5.5

VMware, Inc. 9
Chapter 1 vCenter Server Heartbeat Introduction
Data Protection
Once installed, vCenter Server Heartbeat configures itself to protect files, folders, and even the registry
settings for vCenter Server on the active server by mirroring these in real-time to the passive server. If a failover
occurs, all files protected on the failed server are available after the failover, hosted on the Secondary server.
Figure 1-3. Apply Process
Communications
The VMware Channel is a crucial component of the setup and can be configured in a number of ways.
Both the Primary and Secondary servers must have two or more network interface connections (NICs).
The Principal (Public) network requires one NIC. The VMware Channel uses a separate NIC, a private
connection used for control and data transfer between the pair of servers.
The VMware Channel might use a second pair of NICs to provide a degree of redundancy. In this case, the
VMware Channel has a Dual Channel if more than one dedicated NIC is provided for the VMware Channel
on each server. To provide added resilience, the communications for the second channel must be completely
independent from the first channel – they must not share any switches, virtual switches, routers or the same
WAN connection.