HP StoreVirtual 4000 Storage - Manual (Page 6)

Table 1 Uses for Remote Copy
How it works Use Remote Copy for
Remote Copy stores remote snapshots on a machine in a geographically separate
location. The remote snapshots remain available in the event of a site or system
failure at the primary site. Business continuance and disaster
recovery
Remote Copy eliminates the backup window on an application server by creating
remote snapshots on a backup server, either local or remote, and back up from
that server. Off-site backup and recovery
Remote Copy makes a complete copy of one or more volumes without interrupting
access to the original volumes. You can move the copy of the volume to the
location where it is needed. Split mirror, data migration, content
distribution
Remote Copy creates copies of the original volume for use by other application
servers. Volume clone
Benefits of Remote Copy
•
Remote Copy maintains the primary volume’s availability to application servers. Snapshots
on the primary volume are taken instantaneously, and are then copied to remote snapshots
in the off-site location.
•
Remote Copy operates at the block level, moving large amounts of data much more quickly
than file system copying.
•
Snapshots are incremental, that is, snapshots save only those changes in the volume since the
last snapshot was created. Therefore, failback may need to resynchronize only the latest
changes rather than the entire volume.
•
Remote Copy is robust. If the network link goes offline during the process, copying resumes
where it left off when the link is restored.
Planning for Remote Copy
Remote Copy works at the management group, cluster, volume, and snapshot levels. Review Table 2
(page 6) for common configurations at these levels.
Table 2 Remote Copy, LeftHand OS, and storage systems
Remote Copy configuration Storage system
level
Management
groups •
Create remote snapshots in the same management group or in a different management group
than the primary volume.
• If using different management groups, the remote bandwidth setting of the management group
containing the remote volume determines the maximum rate of data transfer to the remote
snapshot.
•
Event notification tells you when copies complete or fail. It also notifies you if a remote volume
or snapshot is made primary or if the status of the connection between management groups
containing primary and remote volumes changes.
• Create remote snapshots in the same cluster or in a cluster different from the primary volume. Clusters
Volumes •
Primary volumes contain the data to be copied to the remote snapshot.
• Data is copied to the remote snapshot via the remote volume.
•
The remote volume is a pointer to the remote snapshot. The remote volume has a size of 0
bytes.
•
After data is copied from the primary snapshot to the remote snapshot, the remote snapshot
behaves as a regular snapshot.
Snapshots
6 Understanding and planning Remote Copy