One of the many new features in DPM 2012 is the ability to restore single files from a vhd backup , this feature was available in DPM 2010 (ref : http://scug.dk/blogs/dataprotectionmanager/archive/2010/08/29/restoring-single-files-within-hyper-v-guests-protected-with-data-protection-manager-2010.aspx) but that required a decicated hardware unit for running DPM this have been improved in DPM 2012 so there is no longer a requirement for that , so we can run DPM from within a HyperV guest and still be able to recover single files from full vhd backups.

This can help reduce the hardware cost in a distributed enviroment where we have the Tape drive located centrally but still want to be able to do quick restores locally.

Download link for beta 2 http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=27216

We need to start with setting up a protection group , so lets select a server through the HyperV Cluster , and as you can see the DPM10 we are sitting on now is running within the same HyperV Cluster

And name our protection group , dpm is running virtual so there is no tape drive attached so we only have the disk option.

and we will stick with the defaults just for this test

and we need to allocate some space

And we will replicate the data now so we have something to recover from.

And lets create the group.

and as always sucess and DPM goes hand in hand

And in our running jobs we can see the first replica being created.

Sadly there is no hardware VSS in the lab so we need to live with redirected access until the backup is done , Microsoft please consider to enable the hardware VSS provider for your iscsi server to work with DPM.

And we have a backup to restore from

When you go to recovery and drill down to the VHD , Windows driver installer will pop up

And there will be a new storage HBA installed

and when to drill down again you can see the drive being inserted

the drive is visible in diskpart

and from the disk administrator but should not be touched from other than the DPM admin interface

and lets go back to drilling down the interface

Until we get a single file to restore

Recovery of single items needs to be recovered over the network to a machine with a dpm agent installed

or as here the dpm server itself.

and we are ready to restore.

Small file so recovery is almost instant , one more reason to love disk to disk backup

And we have the file restored.

This was a short intro to one of the many greate features in Data Protection Manager 2012 beta 2.