Does Hyper-V Replica work with windows feature x?
Learn about features in Windows and their support for Hyper-V Replica
June 9, 2017
Q. Does Hyper-V Replica work with feature x of Windows?
A. Hyper-V Replica is completely agnostic of what is running inside the VM. The replication is at the hypervisor level and replicates the changes made to the VHD files asynchronously at a 30 second, 5 minute or 15 minute interval. This means any workload would be replicated however you should consider the nature of the workload and what would happen in an unplanned failover.
During a planned failover the source VM would be stopped, remaining data replicated and the replica VM started on the target. This means there is no risk of data loss.
In an unplanned failover there is a risk of data loss, the exact amount depending on the frequency of replication. In the unplanned failover scenario when the replica starts it would start with potential data loss and also back to a previous point in time. Prior to Windows Server 2012, for example, this was a major problem for domain controllers. Therefore consider if your feature/workload would be OK with some data loss (this is DR and so a certain amount of data loss it typically expected) and to a previous point in time (which is generally a problem for directory service type solutions that are very sensitive to time and synchronization with other instances). If a service has its own DR solution then it would be worthwhile to investigate its pros and cons vs Hyper-V Replica. For most workloads where an application-native DR solution is not available then Hyper-V Replica is a great option.
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