Exchange Server Multi-site Data Replication and Data Loss

In MS Exchange Server, multi-site data replication technology refers to the process of availing the redundant data at multiple sites. This solution is provided by third-party software vendors and hardware vendors. But there is a drawback with this technology that if any bad data has been written on the primary storage device causing the database corruption then the same data will get transferred to the remote sites also. Hence this technology does not substitute EDB recovery options.

There are two ways in which the data replication can be performed: synchronous and asynchronous, each having its own set of advantages and disadvantages. One more basis of categorization generates host-based and storage-based replication.

Asynchronous replication: In this the host receives the write-completed reaction from the storage system when the write operation is committed to the local storage device, without waiting for an acknowledgement from the remote storage device. But there are few back points of this method.

The major one is data loss. The primary site outage may lead to the site replica not to be current. Although this delay is configurable on most storage solutions, you should be aware of the potential for data loss due to this behavior. The others are data integrity and performance related problems.

Synchronous replication: The host only receives a write-completed response from the storage system when the write operation is completed in both the local storage location and in the remote storage location. So this is considered superior than the one mentioned earlier.

Host based replication: This mechanism uses a filter driver which of interrupts the I/O process to manage the further procedure of replication. This filter driver is also called host-based software.

Storage based replication: In contrary to the host-based replication, this occurs at the storage device level.

The first described solution i.e. asynchronous replication creates the serious problem of data loss at the sites got replicated. During the link failure condition or primary site failure, data which has been written after will not get replicated. So when you design the storage replication solution, keep in mind of these failures which can happen at your exchange server. However when the server fails, the most important aspect is to recover the data which is there. In other words Exchange recovery becomes a must in all data loss incidents.

This failure can be an outcome of dirty shutdown, corrupted header and many similar problems. The exchange server recovery is possible through third party applications called Exchange data recovery software. These software have the trick to recover the mailboxes from the corrupted MS Exchange server database.

Stellar Phoenix Mailbox Exchange Recovery is the highly developed and advanced Exchange recovery utility. This software recovers in the form of PST files, readable in MS Outlook.

This EDB recovery software supports MS Exchange Server 5.5, 2000 and 2003. The easy to use interface of this Exchange server recovery software doesn't demand any technical stuff from the user. This is the complete and the most secure solution for any data loss incidents.

Article submitted Monday, July 14, 2008
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