Replication
Some of the features described in this section are only available for on-premises deployments.
This section describes backup replication as a part of the protection plan. For information about creating a separate replication plan, refer to "Off-host data processing".
If you enable backup replication, each backup will be copied to another location immediately after creation. If earlier backups were not replicated (for example, the network connection was lost), the software also replicates all of the backups that appeared after the last successful replication.
Replicated backups do not depend on the backups remaining in the original location and vice versa. You can recover data from any backup, without access to other locations.
Usage examples
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Reliable disaster recovery
Store your backups both on-site (for immediate recovery) and off-site (to secure the backups from local storage failure or a natural disaster).
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Using the cloud storage to protect data from a natural disaster
Replicate the backups to the cloud storage by transferring only the data changes.
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Keeping only the latest recovery points
Delete older backups from a fast storage according to retention rules, in order to not overuse expensive storage space.
Supported locations
You can replicate a backup from any of these locations:
- A local folder
- A network folder
- Secure Zone
- An SFTP server
- Locations managed by a storage node
You can replicate a backup to any of these locations:
- A local folder
- A network folder
- The cloud storage
- An SFTP server
- Locations managed by a storage node
- A tape device
To enable replication of backups
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On the protection plan panel, click Add location.
The Add location control is available only if replication is supported from the last selected backup or replication location.
- Specify the location where the backups will be replicated.
- [Optional] In How long to keep, change the retention rules for the chosen location, as described in "Retention rules".
- [Optional] In Convert to VM, specify the settings for conversion to a virtual machine, as described in "Conversion to a virtual machine".
- [Optional] Click the gear icon > Performance and backup window, and then set the backup window for the chosen location, as described in "Performance and backup window". These settings will define the replication performance.
- [Optional] Repeat steps 1-5 for all locations where you want to replicate the backups. Up to five consecutive locations are supported, including the primary one.
If you enable backup and replication in the same protection plan, ensure that the replication completes before the next scheduled backup. If the replication is still in progress, the scheduled backup will not start. For example, a scheduled backup that runs once every 24 hours will not start if the replication takes 26 hours to complete.
To avoid this dependency, use a separate plan for backup replication. For more information about this specific plan, refer to Backup replication.