You are here: Full server to ESX protection > Full server to ESX requirements

Full server to ESX requirements

In addition to the Core Double-Take requirements, use these requirements for full server to ESX protection.

Source server—The source server can be any physical server running any of the operating systems listed in the Core Double-Take requirements. The source server must have Double-Take installed and licensed on it.
ESX server—The ESX server that will host your target can be any of the following operating systems. Note that ESX is commonly referred to as the Classic edition and ESXi as the Embedded and Installable edition.

ESX 4.0.x or 4.1 Standard, Advanced, Enterprise, or Enterprise Plus
ESXi 4.0.x or 4.1 Standard, Advanced, Enterprise, or Enterprise Plus
ESXi 5.0 Standard, Advanced, Enterprise, or Enterprise Plus

If you are using the Standard edition of ESX 4.0 or ESXi 4.0, you must have update 1 or later.

If your source is a Windows 2008 R2 server, your ESX server must have ESX 4.0 update 1 or later.

vCenter—Although vCenter is not required, if you are using it, then you must use version 4.1 or later.

VMotion is only supported if you are using vCenter.
Virtual recovery appliance—The ESX server must have an existing virtual machine, known as a virtual recovery appliance, that meets the following requirements. (When you establish protection, the virtual recovery appliance will create a new virtual server, mount disks, format disks, and so on. If failover occurs, the new virtual machine is detached from the virtual recovery appliance and powered on. Once the new virtual machine is online, it will have the identity, data, and system state of the source. Since the virtual recovery appliance maintains its own identity, it can be reused for additional failovers.)

Operating system—The virtual recovery appliance can be any of the operating systems listed in the Core Double-Take requirements.
Operating system version—The virtual recovery appliance must have the same or newer operating system than the source (not including service pack level).
Operating system installation location—Because VMware boots from the first bootable volume that is discovered, the operating system must be installed to SCSI device 0, Slot 0 on the virtual recovery appliance.
Double-Take—The virtual recovery appliance must have Double-Take installed and licensed on it.
Microsoft .NET Framework—Microsoft .NET Framework version 3.5 Service Pack 1 is required on the virtual recovery appliance. This version is not included in the .NET version 4.0 release. Therefore, even if you have .NET version 4.0 installed, you will also need version 3.5.1. You can install this version from the Double-Take CD, via a web connection during the Double-Take installation, or from a copy you have obtained manually from the Microsoft web site.
Snapshots—Do not take snapshots of the virtual recovery appliance, because they will interfere with proper failover.

Disk controller—VMware Paravirtual SCSI Controllers are not supported.
Domain controllers—If your source is a domain controller, it will start in a non-authoritative restore mode after failover. This means that if the source was communicating with other domain controllers before failover, it will require one of those domain controllers to be reachable after failover so it can request updates. If this communication is not available, the domain controller will not function after failover. If the source is the only domain controller, this is not an issue.

Supported configurations—The following table identifies the supported configurations for a full server to ESX job.

Configuration		Supported	Not Supported
Source to target configuration¹	One to one, active/standby	X
	One to one, active/active		X
	Many to one	X
	One to many	X
	Chained		X
	Single server		X
Server configuration²	Standalone to standalone	X
	Standalone to cluster		X
	Cluster to standalone	X
	Cluster to cluster		X
	Cluster Shared Volumes (CSV) guest level	X
	Cluster Shared Volumes (CSV) host level		X
Upgrade configuration³	Upgrade 5.2 physical or virtual server to ESX connection to 6.0 full server to ESX job	X
Upgrade configuration³	Upgrade 5.3 P/V to ESX job to 6.0 full server to ESX job	X

See Supported configurations for details on each of the source to target configurations.
Supported cluster configurations can be used to protect a node, shared storage, or a virtual machine, however, there is no cluster resource or cluster-awareness with this configuration.
When upgrading from version 5.2, you can keep your existing job, but you will need to upgrade to version 5.3 first, then upgrade to version 6.0. If you want to upgrade directly to version 6.0, you will have to delete your job and re-create it. When upgrading from version 5.3, you can perform a rolling upgrade where you update the target server first. After the upgrade is complete, the source will automatically reconnect to the target. At this point, the job will be an unmanaged job that you can delete or failover. No other job controls will be available. Once you upgrade you source, the job will be fully controllable.