What parts are missing from your DR plan? Part 2.
Cristie Data helps you manage complex physical server recoveries—even at scale. Our recovery software integrates seamlessly with leading backup solutions from Rubrik, Cohesity, Dell Technologies, and IBM, enabling automated, full system recovery.
Do you have a comprehensive disaster recovery plan for failed physical systems?
Virtual machines and cloud computing dominate the modern IT landscape. Nevertheless, physical systems are essential – both as the foundation for virtualization and for compute-intensive or legacy applications. However, many current backup solutions neglect the protection of physical machines. This creates a blind spot in disaster recovery. In the event of a cyberattack or disaster, restoring physical systems becomes particularly time-consuming and can lead to long downtimes for critical services.
Cristie Software drastically reduces downtime by eliminating manual intervention in restoring physical systems.
Manual processes and a lack of automation make restoring physical machines difficult, especially in large server environments. Cristie solves this problem with advanced automation—similar to virtual machines. Our solution also offers flexible recovery to different target environments (virtual, cloud, dissimilar hardware)—without any manual intervention.
Recovering physical servers after a failure is more complex than recovering virtual machines due to several fundamental factors:
1. Hardware dependency
- Physical components: Physical servers depend on specific hardware (motherboard, CPU, RAM, hard drives, network cards, etc.). A single component failure can affect the entire server. Restoration requires spare parts and repairs, resulting in extended downtime.
- Outdated hardware: Older hardware may be difficult or impossible to replace, forcing a lengthy upgrade process.
- Manufacturer dependency: You may be locked into specific hardware vendors, which limits flexibility and can lead to procurement delays.
2. Lack of abstraction
- Close connection to the operating system (OS): Physical servers are tightly integrated with the operating system and underlying hardware. Recovery requires reinstalling and configuring the operating system, drivers, and all applications—a complex and time-consuming process.
- Lack of portability: Physical servers cannot be easily migrated between hardware platforms. A full recovery often requires the exact replication of the original hardware components and configuration.
3. Manual Processes
- Physical access required: Recovery often requires manual intervention. Someone must be on-site to troubleshoot hardware issues, install components, or boot from recovery media. This causes delays, especially in remote data centers or where staffing is limited.
- Slow recovery: Manually reinstalling the operating system, configuring settings, recovering data, and testing applications on a physical server are time-consuming and error-prone.
In summary:
Due to their dependence on specific hardware, their tight coupling with the operating system, and the need for manual processes, physical servers are more difficult to recover after a failure. Physical machines lack the abstraction, portability, and automation potential of virtual machines, which fundamentally complicates their rapid recovery in a disaster recovery scenario. Cristie offers bare machine recovery (BMR) solutions that seamlessly integrate with backup environments from Rubrik, Cohesity, Dell Technologies, and IBM without significant additional management overhead. If necessary, Cristie CBMR software can also be deployed as a standalone recovery solution.
Here’s how to find out more:
Are you facing the challenge of restoring physical systems after a cyberattack or in another large-scale DR scenario? contact the Cristie Data teamto learn how we're helping other companies achieve this. If you're already using a backup solution from Rubrik, Cohesity, Dell Technologies, or IBM, our recovery software is an essential addition to your backup environment. It can save you hours, if not days, of downtime in the event of a disaster.
