VMware: vSphere Replication Part 7 - Provision additional Replication Servers

As stated in previous article vSphere Replication architecture comprises two key elements: vSphere Replication Manager and one or more vSphere Replication Servers. Although there is only one vSphere Replication Manager in a vSphere Replication deployment we can add more than just one vSphere Replication Server in our environment to achieve a better load balancing for replicating VMs to target site.

Provisioning more than one vSphere Replication Server concurr in offloading replication tasks to more than just one server leading to a potentially faster replication process.

How can we deploy more than just the standard vSphere Replication Server comprised in vSphere Replication Appliance?

The process is really simple, just login to vSphere Web Client and select vSphere Replication -> Home -> Manage -> vSphere Replication -> Replication Servers and click Deploy Additional RS Server.

The usual OVF deploy form will pop-out, make sure you select the assembly file vSphere_Replication_AddOn_OVF10.ovf that came with vSphere Replication appliance iso downloaded from VMware website.

You will need to provide IP address or leave DHCP assignation if you prefer, and an administrative password to manage the server. Please bear in mind that vSphere Replication Server unlike vSphere Replication Management Server does not have a VAMI so you cannot login to a webpage to configure it but vSphere Replication Management Server will address this for you and will give you the opportunity to configure additional vSphere Replication Servers from it's VAMI.

Once deployed and powered on we can add it as an additional replication server.

Click Register vSphere Replication Server and select the newly deployed standalone server.

Newly deployed vSphere Replication Server will be added and will be listed under Replication Servers page.

Additional vSphere Replication Server can now be selected when performing a replication. Auto-assign mechanisms will always choose least busy vSphere Replication Server (i.e the one with least replications assigned) while manual selection gives you the opportunity to manually choose by which server your VMs will be replicated to target.

Other blog posts in vSphere Replication Series:

vSphere Replication Part 1 - Introduction
vSphere Replication Part 2 - Installation
vSphere Replication Part 3 - Roles & Permissions
vSphere Replication Part 4 - Configuration
vSphere Replication Part 5 - Enable Replication
vSphere Replication Part 6 - Perform Recovery
vSphere Replication Part 7 - Provision additional Replication Servers