Backup and Replication Test

[Pman]

Hello All,

new to the Nimble and looking to make sure what we are replicating we can restore.  Curious if there is a good doc on how we can test and restore a VM or a volume without interrupting production.  We have a CS-215 at the DR site and a CS 300 in the office.  Would like to test a VM first then maybe a volume to make sure the backups are good.  We replicate about 6 Volumes nightly.  Any help is appreciated.  Thanks

Perry

[daniel_moloney · Accepted solution]

Hi Perry,

Unfortunately I cannot find any document that details these steps, hopefully the below steps will help with your testing.

1. From the downstream array (CS215) identify and select the replica volume which holds the VM you would like to restore.
2. In the top right corner select snapshots and identify the time period you would like to restore.
3. Click Clone and provide a new name for the cloned volume.
4. Edit the access permissions of the new volume by adding the initiator group of the DR host/s.
5. Rescan the DR host/s, once complete select a host to add new storage.
6. In the VMware "Add Volume" wizard, select the new volume and when prompted select "assign a new signature".
7. The volume will be presented and you can now browse the datastore and add the VM to the inventory by right clicking the .vmx and selecting "add to inventory".

One the VM is added to the inventory you may want to disable the network adapter to ensure it does not conflict with anything,

Lastly, here is a post which includes some scripts that can automate this process. Nimble Automation Scripts - SQL Dumps

[Pman]

Daniel,

Thanks for the reply.  Just a couple questions. I only have hosts in my prod environment and NOT my DR environment.  That being said , how do i get the volume seen by my Prod Hosts?  Just want to test in the event that my prod blows up?  Any help is appreciated.  thanks.

[daniel_moloney]

Hi Perry,

Given there are no hots in the DR location there are a couple of options I can suggest. I have ordered based on recommendation.

1. If you have an old server or desktop sitting around you could have this setup in the DR site for testing purposes. This is probably the easiest option which ensures you can also test the recovery process along with the Nimble Array in the DR location.
2. Use the source snapshots in production to create a cloned volume and test against the production hosts (ensuring not to disrupt the environment). Again this should be easy enough to setup and because the replication is based on these snapshots it provides validation that they should be ok in DR.
3. Assuming you are using iSCSI, you could present the storage networks back to production. This is probably the more difficult option to get setup as it requires knowledge of the network and the ability to extend layer 2 across sites as its not a good idea to route an IP storage network.

Hope this information helps.