recovery of a vpar via make_net_recovery?

[Doug O'Leary]

Hey;

We have a DR exercise going on now. For the most part, things seem to have gone exactly as they should - painful, but functional.

The recovery of a vpar from an 8420 onto a 8400 didn't work. After the load, the DR system attempts to build the kernel and fails.

We've tried everything I can think of to get the kernel to build but no joy.

Is there any issues with recoverying a vpar via a make_net_recovery image onto a physical system?

Thanks for any info/suggestions/tips that you can provide.

Doug O'Leary

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom,

Sometimes depending on Ignite version number and hardware differences this happens.

I've seen plenty of scenarios like this on ITRC and offline where this has worked.

The more modern your Ignite version, the more like your hardware source and target is the better chance you have for success.

Other options:
Recovery of this system with an Ignite Golden image.
Identify a problem in the recovery archive log that might be unrelated to his issue, e.g. read the logs.
Another image- Sometimes you need to try a different image.

SEP

[Bill Hassell]

Steven is correct -- a standard make_net_recovery is designed only to restore to the same hardware which (in order of importance) depends on the disks, LAN cards and CPU hardware. A Golden Image reworks a standard MNR into a (more) generic image which will work better in different hardware. The rp8400 and rp8420 are virtually the same (except internal speeds and buses which do not affect compatibility) but the big issue is likely I/O. You'll need identical LAN cards and disk I/O cards for a reliable restore. Or convert to a Golden Image and it should work fairly smoothly.

[Torsten.]

Are both systems (source and destination) running vPars?

[Prasanth V Aravind]

I have done a successful restoration of 8420 tape image to 8400 server.

I remember that, i have updated ignite-ux as well as h/w support pack on 8420 before taking ignite backup.

Regards
Prasanth

[Doug O'Leary]

Hey

>>Are both systems (source and destination) running vPars?

No; the source is a vpar on an 8420, the target is a full 8400.

Based on the replies, it sounds like that should be possible; however, it appears we ran into some h/w incompatibilities.

I'm thinking Plan B would be the golden image and restores of critical os files.

All this may be a moot point as this should be the last DR exercise at sungard. But, you know there'll be meetings and finger pointing anyway...

Thanks for the replies.

Doug O'Leary

[Bill Hassell]

> No; the source is a vpar on an 8420, the target is a full 8400.

I would never expect this to woek. A vPar is an imitation (aka, virtualization or emulation) of a real machine and as such, none of the I/O interfaces are the same without vpmon running. Sometimes, virtualization is overrated as far as compatibility is concerned. If you install vPar software on the rp8400 and create the partition, you should have no problems. In this case, virtualization will mask any hardware differences underneath the vPar (like disk and LAN cards) and the Ignite restore should be fine.