Create a Volume Collection

You can create as many volume collections as needed. An initial schedule is created automatically when you create a volume collection.

NOTE: If you want to specify synchronous replication as the replication type on a volume collection, you must do so when you create the volume collection. You cannot change the replication type after the volume collection is created. Also, you cannot use both protection templates and synchronous replication.
  1. Choose Manage → Data Protection → Volume Collections.
  2. Click the plus (+) sign to add a new volume collection.
  3. On the Name and Schedules page in the Create Volume Collection dialog box, add the required information.
    1. Enter a name, and, if you are using a protection template, select it.
      NOTE: Protection templates are not supported with synchronous replication.
    2. Select a replication type from the list and a replication partner.
      If you want to associate two downstream replication partners with the volume collection, you must specify Periodic Snapshot as the replication type. You can specify only one downstream partner for a protection schedule, but when you use Periodic Snapshot to set up the schedules, you can switch between two downstream partners as you set up the schedules. These partners can be either two on-site partners or one on-site partner and one HPE Cloud Volume partner.
    3. For the Synchronization Service, select one of the following options.
      This quiesces application I/O when snapshots are created to ensure application-consistent backups and replicas.
      Option Description
      None Create snapshots that do not need synchronization.
      Microsoft VSS Create application-consistent snapshots for applicable types of Microsoft applications, including Hyper-V. Synchronization quiesces volume traffic before a snapshot is taken. This ensures that your application never has a snapshot with incomplete data. Select the appropriate application and provide further information such as the application server address. For detailed information, see the Windows Integration Guide.
      VMware vCenter Create snapshots through a VMware vCenter Server. This ensures that snapshots are VMFS-consistent. The first time you create a volume collection with schedules that use this synchronization setting, you need to provide the vCenter host name or IP address, user name, and password. For detailed information, see the VMware Integration Guide.

      To avoid possible performance issues for snapshot schedules that synchronize with Microsoft Exchange, do not run the snapshot verification more than once a day.

    4. In the Schedules section, create a custom protection schedule.

      Default values are provided for many of the fields.

      • You can create multiple schedules for the volume collection.

        For example, you can create one schedule for working hours, one for peak hours, and one for weekends. Schedules can overlap, but they cannot span midnight. If you need a schedule that takes hourly snapshots from 10 PM to 4 AM, you need to create two schedules. The first schedule covers the time period from 10 PM to 11:59 PM and the second schedule covers the time period from 12 AM to 4 AM.

      • If you chose replication, specify how frequently (or after how many snapshots) replication of the volumes in the volume collection should be triggered.
  4. After you define all the protection schedules you need, click Next.
  5. On the Create Volume Collection page, in the Volumes tab, select a volume that appears in the Available volumes list, click the right arrow to add it to the Selected list.

    You can filter the volumes by name and location (either in a pool or a folder). You can also select multiple volumes and add them all at once.

    NOTE: You cannot associate a volume from a replication destination.

    Repeat until you have added all the available volumes that you want to include in this volume collection.

  6. Click Create.