The first product in our Replication Roundup is vSphere Replication.  vSphere Replication is VMware’s product for VM based replication, and is included in licensing Essentials Plus and up.

The Lab Setup:

For our lab, we have 2 vCenter 6.0 servers, and 2 ESXi 6.0 servers, 1 for each site.  Each ESXi host is added into the respective vCenter server.  In this post, we will cover installation, and connecting the 2 sites together, making the environment ready to replicate VMs once configured.

Installation:

vSphere replication is installed by deploying an OVA at each site, configuring the respective settings, and then connecting the 2 sites.

First, choose to deploy an OVA template from the vSphere Web Client, and choose the downloaded OVA file.  Review the details, and accept the EULA.

   

Now, give the vSphere Replication Appliance a name, and choose the datacenter or folder  object to hold it.  Next up is CPU allocation.  The default is 4 vCPUs.  I chose 2 vCPUs for my lab.  After that, we select a resource.  In my nested lab, my only resource was a single host.

    

Next, we choose our storage: Thick or Think provisioning, a Storage Policy, and the datastore to house the appliance.  After clicking Next, we will enter our network information.  For our lab, I;m just going to use DHCP for the appliances.

 

After we set the password for the Root account, we want to setup an NTP server.  Be sure that the time between the vCenter server and the appliances are in sync – otherwise, the web client plugin won’t get registered.

Finally, it lets us know that it is going to register with vCenter, and will have access to the APIs.  Click Next, review the settings, and choose to power on the appliance.

 

 

That completes the deployment of the OVA file. At this point, we can do the same at the remote site.

Part 2 – vSphere 6.0 Replication – Configuration