Planning vVols replication

To implement vVols replication between two systems, each system must support vVols and asynchronous policy-based replication.

The following restrictions apply when you use vVols replication (For more information on asynchronous policy-based replication, see Disaster recovery.:

• A limit of one I/O group can be configured in each system.
• A limit of one partnership can be configured for vVols replication. Additional partnerships can be configured in each system but only a single partnership can be used for vVols replication.
• The size of a virtual volume cannot be changed while it is part of a vSphere replication group.

Each storage system is a separate fault domain for vVols replication. The storage systems must be sufficiently far apart such that anticipated disruptions affect only one location.

Use vCenter Server and ESXi versions that support vVols replication. vCenter Server and ESXi can discover replication groups, but do not manage their lifecycle. When you use vVols replication, the failover and disaster recovery operations are managed through vCenter Server integrations such as VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM) and PowerCLI. A vCenter Server is required in each location.

Storage Virtualize supports the use of preconfigured replication groups only. The automatic creation of replication groups by using vSphere is not supported.

When you use replication with virtual volumes, you can apply a replication storage policy only to a configuration virtual volume and a data virtual volume. The swap virtual volume and any memory vVols are excluded from replication. Virtual machine snapshots are also excluded from replication.

When planning the VMware environment, if you intend to create virtual machine snapshots, you must check that the vCenter Server integrations you intend to use to manage vVol replication support replication without snapshots.