Restoring an Exchange Server database

You can use the restore into function to restore an Exchange Server database backup to a recovery database or alternate database. You can also restore a DAG active or passive database copy to a recovery database or alternate database.

• Ensure that your system is set up to use the DAG node name (DAGNODE). You can specify the DAG node name in the DAG Node field in the IBM Storage ProtectNode Names page of the IBM Storage Protect configuration wizard, or in the Back up DAG databases to common node field in the General properties page for your Exchange Server workload.
• You can restore mailboxes with the Mailbox Restore Browser or Mailbox Restore functions. In some rare cases, however, you might want to restore data into a recovery database or alternate database. Ensure that a recovery database or alternate database exists before you attempt the restore operation.

• For database backups in the Exchange Server Database Availability Group (DAG) environment, you can restore a database regardless of which DAG member the database was backed up from because all database copies are backed up by using a single DAG node. Local backups must be restored on the node where the backup was completed.

  In a stand-alone environment, you cannot back up a database from one DAG member and restore it to a different DAG member. Backups of the same database are managed with the same policy, regardless of whether the database is active or passive at the time of the backup.

• Running any type of restore into function automatically disables VSS instant restore capability.

  When you restore a database by using instant restore processing, data that exists in the destination database is overwritten, and is no longer available after restore processing is complete. When you restore a database by using the restore into function, you restore data to an alternate target destination. The data is not restored to the original source destination. For the restore operation to be successful, the alternate target destination must be of equal or greater size as the original source volume.

• To complete restore operations, backups must be taken on the same version of Exchange Server.
• You cannot use multiple instances of IBM Storage Protect Snapshot for Exchange Server to restore databases into the recovery database simultaneously.

1. From Microsoft Management Console (MMC), click Recover Data in the welcome page.
2. On the Recover tab for the Exchange Server instance, select View: Database Restore.
   In the Results pane, browse to the databases that are available to restore. The following options are available:

   Table 1. Table 1. Database restore selection options

   Option	Action
   Filter	Use the filter options to narrow the list of databases in the result pane. Click Show Filter Options and Add Row. In the Column Name field, click the down arrow and select an item to filter. For database backups in the Exchange Server DAG environment, the Server column displays the name of the DAG and the server that created the backup in this format: DAGNAME\SERVERNAME where DAGNAME is the name of the DAG, and SERVERNAME is the name of the server (DAG member) that created the backup. For example: TSMDAG4\AVOCADO To filter by Backup Date, click the default date and time to edit the table cell. To change the date, click the arrow button that is displayed at the end of the cell. The calendar date selection tool is displayed. After you select a date, to display the date in the field, press Enter. To edit the time, enter the time by using the 12-hour clock time convention such as 2 p.m. When you click Select All, all rows that reflect the filter specifications are selected. In the Operator field, select an operator. In the Value field, specify a filter value. If you want to filter on more items, click Add Row. Click Apply Filter.
   Backups	Select the database to restore. You can click Active Backups to show only active backups, or click All Backups to show both active and inactive backups.
   Search	In the Search field, enter a keyword to filter the list of available databases.
   Refresh	Click Refresh to update the view with your changes.

   If you applied a filter, the objects on the server that match the filter or search criteria are listed in the Recover tab. The status area indicates the number of items that match the criteria n of x displayed, where n equals the number of objects that match the filter criteria, and x is the number of objects that are retrieved from the server. For example, 5 of 20 displayed. If you specify refresh options to further narrow your results, and click Refresh again, the objects on the server that match the filtered and refresh options are displayed. Each time that you click Refresh, another query is run against the IBM Storage Protect server.

3. On the Recover tab for the Exchange Server instance, select one or more backups to restore.
   If the Auto Select option is set to Yes in the Restore Options view, more backups that are necessary to restore the most recent backup are selected for you. If you do not want the additional selections that are made for you, set Auto Select to No.
4. Verify the restore options. If the restore options are not displayed, click Show Restore Options.
5. Optional: Choose a mode for the current task:
   • Run Interactively: Click this item to run the current task interactively. This selection is the default.
   • Run Scheduled: Click this item to convert the current action into a scheduled task. When you select this item, the schedule wizard runs the command that is required to complete the task.
6. Start the restore operation:
   • To restore the backup, right-click that backup name and select Restore. Alternatively, in the Actions pane, click Restore.
   • To restore the backup into another location, right-click and select Restore Into to specify a target location for the restore operation. A dialog window opens where you can specify the destination database.

     Select the name of a database into which a VSS backup is restored.

   VSS instant restore is available only for full or copy type backups that are on the disk devices that support this type of restore operation. During the VSS instant restore operation, the drive or volume where the database is located must not be accessed by any other process or application.