Migrating VMs to new data centre using replication

[resruss]

Hi all,

I'm currently in the process of replicating some customers VMs from one side of the country to the other using Veeam 6.1 Replica jobs.
Tests have been great so far, the Windows 2003 VMs boot to login window fine.

Hoping to do migration over the weekend, but I've just had the thought of whether I need to be using VSS the whole time.
The initial backups that were imported using the seed method weren't done using VSS and neither have the incrementals.
The servers have been running during the incrementals thus far, but for the final incremental replicate jobs, the servers will be shut down.

At least one of the servers is a DC, just wondering if I needed to use VSS given that the final incremental replicate job is to be performed with the server offline.
The server I've tested seems to boot fine, but I'm actually not sure if it's a DC (we don't have logins to the windows environment so haven't tested logging in)

Has anyone had any experience doing similar?
We're not re-IPing this side, going to reconfigure the LAN subnets on the other side instead

[dellock6]

Hi,
as a rule of thumb, it's better to use VSS whenever is available. especially on DCs it guarantees active directory consistency. anyway you will not use it during final replication if the source VM will be powered off.

Luca.

[resruss]

Thanks for your response Luca.
I've been given logins on the domain and since been advised there are 2 DCs, both of which I've replicated.
and have booted a copy of the VM I replicated with the NICs attached.
I noticed during boot of the first DC I tested it quickly shows The Active Directory is rebuilding indices.
That does progress quickly and seemed fine after that.

I've actually never seen that message before, are there any errors I need to search for in Event Viewer, does it necessarily mean there's a problem?

[resruss]

Scratch that.
I've tested replication between both DCs, it works.
Just as a final test, I rebooted one of the DCs and now that same server is hung on the Active Directory is rebuilding indices.

Has anyone seen / resolved this before when not using VSS?
Am I better off starting a fresh backup to HDD, shipping it to our environment and seeding the new backup to a new replica?

[dellock6]

Honestly, I never saved a DC without VSS, so I cannot help you on this side. If you have time, maybe yes you can try to start fresh using VSS this time.

Luca.