The filer scales from 50GB to multiple terabytes. NetApp SnapMirror technology allows asynchronous mirroring of data between filer volumes. Data on the source volume is periodically replicated to the target at a user-definable time interval, with an allowable range from one minute to one month. To initialize the mirror, the complete source volume is copied to the target volume. Once this copy completes, replication events then copy only changed blocks from the source to the target volume.
Snapshots enable creation of a read-only copy of an entire filer volume.
To make the copy, only those blocks that have changed after a specified time are saved. Two sequential Snapshots can be compared and the differences identified. Comparing at the block level requires only changed blocks to be sent to the mirror target, thus allowing tangible network bandwidth cost savings. Implementing the update transfers asynchronously eliminates data latency issues typically associated with remote synchronous mirroring techniques. The SnapRestore software reverts a data volume or volumes to a stored Snapshot copy.