No suitable placeholder datastore

[Gabrie1]

Hi

Setup SRM5. Replication from Site-A to Site-B is now completely configured. Unfortunately, trying to configure replication from Site-B to Site-A doesn't allow me to set a placeholder datastore. It does show me a number of datastores but they are all greyed out.

As far as I can see, the datastore I would like to use is empty, but formatted with VMFS5. It is configured at the other site. It is connected to all hosts.

Any idea why the datastore is greyed out?

Gabrie

[AureusStone]

Seems strange.  Is the placeholder datastore available on all of the hosts?  Is the datastore non-replicated?

Maybe delete the placeholder and reformat.

Log in to the other vCenter server and manage SRM from there.  For some reason with older versions of SRM this has made a difference for me.

Otherwise I guess you will have to raise a support ticket.  Seems like a bug.

[Gabrie1]

Why MUST it be non-replicated? Because it is replicated since I also store templates on it and in case of a failover it always handy to have that datastore available. Are you sure SRM checks to see if it is NOT replicated?

Thanks for answering

[AureusStone · Accepted solution]

I am not certain if SRM checks if the placeholder datastore is replicated or not.  But VMware does recommend that you use non-replicated datastores.

"Ensure that a placeholder datastore has been created at the recovery site in order to complete this step
correctly. A placeholder datastore can contain shadow VMs for members of a protection group. The placeholder
datastore should be accessible to all hosts in the recovery cluster. It should not be replicated and can be
relatively small."

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/products/SRM/VMware-vCenter-Site-Recovery-Manager-Evaluation-Guide.p...

Most SRM designs I see use a dedicated very small (1GB is heaps) LUN which only contains placeholder VMs.  I think this is cleaner and easier then placing your placeholder on a LUN that also stores templates.

[Gabrie1]

I will change my design and create a small place holder LUN.

What I often miss in manuals like these is the reason why. Or a better explicit yes or no.

"Ensure that a placeholder datastore has been created at the recovery site in order to complete this step
correctly. A placeholder datastore can contain shadow VMs for members of a protection group. The placeholder
datastore should be accessible to all hosts in the recovery cluster. It should not be replicated and can be
relatively small."

Because when I read this, I interpeted it as: There is no need to replicate, because you only need it to be on the recovery site.

I didn't draw the conclusion that you really shouldn't replicate it.

Will give it a try to see if the replication is the issue 🙂

Thanks

[JoVerstappen]

Worked after removing the replication