How to properly handle disaster recovery to Azure cloud with vm, disk, and local file copy

Question

I have a question, I hope you might be able to help me with. Following is a scenario that I would like to create using Azure. Could you let me know if this is feasible, and how I would go about doing this?

Scenario:

•Create a virtual machine--which I have done.

•Add an empty disk, format, create volume, etc.

•Now, I want to be able to have an area on this disk to which I will copy data from our local network. This would be done as a backup in the event of local infrastructure failure.

The idea behind this is to have a virtual machine that always has the latest copy of important local-premise files, along with installed applications allowing our users to remote into this vm in the event local services are disrupted.

I have the virtual machine, the storage container, the empty disk mounted, formatted, and available on my vm, but what do I do now to have an area (or the entire drive) made available for local on-premise file copy? I am evaluating CloudBerryLab's backup application, but when I use it I can only seem to send my file copies to a storage area that is not a disk drive--hence, not attached to the virtual machine.

So, am I not understanding how to handle this scenario properly? What tools should be used to make this happen, or is there a better architecture in Azure to handle this?

Thank You.

Answer 1

If you have a current version of Windows Server on-prem, you can just sign up for Azure Backup. Instead of keeping a VM running and paying for compute hours plus the storage, wait and spin it up only if you need it. The restore from Azure backup is amazingly quick to a VM. Once you have a Windows Azure account, you will be able to see the Backup option. Set that up and then you can download the agent onto your Windows Server and set up the backup. SSL Cert is required.