Enhanced data protection/CDP question

[JLaay]

Hi all,

I 'm trying to understand the workings of Starwinds Enhanced Data protection / CDP

My goal is to be able to restore a VM contained in a Starwind .img file
( I use one .img-file per VM )

So far I 've made snapshots with the use of ghettoVCB.
For restoring I used ghettoVCB-restore.

Simulating a failure, I 've deleted the VM with vSphere client from the .img-file of Starwind.
Restored the with ghettoVCB snapshotted VM with ghettoVCB-restore. Restarted VM, Works fine.

Restoring Starwind disk (? Starwind disk is equal to .img-file ?)
I read/used the (outdated) document http://www.starwindsoftware.com/starwin ... protection

Reading the already mentioned document I cannot get my head around being able to do the same thing with the EDP/CDP procedure by Starwind.
What I 'm missing in the doc is the action to 'overwite' the the data of ALL the drives > restore the snapshot of all the drives.
If this were at all possible on a running VM/windows system.

I 'm sure I'm missing the clue.

Can anyone using this functionality help me out?

Thanx,

Jaap

Answer of support Starwind:

Restoring StarWInd disk (link clone and full clone)

The purpose in my opinion is to restore a StarWind image file .img

1. I only see: connecting the second ‘linked clone’ snapshot. No copying/restoring the data from that second snapshot to the image file.
2. I can’t see how you will be able to restore the system drive (physical server of VM).
3. Why is the original snapshot in this case deleted?

You may consult the following guides:
http://www.starwindsoftware.com/images/ ... pshots.pdf
http://www.starwindsoftware.com/images/ ... nd_CDP.pdf

When you restore the image file, it is actually not restored, but a virtual disk is cloned.

Linked clone - it is a clone connected to the parent disk. It means that a new Snapshot/CDP device is created, which is using some logs of the parent disk.
The benefits of such a solution – the cloning is done rather quickly. Downsides – it is not independent disk, and uses parent logs, therefore the access speed to such device is slower.
Full clone – creates completely independent copy of a disk. Downsides – the cloning is slower. Upsides – it is not linked to parent disk, therefore works faster.

[Constantin (staff)]

So, as I can see, you`ve received answer from our support team. Do you have any additional questions?

[JLaay]

Hi Constantin,

I 've sent the questions and problems I have with EDP/CDP to Julia.
(because she asked from the beginning of my evaluation to do so)

With the documentation in front of me:
- I 've created a new target and run the snapshot shot.
- Mounted the device to be able to restore files.
- No files available

Also sent the log-file.

The main question: is EDP/CDP equivalent to VMware snapshot has not been answered.
Can I remove a target (.IMG-file) and get it back by use us EDP/CDP.

Greetz Jaap

[Constantin (staff)]

Yes, CDP can be compared to VmWare`s snapshots, but CDP allows you to make in time backups.