In the replicated virtual machines, some hard drives contain information that does not need to be transferred to the destination site. For example, you can exclude from replicating a hard disk that only holds a swap partition.

With VMware Cloud Director Availability, you can select which source disks in a virtual machine to replicate when creating the replication. Also, you can modify this selection after creating the replication. By default, all disks in a virtual machine are selected for replication. Also, you can deselect all disks. Without any disks selected, VMware Cloud Director Availability replicates only the vApp or virtual machine settings.

The same storage policy applies to all the selected disks in a virtual machine.

Replication Direction

You can modify the selected disks in all incoming and outgoing replications:
  • From an on-premises site to a cloud site
  • From a cloud site to an on-premises site
  • From a cloud site to another cloud site

Disk Properties

  • Disk Key is the virtual device key of the disks and is unique for a virtual machine. The disk key is calculated and depends on the controller type and socket the disk is attached to.
  • Label shows the virtual hard drive label.
  • Capacity shows the hard drive space.

Modifying the Virtual Machine Hardware

After creating a replication, you can also edit the source virtual machine hardware and modify the disk count externally to VMware Cloud Director Availability, for example, in vCenter Server or in VMware Cloud Director.

  • After adding a disk to the source virtual machine hardware, VMware Cloud Director Availability selects it for replication and pauses the replication.

  • After removing a disk from the source virtual machine hardware, VMware Cloud Director Availability removes it from the replication configuration without pausing the replication. Previously replicated instances keep their disk count as of the time of their creation.

Disk Mismatch

  • When using a seed virtual machine, the disk count in the virtual machine at the destination must match the number of selected disks in the source virtual machine.
  • For a successful reverse replication, you must address any differences in the selected disks between the source and the recovered workload. Attempting a reverse replication with mismatching disks shows an error message and the source vApp or virtual machine is powered off without completing the reverse replication.