Help with Disaster Recovery of Compaq server to a Dell Server 1

[Raid5]

Hello Everyone,
I have been given the task of doing a Disaster Recovery scenario for a company. I have to do a Disaster Recovery of a Compaq Proliant 6000 server to a Dell Poweredge server. A Disaster recovery to a server of the same class and Raid Controller is easy. But if you change the hardware then that is another story. Have any of you ever restored a server class box to another brand server "much different hardware"? If you have please help me with the procedure that you used with backup Exec 9.x.

 

[comtec17]

What OS is this server running? Win2k or NT4?

Is the server running AD, SQL, Exchange, etc..?

Typically upon the completion of the restore and prior to rebooting the server you will want to remove the following drivers:

NIC
Video
RAID Controller
any other differing hardware driver

Then re-install drivers and reboot.

Microsoft does not support doing this as their requirement is to recover the same server to the same hardware.

 

[Raid5]

Thanks for the reply,
I have 2 servers to restore, one is NT4 sp6a and the other is 2003 Standard edition to restore. The NT 4 box has oracle. and the 2003 box is a Domain Controller in a AD forest. Your reply makes sense but how to remove drivers for an OS that you are not booted into. After I restore my server, how will I remove the drivers because I am not actully booted into my restored configuration at that point.

J.R.

 

[comtec17]

You will need to install the base OS and SP first along with you backup software/client.

Once you are up and running, do your restore, then remove the drivers and re-add.

 

[Raid5]

I do really appreciate the help but I must point out again.
1. Build the OS and SP level.
2. install backup agent.
3. restore all server data.
4. before rebooting remove all drivers.
Step 4 will be performed before rebooting the server right! If you remove the drivers before rebooting then you are removing the drivers from the "Base install" not the restored configuration, right? When you reboot the box the OS that you have restored will be booting up, Not the base install that we have overwritten with the restore. I just don't see how removing drivers on the base install is going to make any difference at all. Hopefully you will be kind enough to let me know.

Thank You.

 

[comtec17]

Once you restore the data, the restored drivers are not active until you reboot. This is why you remove the drivers after the restore and reapply the new ones, then reboot.