Replicating a Virtual Machine and Enabling Multiple Point in Time Instances

You can recover virtual machines at specific points in time (PIT) such as the last known consistent state.

Note: You cannot use the Site Recovery Manager interface to configure replication that uses point in time (PIT) snapshots. To enable PIT snapshots, configure replication of a virtual machine by using the vSphere Web Client. See Configure Replication for a Single Virtual Machine in vSphere Replication Administration.

When you configure replication of a virtual machine, you can enable multiple point in time (PIT) instances in the recovery settings in the Configure Replication wizard. vSphere Replication retains a number of snapshot instances of the virtual machine on the target site based on the retention policy that you specify. vSphere Replication supports maximum of 24 snapshot instances. After you recover a virtual machine, you can revert it to a specific snapshot.

During replication, vSphere Replication replicates all aspects of the virtual machine to the target site, including any potential viruses and corrupted applications. If a virtual machine suffers from a virus or corruption and you have configured vSphere Replication to keep PIT snapshots, you can recover the virtual machine and then revert it to a snapshot of the virtual machine in its uncorrupted state.

You can also use the PIT instances to recover the last known good state of a database.

Note: vSphere Replication does not replicate virtual machine snapshots.

Figure 1. Recovering a Virtual Machine at Points in Time (PIT)

Site Recovery Manager only recovers the most recent PIT snapshot during a recovery. To recover older snapshots, you must enable the vrReplication > preserveMpitImagesAsSnapshots option in Advanced Settings in the Site Recovery Manager interface. See Change vSphere Replication Settings.

To recover a virtual machine from an older PIT snapshot, you must manually revert the virtual machine to that snapshot after the recovery. See Recover a Point-in-Time Snapshot of a Virtual Machine.

If you recover a PIT snapshot of a virtual machine for which you have configured IP customization, Site Recovery Manager only applies the customization to the most recent PIT snapshot. If you recover an older PIT snapshot of a virtual machine with IP customization, you must configure the IP settings manually.