EMC Solutions at Microsoft: Optimizing Exchange Backup and Recovery with VSS (Volume Shadowcopy Service) Technology Integration
Microsoft wanted a third-party tool to showcase the VSS technology infrastructure in Windows 2003 for taking instant snapshots of storage volumes. The product was to be used on Microsoft's own corporate Exchange servers.
Microsoft worked closely with EMC to develop a product that met Microsoft's SLAs for backing up/restoring its own production Exchange servers. The joint solution kept backup times within the current backup windows, but allowed any amount of data to be restored within minutes.
This case study highlights the best practices learned from developing and deploying the VSS solution for Exchange using EMC CLARiiON storage technologies and EMC Replication Manager/SE.