Users Guide

Replay Manager Best Practices
This section provides best practices for restoring and backing up data. Guidance is given specic to the backup extension type.
Backing Up Replay Manager Data
The following options exist to create a backup of the Replay Manager data that can be leveraged for disaster recovery.
Backing Up Service Conguration and Database
The Replay Manager Service conguration data and Replay Manager database can be manually copied to another location for safekeeping.
The copy can be used to restore the data if the original data becomes lost or if the server running Replay Manager crashes and the data is
not recoverable. Moreover, if the copy is placed on a Storage Center volume, Storage Center can be used to replicate the volume to a
remote DR site for additional safekeeping.
NOTE: Some data, such as Storage Center passwords, are protected using encryption that is machine-specic. Therefore, some
Replay Manager settings must be recongured if the copy is restored on a dierent server.
For Windows Server, copy all the les in the following directory to another location for safekeeping: C:\ProgramData\Compellent
\ReplayManager.
Backing Up Backup Set Data
Replay Manager can be congured to automatically copy backup set data for a given server to another location for safekeeping.
By default, backup set data is not copied to another location. The copy can be used to restore the data if the original volume containing the
backup set data becomes lost, or if the server running Replay Manager crashes and the Replay Manager conguration data is not
recoverable. Moreover, if the copy is placed on a Storage Center volume, you can use the Storage Center to replicate the volume to a
remote DR site for additional safekeeping.
Related link
Congure Servers
Recovering Data from a Remote Storage Center
Replay Manager is intended to provide only backup and recovery capabilities using individual restore points for Microsoft VSS-enabled
applications on the same Storage Center. Replay Manager is not intended to be an end-to-end automated disaster recovery solution.
However, the snapshots created by Replay Manager can be used for disaster recovery at a remote site. Replays on remote sites appear like
any other Replay taken with the Storage Center Data Instant Replay feature. These Replays can be replicated using Dell Storage Manager.
Because the Replay Manager application is not used at remote sites, it has no knowledge of the Replays being replicated from the source
system, or that Replays now exist on a dierent storage system at the recovery site.
The Replays created on remote sites outside of the Replay Manager environment can be used by changing the ReadOnly, ShadowCopy,
and Hidden attributes for the volume. The following procedure outlines the steps required using the Dell Storage Manager and the
DISKPART command. For detailed information about using Storage Center, see the Dell Storage Manager Administrator’s Guide.
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