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Snapdrive for Unix

What volume-based SnapRestore is

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Volume-based SnapRestore (VBSR) restores the volume with all its storage objects. The volume-based restore is faster than each storage object restored individually. VBSR also works with FlexClone volumes and vFiler configurations. VBSR for vFiler is available for Data ONTAP 7.3 and later.

SnapDrive 3.0 for UNIX and earlier can restore LUNs for a host-side entity like file system, disk groups, and host volumes, or normal files created over NFS from an application consistent snapshot. SnapDrive for UNIX uses Single File Snap Restore SFSR implemented in Data ONTAP. SFSR works as following:

  • For normal files while the SFSR is proceeding, any operation which tries to change the file is suspended until SFSR is complete.

  • For LUNs, when SFSR is proceeding the LUN is available and I/Os (both reads and writes) are allowed. SFSR for normal files as well as LUNs may take a long time depending on the size of the LUN or the file being restored.

Therefore, for some environments SFSR is an obstruction.

SnapDrive 4.0 for UNIX and later enables you to take volume-based Snapshot copies. VBSR is much faster and requires less CPU and storage resources. It restores all the data on the active file system. This functionality can be used if a user wants to restore all LUNs or normal files on a volume from the same Snapshot copy.

Volume-based Snapshot copy should be used with caution because all Snapshot copies taken after volume Snapshot copy that is used for the restore operation are deleted. All the new files and new LUNs created on this volume must be deleted.