6.1

When creating placeholder virtual machines on the new protected site, Site Recovery Manager uses the
location of the original protected virtual machine to determine where to create the placeholder virtual
machine. Site Recovery Manager uses the identity of the original protected virtual machine to create the
placeholder. If the original protected virtual machines are no longer available, Site Recovery Manager uses
the inventory mappings from the original recovery site to the original protected site to determine the
resource pools and folders for the placeholder virtual machines. You must configure inventory mappings on
both sites before running the reprotect process, or the process might fail.
When reprotecting virtual machines with array-based replication, Site Recovery Manager places the files for
the placeholder virtual machines in the placeholder datastore for the original protected site, not in the
datastore that held the original protected virtual machines.
Forcing synchronization of data from the new protection site to the new recovery site ensures that the
recovery site has a current copy of the protected virtual machines running at the protection site. Forcing this
synchronization ensures that recovery is possible immediately after the reprotect process finishes.
For information about how Site Recovery Manager reprotects virtual machines with vSphere Replication,
see “How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with vSphere Replication,” on page 113.
For information about how Site Recovery Manager reprotects virtual machines with storage policy
protection, see “How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage Policy Protection,”
on page 113.
How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with
vSphere Replication
In the reprotect process using vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
protection, then forces synchronization of the storage from the new protected site to the new recovery site.
When performing reprotection with vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager uses the original VMDK
files as initial copies during synchronization. The full synchronization that appears in the recovery steps
mostly performs checksums, and only a small amount of data is transferred through the network.
Forcing synchronization of data from the new protection site to the new recovery site ensures that the
recovery site has a current copy of the protected virtual machines running at the protection site. Forcing this
synchronization ensures that recovery is possible immediately after the reprotect process finishes.
If you want to manually set up reverse replication on a vSphere Replication protected virtual machine, use
vSphere Replication in the vSphere Web Client to force stop the incoming replication group on the old
recovery site, which is the new protected site. If you just delete the virtual machine on the original protected
site, the reprotect will fail.
How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage
Policy Protection
In the reprotect process using storage policy protection, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
replication and protects the virtual machines that are associated with the relevant storage policies on what
was previously the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager reestablishes vSphere entity protection and
monitoring on the new protected site.
Reversing the replication of a storage policy protection group is the same as reversing the replication of an
array-based replication protection group because it only affects the underlying storage. When you perform
reprotect on a recovery plan that includes a storage policy protection group, the replication technology that
your storage arrays provide reverses the replication of all of the consistency groups that are associated with
the storage policies that the protection group contains.
Chapter 9 Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery
VMware, Inc. 113