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Continuous Data Replication

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JG5

MIS
Nov 18, 2001
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Is anyone using this feature in 6.1?
 
I contacted my rep. CV is sending me the software disc and a trial license. I'll update the post once I get it up and running.
 
I posted too soon. The software and trial license came in today. Pretty straight forward install. I've got a 70 gig volume replicating now. It's using about half the memory that an AUX copy does. Not taxing at all on the CPU utilization either. I've not gone into the recovery points yet, or the application awareness. I'll try to test out SQL with it and post an update tomorrow.
 
Does it allow for retention times on the snapshots?
Or point in time retention?
I am required to keep 14 days of SQL data onsite and this would help greatly
How granular does it allow the restore to get or does it require the whole volume be restored
 
Bump...

Seeing a demo of this in about 2 weeks. Very interested in any info on the software.
 
Sorry guys, I haven't had time to test this in depth yet. I'll try to get to it as soon as possible. Anyone can get an evaluation copy I believe.
 
OK...so I'm experimenting with CDR. So far its been a bit hit and miss. Partly becuase i was trying to make it work on a clustered san (because they said it would work) and now apparently it doesn't. So there's been a bit of installing and uninstalling going on.

Now i have it on 2 servers and i'm trying to set up a 'pre seeded' cdr pair - that is where you basically copy the data from the remote site via a usb drive or whatever and put it at the destination before starting an 'out of band' syncronisiation. THis saves you having to transfer large amounts of data across a slow link during the initial sync of the product.

So far i can't get it to work - but CV have pointed out a few post SP3 patches to install so i'm trying that today.

Just a small note - Installing cdr will cause a reboot, and so does a lot of the patching - one patch actually asked for 2 reboots... and then the server didn't restart properly afterwards. I had to safe boot and disable the cdr services and realtime scanning to get it booted. After that i could statr the cdr wout a problem but i don't know yet if the problem will reoccur when i reboot.

Armchair Jedi ~ So dense light bends around him ;-)
 
I have configured CDR in SQL, Exchange, replicated magnetic libraries, and straight file-system replications along with recovery points. None of them are to terribly difficult, but there are lots of little nuances that make it go more smoothly.

ArmChair is right - installation will require multiple reboots due to the fact that windows does not release driver registrations and the CDR module has to use a system level I/O watcher. Future patches will also likely require a reboot, but out of all of the agent set this makes only 3 that require it (DataMigrator for File system, Oracle, and CDR).

The out-of-band sync is a little tricky to perform (there is a posting of the steps at in the CDR forum from Armchair Jedi no less) but once it is done then you can pre-copy large volumes of data and replication becomes a delta sync operation.

Replication of magnetic libraries for remote sites, DR, or just plain old redundancy is an often overlooked use for CDR IMHO. It provides you a really transparent method for moving disk data around and centralizing remote-site backups.

The main thing to keep in mind with CDR (like any replication product) is the it will not break the laws of physics. Replicating a lot of data over a little pipe is still a long and painful process...

My .02 anyway. If you have specifics post them up here or at commvaultusers.com and I'll answer them when I get a few.

-Lord Marshal
 
I used a very good file replication software called SureSync. Their interface is very easy but handles simple to complex replication quite well. I use a copy at home to replicate simply my music files. I also have several server copies of it at work to replicate large chunks of data to several offices worldwide. It's quite reliable. I've set it up a few months ago and haven't needed much maintenance on it.

Their support team is really good too. Their response time is quick. Their website is
Jr. IT Guy
 
I've not pursued the Commvault CDR product since my original post. We implemented a new storage systems and used DoubleTake to replicate the data. It worked perfect on user files, SQL and Exchange. No issues at all.
 
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