HP MSA 2040 SAN Storage - Manual (Page 9)

: What’s new in this release 9
1 Installing and configuring the SRA
The HP MSA Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) for VMware ® SRM enables full-featured use of VMware
Site Recovery Manager 5.0 or greater. Combining the HP MSA storage system’s Remote Snap
functionality with VMware SRM, the SRA provides an automated solution for implementing and testing
disaster recovery between geographically separated sites. It also enables you to use SRM for planned
migrations between two sites.
What’s new in this release
• Added support for MSA 2040.
• Improved log output following VMware recommendations.
• Added get-info.bat script to provide information that may be requested by VMware technical
support.
• Delete any unmapped snapshot left over after an interrupted testFailoverStart operation.
About VMware Site Recovery Manager
VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager (SRM) is a business continuity and disaster recovery solution that
helps you plan, test, and execute the recovery of vCenter virtual machines between one site (the protected
site) and another site (the recovery site).
Two types of recovery are available, planned migration and disaster recovery.
Planned migration
Planned migration is the orderly decommissioning of virtual machines at the protected site and
commissioning of equivalent machines at the recovery site. For planned migration to succeed, both sites
must be up and fully functioning.
Disaster recovery
Disaster recovery is similar to planned migration except it does not require that both sites be up. During a
disaster recovery operation, failure of operations on the protected site are reported but otherwise ignored.
SRM coordinates the recovery process with the underlying replication mechanisms that the virtual machines
at the protected site are shut down cleanly (in the event that the protected site virtual machines are still
available) and the replicated virtual machines can be powered up. Recovery of protected virtual machines
to the recovery site is guided by a recovery plan that specifies the order in which virtual machines are
started up. The recovery plan also specifies network parameters, such as IP addresses, and can contain
user-specified scripts that can be executed to perform custom recovery actions.
After a recovery has been performed, the running virtual machines are no longer protected. To address this
reduced protection, SRM supports a reprotect operation for virtual machines protected on array-based
storage. The reprotect operation reverses the roles of the two sites after the original protected site is back
up. The site that was formerly the recovery site becomes the protected site and the site that was formerly the
protected site becomes the recovery site.
SRM enables you to test recovery plans. You can conduct tests using a temporary copy of the replicated
data in a way that does not disrupt ongoing operations at either site. You can conduct tests after a
reprotect has been done to confirm that the new protected/recovery site configuration is valid.
Protected sites and recovery sites
In a typical SRM installation, a protected site provides business-critical datacenter services. The protected
site can be any site where vCenter supports a critical business need.
The recovery site is an alternative facility to which these services can be migrated. The recovery site can be
located thousands of miles away. The recovery site is usually located in a facility that is unlikely to be
affected by environmental, infrastructure, or other disturbances that affect the protected site.