SRM resources, local?

[mcamp001]

ok, I'm new to SRM, so this may seem like a stupid, obvious question, but when failing over to a DR site, does the DR Vcenter need to contain resources? Such as hosts, VM's, storage, etc. Up until now I have had a single instance of Vcenter for multiple sites, which works just fine, but after starting to go through the SRM config, no resources show up in the DR Vcenter I have put up, so I'm guessing that the resources for that DR site need to reside in that DR Vcenter?  

Some more info;

one copy of Vcenter with multiple sites to manage (site A)

DR copy of Vcenter (appliance) running in site B, but managed from Site A VC

SRM installed and paired Site A and B

When setting up resource mappings, nothing shows up in Site B.

So, the real question is; do I have to move the resources in Site B from the Site A copy of Vcenter to the Site B copy of Vcenter?

Does this make any sense?

[GreatWhiteTec · Accepted solution]

Yes. You will need to have resources at the DR site. You will need hosts, storage etc. Storage should be replicating between sites so that the VMs are "copied" over to DR. SO when failover happen, the DR vCenter takes those copies of VMs and mounts them and makes them the new production VMs. Makes sense?

[GreatWhiteTec]

make sure you read the documentation before moving forward, otherwise you will be pulling your hair out for a while. Once you read and understand how SRM works, it will be very easy to have a successfull deployment.

http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/srm_pubs.html

[mcamp001]

yes, makes sense.. Until now, we have used one Vcenter, so it will take a bit to get used to using multiple copies to manage everything.

One more question, can you link multiple VC's together? I have four sites to use for SRM in sort of a mesh, so is it possible to link all four to manage everything from one console?

[GreatWhiteTec]

Yes. You can use linked-mode. However, linked-mode is not supported on the vCenter appliance.

vCenter Appliance has other shortfalls like no Update Manager, No support for VSA, etc...

[mcamp001]

Thanks a bunch!

[GreatWhiteTec]

No Probs. :smileycool:  Good luck!

[mal_michael]

Hi,

vCenters must be the same version to be in a Linked Mode group.

Michael.

[jeff9565]

mcamp,

**Not sure what I was thinking here, regardless you need vCenter in each location** Keep in mind that unless you use vSphere replication, you would need a vCenter in each location if you are planning on using each one with SRM.  You will also need an SRM server at each location.  You also cannot have a "3 site failover"

For example, you have Site A, B, C, D.

Site A (production) replicates LUN 1 to site B.  Site B replicates that same LUN to site C.  SRM will not fail your virtual machines over to site C.

Jeff