EMC VNX Replicator

Maximize VNX performance and meet your RPOs over any WAN

VNX Replicator provides efficient, asynchronous data replication over IP networks, and offers the following benefits:

  • Replicate file systems and Virtual Data Movers
  • Replicate to a remote system across any distance
  • Advanced replication scenarios like one-to-many, cascaded, and incremental attach
  • One-to-many replication supports up to three destinations
  • Data Mover interconnects support bandwidth scheduled and throttling

While VNX Replicator provides an efficient replication solution for VNX platforms, both are subject to limitations created by the wide area network (WAN). When the WAN connecting the two replication units has latency, packet loss, out-of-order packets, or limited bandwidth, replication throughput can be adversely affected resulting in missed recovery point objectives (RPOs) and potentially failed replication. Either of these expose the business to additional risk in the event of a recovery to the replica.

Proven with EMC

EMC and Silver Peak compiled results for VNX Replicator from joint testing conducted with EMC and real-world customer examples. Silver Peak is able to help customerss using VNX Replicator sustain consistent replication throughput in networks with higher latencies. The example below shows replication between east and west coast sites in the United States over an IP VPN. Typical network latency was 80ms with a 1% rate of packet loss.

Figure 1. VNX Replicator: Replication time versus RPO across an IP VPN with 1% packet loss, 80ms latency 

Regional replication over Internet VPN— Hopkinton, MA to Santa Clara, CA

  • 64 gigabytes (GB) of data per hour replicating over a 45 Mbps network connection
  • RPO: 2 hours
  • Latency: 80ms
  • Packet loss: 1%
  Replication before Silver Peak Replication with Silver Peak software enabled

Throughput

 

24.5 GB/hour

 

174.6 GB/hour

7X increase in throughput

Time to replicate: 

 

2 hours, 48 minutes

Missed RPO by 48 minutes

36 minutes

2 hour RPO maintained / reduced to 0.6 hours

How Silver Peak can help

Silver Peak software eliminates the network inefficiencies that can reduce replication throughput. Silver Peak overcomes distance limitations between source and target appliances by accelerating replication traffic and efficiently using all of the available bandwidth. Silver Peak also protects accelerated traffic with real-time AES encryption without impacting performance. 

Benefits

  • Meet Recovery Point Objectives (RPO). Replicate more data in less time to remote locations.
  • Replicate over longer distances. Eliminate distance limitations between source/target devices. Get consistent, high replication throughput even over poor quality networks
  • Improve business continuity. Maintain redundant data centers in distant geographies for rapid recovery from disasters.
  • Lower disaster recovery costs. Eliminate costly dedicated networks for replication; avoid bandwidth upgrades.
  • Secure data in transit. Encrypt and accelerate traffic between Silver Peak instances at wire speed, using AES-256, IPSec VPN

Resources

  • Silver Peak VRX Replication Acceleration software makes replication acceleration easy and affordable.
  • EMC VNX is a unified storage system that provides options for customers of any size. Smaller businesses can utilize the VNXe as an affordable solution to store and protect their data. For medium-sized to enterprise businesses, the VNX is a flexible high performance solution to all storage and data protection needs. For businesses with replication requirements, the VNX family can utilize EMC RecoverPoint. Additionally, VNXe can use VNX Replicator for less demanding environments.