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Running the Replication Process › Synchronize Master and Replica Servers › How Offline Synchronization Works › Perform Non-full System High Availability Scenarios

Perform Non-full System High Availability Scenarios

Use this method of offline synchronization when the production data set is very large and the WAN link does not have enough throughput to allow for a synchronization of the total data set in a reasonable amount of time.

The offline synchronization process creates VSS snapshots of the volume that resides in the root directory on the master server. By default, Arcserve RHA mounts the root directory to the location where the RHA Engine was installed, such as the C:\ drive. The following example illustrates the location of the VSS snapshot files when the offline synchronization process runs:

C:\OfflineSyncMountPoint\<scenarioID>\E_volume

Synchronization message.

Note: In the following window, C_Volume represents a VSS mounted volume at this point. For example, when you want to retain the sparse file attributes, you can create a new File Server DR scenario to replicate the data from within this mounted snapshot to an external device.

Offline synchronization. C_Volume is the mounted VSS snapshot.

For the Replica server, you create another File Server DR scenario to replicate from the external device into the target root directory. For example, E:\Data on the Replica server. Optionally, you can perform a Robocopy, (robust file copy), a file copy, or any other copy methods from the Master mounted snapshot volume, and then manually copy the data from the external drive into the target folder on the Replica server after you transferred the drive.

Follow these steps:

  1. Configure the scenario in the usual manner.
  2. From the Manager, click Offline Sync.
  3. Copy data from the mounted VSS snapshot to external device.
  4. Move the device to the replica server and then copy the data to the target folder.
  5. From the Manager menu, click Tools and Offline Sync Management
  6. Select the offline sync option that you would want to use.

    Note: The Verification option compares the files in mounted VSS snapshot on the master server with the data that resides in the root directory on the replica server and reports back to you if they are identical or not.

  7. Continue running the scenario.