CBT = fales on replicas

[ChrisVH1982]

Hello,

I wonder if somebody has a clue why Veeam behaves like this:

We are replicating a large VM from a branch office to our main office. It does the job when it comes to disaster recovery because the VM can be started at its new location. However, would like to take a backup of it, too. Rather than taking a backup of the replica using Veeam, we would like to back this VM up using EMC NetWorker. That tool requires CBT to be enabled.

We could manually enable CBT for that particular replica, but what will happen?
1. Replica will become unusable to Veeam
2. Inconsistencies
3. CBT will just be disabled when new replication job will run
4. It's all good and we can safely leave it enabled?

I just think that there must be a reason why it has been disabled.

Your help is much appreciated!

[foggy]

Christian, reasons of inability to use CBT on replica VMs are explained in this thread. However, haven't you considered using replicas from backup in order to have both backup and replica of the same VM without the need to touch it twice?

[ChrisVH1982]

That thread you are referring to is exactly what I am struggling with. I want to keep both my replica and backups at the remote site, not backups at branch office and just the replica at the DR site.
Okay so CBT can't work for replicas since VMware cannot track those "external changes".

[foggy]

How about backup locally, backup copy to remote site and then using replica from backups there?

[ChrisVH1982]

Yes I think this is an option. So basically the local backup is kind of a "cache" then, right. This way it's not a replica being transferred but a backup. And using instant recovery, we can still ensure that the VM can start very quickly.

[veremin]

It's more like a seed. The replica VM restore points are created from backup data, no need to use Instant VM Recovery, as everything can be done via failover/failback operations. More information here. Thanks.