Purpose of DPM\Volumes directory

[Juergen Hasslauer]

Hi

Can somebody please provide information about the purpose of the three
directories beneath C:\Program Files\Microsoft Data Protection
Manager\DPM\Volumes (DiffArea, Replica, ShadowCopy)?

What data do they contain?
When are these three directories accessed?

I’m quite sure that the replica contains a mount point for each protected
source data object. The mount points are being used to access the partition
created by DPM within its storage pool for the replica of each protected data
object.
Is this correct?

What is the purpose of the other two directories?

Thanks

[Kapil Malhotra [MSFT]]

Juergen,

You are right. The replica directory contains mounted replica volumes.

Similarly the DiffArea directory contains mounted shadow copy volume which
contains the diff areas files for VSS. The "ShadowCopy" directory will be
used when you use DPMBackup.exe to backup DPM DB locally OR use
DPMBackup.exe to mount DPM shadow copies to use any third party backup to
back them up.

--
Thanks,

Kapil
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"Juergen Hasslauer" <JuergenH...@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in
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[Juergen Hasslauer]

Hi Kapil

Thanks for your answer. The reference to DPMBackup.exe was really helpful!

I must admit that I still do not fully understand the DiffArea.
Why do I see only the mount points of protected data objects beneath this
directory and not a file system structure?

For a protected Exchange storage group I can see the incremental backups
beneath the Replica directory, but not beneath the DiffArea folder.

Thanks for your additional explanation.
Your answers will help me to better understand the architecture of DPM.

Regards
Juergen

[Kapil Malhotra [MSFT]]

Juergen,

The shadow copy diff area is where VSS stores changed blocks. This is
internal details of VSS and the diff area is not human readable.A shadow
copy is a read only volume exposed by VSS by using an aggregate of the
current blocks on the volume and change blocks which are stored in the diff
area.

--
Thanks,

Kapil
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

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