Recoverpoint DR and Backups

[whynotq]

Recoverpoint seems to be a topic of conversation at the moment so i have to add an extra component in here that i hope someone can put an answer to.

scenario is this:

2 sites with EMC SAN, RecoverPoint and SANTap. Nothing odd here, Windows VMs with OS in VMFS and data on RDM, again simple enough the problem comes with the backup.

all LUNs are being Replicated and mounted on a Windows 2000 server running Backup Exec, I know it will see the RDM replicas OK as these will be Windows Volumes but can I mount the VMFS Replica on this or does it need to be 2003 and treated as if it were a VCB proxy?

[daniel_uk]

Does recoverpoint do the backing up or are you using VCB? If its VCB then you will need a 2003 host to use as the proxy.

[kix1979]

I'm a little confused... Where do you want to backup to run? At the source or target? On top of that, are you asking if you can use VCB on the target to backup to tape?

[whynotq]

Recoverpoint is replicating from the DR to the Primary site (seems odd but this is the way it is) and the tape device & Backup server are at the Primary site. all i need to understand is how the backup server will see the replicated VMFS disk, do i need to use the same basic guidelines that we would use for VCB? VCB is not a component of this solution at this time.

[kix1979]

If you are not using VCB, your software will need to have an agent on one or more ESX hosts. There would be no requirement for fibre channel connectivity without VCB.

[whynotq]

I guess it's a case of VCB and a "DR" esx3 host, customer wasn't planning on this and intended to just mount the VMFS on the Backup Server. But thinking about it now that I've recovered from the weekend it is a simple DR with Backup.

[daniel_uk]

If its all SAN connected you could just use a VCB proxy.

[whynotq]

yep, looks like it's the only way to go, which is annoying as it'll mean upgrading the host to W2k3 from 2000. I guess the other option, depending on the Recoverpoint "lag" window between replication, would be linux agent in the COS. But it's Backup Exec, does it do Linux?

[daniel_uk]

Backup Exec dosnt support ESX volumes i beleive.

Surely a 2003 upgrade wont do any harm! tis 7 years old now