Permanent Failover, then what?

[jbarrow.viracoribt]

So, I'm trying to document my recovery process and I have a question about Permanent Failover.

Take this scenario...

I have a VM running in production, that VM is replicated hourly.
That VM is accidentally deleted (just go with me here) and I need to recover from a replica.
I start the Restore wizard, I choose Failover to replica, I select my VM, I choose a restore point, then I let the process finish.
Once completed, I then choose Permanent Failover.

Here's where I'm a little confused. Based on what's going on above, I'm pretty sure this would leave me with the replica VM now acting as a replacement VM for the production VM that failed, but this replica VM is now running at my DR site. How would I get this VM back over to my production site after this step? Would I just set up a replication job going the other way then repeat the process? That seems like a bunch of extra work.

Thoughts?

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi Jonathan,

You're right, you can perform permanent failover and then configure replication/quick migration job to move this VM back to production. Alternatively, you can start a VM failover operation (not permanent failover) and then select failback to production option to copy this VM back to production. For additional details, please take a look at our User Guide (page 252).

Thanks!

[tsightler]

Yes, "permanent failover" is by definition intended to be permanent, so effectively at that point there is no failback and thus you would have to replicate the VM back. Unfortunately, running at the DR site without "permanent failover" requires running off of a snapshot so isn't always possible for extended periods of time or in cases where performance is of critical importance.