DL4300 Appliance
Determining your seeding needs and strategy
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To avoid slowing down your network with an intensive transfer of historical data, seed your prior backup data to
the target Core using a seed drive. A seed drive is an archive file that copies a set of deduplicated base images
and incremental snapshots from the source Core. The seed drive file contains the full set of previous recovery
points for the protected machines you want to replicate from the source Core to the target Core.
Move the seed drive file to a storage volume which you then make available to the target Core. Then you
consume the information from the seed drive. This involves attaching the volume with the seed drive image to
the target Core and importing the data to the repository from the Core Console. This process repairs orphans,
uniting incremental snapshots replicated to the target Core with their base images, to form one or more complete
recovery point chains. This process is sometimes called copy-consume.
Seeding data from your source Core is not always required. For example:
•
If you are setting up replication for a new Rapid Recovery Core, seeding is not required.
•
If the data from previous snapshots are not critical for your replicated data, and you only need to recover data saved after
replication is set up, seeding is not required.
NOTE:
In this case, Dell recommends capturing a new base image immediately before or immediately
after setting up replication. This step ensures a full recovery point chain exists on the target Core from
which to restore data in the future.
•
If you captured a base image immediately before setting up replication, and only have a need to restore from data
captured after that date, seeding is not required.
•
If you set up replication without specifying a seed drive, then the snapshot data transmits over the network from the
source Core to the target Core.
If one of these situations applies to you, you do not need to seed data. In such cases, replication can be
completed entirely from the source Core.
If you set up replication for a Core with existing recovery points and may need to restore at the volume level,
want to perform a BMR, or want to restore data from an earlier base image or incremental snapshot, seeding is
required. In these situations, consider your seeding needs and strategy. Review the information in this topic and
decide whether you will seed to your target Core, and which approach you will use.
Approaches to seeding data
If you want your replicated machines on a target Core to have access to data saved previously on the original
source Core, seed your target Core using one of the following approaches:
1. Seed to the target Core over a network connection. Specify the use of a seed drive when you define
replication. you can then share the folder containing the seed drive with the target Core, and consume the
seed drive file over the network. For large data or slow connections, seeding by this method can take a
substantial amount of time and consume substantial network bandwidth.
NOTE:
Dell does not recommend seeding large amounts of data over a network connection. Initial
seeding potentially involves very large amounts of data, which could overwhelm a typical WAN
connection.
2. Transfer backup data from the source Core using physical storage media. Transfer the seed drive file to a
portable external removable storage device. This approach is typically useful for large sets of data or sites
with slow network connections. Seeding using this method requires you to perform the following steps:
a. Create a seed archive from the source Core, saving it to removable media.
b. Transport the seed drive to the physical location of the target Core.
c. Attach the drive to the target Core.
d. Consume the data from the seed drive to the repository of the target Core.
If replicating to a third-party Core, once your media is received by the MSP, a
data center representative typically attaches the media and notifies you when it is
ready for you to consume (or import) the seed data into the Core.
