core service. In release 6.2 and later, you can do this from the Settings page of the Core Console. For details, see "Restarting or shutting down the Core service" in the Rapid Recovery 6.4 User Guide.

NOTE: If upgrading from Rapid Recovery Core versions earlier than 6.2, see knowledge base article 119400, How to Stop the Core Service.
When upgrading, you only see a limited number of steps in the installation wizard. The steps differ based on your configuration, including whether you use replication, if you are using the automatic update feature, if you have already agreed to share data with Quest, if prerequisites are installed, and so on.
If replicating in your Core, always upgrade the target Core before the source Core.
A license is required to run all versions of Rapid Recovery Core. If you are installing a trial version with an embedded temporary license key, your trial license will expire in 14 days. At that time, new snapshots or other scheduled data transfers are paused until an active license is registered. For more information, see Managing Rapid Recovery licenses.

Understand your privacy settings before installing Rapid Recovery Core. Typically, Rapid Recovery requires access to a limited set of your personally identifiable information (PII) to run a standard license. When installing Core version 6.2 or later, you are asked whether to share personal data with Quest or whether you want to decline. If you decline (which is your right), you cannot use the Core until you obtain and register a non-phone-home license from the Rapid Recovery licensing team.

NOTE: For more information about managing your PII, the GDPR, the functions you cannot perform if you do not accept the use of personal data, and how to obtain a non-phone-home license, see the topic "Managing privacy" in the Rapid Recovery 6.4 User Guide.

After upgrading an existing Core, remember to resume any protection and replication. To resume Agent-based protection in an upgraded release 6.4 Core, your protected machines must be running a supported version of Rapid Recovery Agent.

For step-by-step instructions for installing or upgrading the Rapid Recovery Core software, see the topic Installing the Rapid Recovery Core.

Upgrading the Rapid Recovery Agent software

Upgrading Rapid Recovery > Upgrading the Rapid Recovery Agent software

This topic addresses upgrading the Agent software that protects your machine in a Rapid Recovery Core. Be sure to read this section before you upgrade. If installing the Rapid Recovery Agent software for the first time, see the topic About installing the Rapid Recovery Agent software.

To take advantage of the latest features, Quest recommends that you upgrade the Rapid Recovery Agent software on machines that you want to protect with Agent-based protection. Generally, the same Agent installer executable program (standard, or web installer) can be used for a clean installation or to upgrade an existing version of Rapid Recovery Agent.

NOTE: There is one exception: if upgrading from a version of Agent prior to 6.2.0, please use the standard installer.

Caution: Before upgrading Agent, it is critical that you verify that the machine you want to protect is supported by the current version of Rapid Recovery Agent. See the topic "Rapid Recovery Agent software requirements" in the Rapid Recovery 6.4 System Requirements Guide. If the operating system of the machine you want to protect is no longer supported, you may be able to run an earlier version of Rapid Recovery Agent on that machine and still protect it in the Core. However, if the version running on your protected machine is not supported by Quest, you may be asked to upgrade if you need assistance from Quest Data Protection Support. Logically, new features supported by Rapid Recovery Core may not be available on machines protected with an older version of Rapid Recovery Agent.

For information about getting the appropriate version of Rapid Recovery software, see Obtaining Rapid Recovery software. When the upgrade is complete, restart the machines as necessary, and then check the Core to verify that each upgraded machine is being protected.

Quest recommends installing or upgrading to the latest version of the Rapid Recovery Agent software on machines that you want to protect:

On every physical machine in your environment.
On every Hyper-V host or Oracle VM VirtualBox virtual machine you want to protect.
On every node in a Hyper-V cluster.

Optionally, you can protect VMware vCenter/ESXi virtual machines and Hyper-V virtual machines using our Rapid Snap for Virtual feature. This is also known as agentless protection. To protect VMs agentlessly, some additional requirements may apply (for example, installing VMware Tools or Hyper-V Integration Services, as appropriate). Application support for agentless protection of SQL Server and Exchange Server is included in Rapid Recovery as of release 6.2, but must be enabled explicitly. Naturally, when protecting machines agentlessly, you cannot take advantage of features unique to Rapid Recovery Agent. For a clear understanding of advantages of and limitations for agentless protection, see the topic “Understanding Rapid Snap for Virtual” in the Rapid Recovery 6.4 User Guide.

If you opt not to use Rapid Snap for Virtual, then install or upgrade to the latest version of the Rapid Recovery Agent software on Hyper-V virtual machines, and on every VMware vCenter/ESXi virtual machine you want to protect with the Agent, instead of agentlessly.

Upgrading on a Windows machine

Following our support policy, Quest fully supports compatibility with the latest release of the prior major/minor version (6.3.0), and offers limited support for the latest maintenance release for the prior major/minor version (6.2.1).

You can upgrade supportedRapid Recovery Agent versions in place (without removing a prior version of Rapid Recovery Agent) for releases currently under full or limited support.

Practically speaking, while not currently supported, you can upgrade in place from AppAssure Agent release 5.4.3 or any version of Rapid Recovery Agent to Rapid Recovery Agent release 6.4.0.

When upgrading a version of AppAssure earlier than release 5.4.3, you must perform a two-step or three-step upgrade process, as described in the topic Upgrading AppAssure 5.x Core to Rapid Recovery Core. if you have the installers (which are no longer available from Quest), first update the machine to AppAssure release 5.4.3. Then run the Rapid Recovery release 6.x installer, as applicable. If you did not save installers, then uninstall the older version and then install the current version.

NOTE: Due to legal divestiture agreements between Dell and Quest, only rebranded versions of Rapid Recovery documentation and software (release 6.1.2 and later) can be downloaded from the technical documentation website and the Quest support website, respectively. If you have not retained the installer, Quest cannot provide it. In such cases, uninstall the earlier software version.

Caution: Before uninstalling AppAssure Agent, make sure the protected machine backs up to the Core. When you see the option to Uninstall the configuration settings and data, including all backup images and change logs, clear the option. You must retain settings and data. Then, perform a clean install of a supported Rapid Recovery version on the same machine.

Because there is more than one type of Windows machine, the steps for upgrading depend on the version of Windows installed. Upgrading a Windows machine includes the following options:

To upgrade Agent on a machine with a standard Windows operating system, see Installing the Rapid Recovery Agent software on Windows machines. Supported Windows operating systems are listed in the topic "Rapid Recovery release 6.3 operating system installation and compatibility matrix" in the Rapid Recovery 6.4 System Requirements Guide.
To upgrade a machine with a Windows Server Core Edition operating system, see Installing the Agent software on Windows Server Core Edition machines.

NOTE: When upgrading to Rapid Recovery Agent on Windows machines on which the software drivers have changed, you are prompted to restart your system. .

Upgrading Rapid Recovery Agent on a Linux machine

If upgrading from one release of Rapid Recovery Agent to another, please be aware of the following points:

You must remove the local software repository created by previous installations of the Rapid Recovery Agent software. Steps are included to help you determine if a local repository exists and to remove it.
A new local repository is created automatically when you install the repository package using the package manager to upgrade from a supported earlier release of Rapid Recovery Agent to the current release.
A single procedure addresses both installing the Rapid Recovery Agent software on any compatible distribution of Linux, and upgrading from one version of Rapid Recovery Agent to a later version. See the topic Installing or upgrading Rapid Recovery Agent on a Linux machine.

NOTE: As a best practice, to ensure that the proper Rapid Recovery kernel module version is used to protect your machine and continue taking incremental snapshots, the best practice is to restart the machine after completing your upgrade of the Rapid Recovery Agent software.

Upgrading AppAssure Agent to Rapid Recovery Agent on a Linux machine

When upgrading a Linux machine from AppAssure Agent to Rapid Recovery Agent, perform these basic steps:

Optionally, back up the agent ID information associated with that protected machine.
For more information, see Backing up and restoring the AppAssure Agent ID.
Completely remove the AppAssure Agent software from the machine using the AppAssure install script.
For more information, see Uninstalling the AppAssure Agent software from a Linux machine.
Install Rapid Recovery Agent.
For more information, see the procedure Installing or upgrading Rapid Recovery Agent on a Linux machine.
Configure the Rapid Recovery Agent software on the upgraded machine.
For more information, see Configuring the Rapid Recovery Agent on a Linux machine.
Restore the agent ID.
This process is also described in the topic Backing up and restoring the AppAssure Agent ID.

NOTE: After updating Rapid Recovery Agent, the first snapshot will result in a base image, creating a new recovery point chain.

For new installations, or if the drivers have changed in the version of the Rapid Recovery Agent software to which you are upgrading, you are prompted to restart your system.