Preparing for disaster recovery

Recommendations for disaster recovery preparation

Preparing for disaster ahead of time is key to recovering from it. The first steps to recovery from catastrophic failure of an Exchange database or filer should take place long before the event occurs.

Every environment and site is unique and every company has different requirements, depending on the amount of time recovery can take, archiving resources, and other factors. Taking these differences into account, consider the following general disaster recovery preparation recommendations:

If you are using SnapMirror to mirror your data, keep the filer storing the destination SnapMirror volumes in a different physical location than your primary production system. In extreme cases, an entire site can be destroyed in a catastrophic event.
If you are using archiving, the archive media, such as a NetApp NearStore® system or tape, should be located off site.
Instate a policy of redundant knowledge by ensuring that more than one person knows how to restore the system.
Record your Exchange data configuration, and keep detailed records and logs of changes you make to your Windows and Exchange environments. Keep hardcopy duplicates of these records off site.

Components required to restore your environment

To be able to reconstruct your Exchange environment after a catastrophic failure, you must be able to recover the following three components:

Windows environment
You can either back up or replicate your Windows environment.

For more information about backing up your Windows environment, see Backing up your Exchange environment.

For more information about replicating your Windows environment, see Replicating your Exchange environment.
Exchange server
You can either back up your Exchange server or reconstruct it using the Exchange recovery mode. To be able to reconstruct your Exchange server, you must have restored or replicated your Windows environment exactly.

For more information about backing up your Exchange server, see Backing up your Exchange server.

For more information about replicating your Windows environment, see Replicating your Exchange environment.
Exchange data
You use SnapManager for Microsoft Exchange to create backups of your Exchange data, then move that data off site, either by archiving those backups or using SnapMirror to mirror them to another filer at a remote site.

Two methods to get Exchange data off site

You can use either of these methods to get your Exchange data off site for disaster recovery:

You can use SnapMirror to mirror your filer data to a filer in another location.
For more information about using SnapMirror with SnapManager, see Using SnapMirror with SnapManager.
You can archive the data to physical media, such as tapes, and store that media off site.
For more information about archiving Exchange data, see Archiving SnapManager Backups.

If you're unsure which method to use, see the following table, which outlines advantages and disadvantages of each method:

Method to get Exchange data off site	Advantages	Disadvantages
Using SnapMirror	Restoring from a SnapMirror destination is significantly faster than restoring from tape. The destination can be updated more frequently than tape, resulting in more current archives.	Another filer is required in the remote location. WAN connectivity to the remote location is required.
Archiving SnapManager backups	The required equipment might already be available and in use.	Restoring from tape is significantly slower than restoring from a filer. Tapes must be stored and managed.