Double-Take Software Inc. has announced that it is enhancing its replication product offering for VMware environments. The solution will now replicate the virtual machines at the host level, which should make the solution more cost effective for the end user. Previously, each virtual machine had to have its own Double-Take replication product installed and licensed in the guest operating system. In this updated Double-Take Software Inc. has announced that it is enhancing its replication product offering for VMware environments. The solution will now replicate the virtual machines at the host level, which should make the solution more cost effective for the end user.Previously, each virtual machine had to have its own Double-Take replication product installed and licensed in the guest operating system. In this updated version of the software, Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure runs on a single Windows server in a virtualized environment, and allows administrators to centrally manage and monitor multiple virtual machine protection jobs from any Windows desktop using the client management console. Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure captures changes regularly, keeping the target virtual disks up to date and ready for failover, recovery and backup at any time. During an outage, the replicated virtual machine can be started on the target server with the latest replicated data available. The replication does not however provide continuous or byte-level data protection. According to the company, the transmission of data is scheduled in 15 minute intervals or can be scheduled whenever there is 32MB or more of data to transmit. Work is ongoing with VMware to provide byte-level replication as the company is a member of the VMware Community Source program. “It’s the optimal solution for virtual machine users who believe ease-of-use and proven reliability are top priorities,” added Bob Roudebush, director of solutions engineering at Double-Take Software. “By offering protection of entire virtual machines, in addition to flexible replication and compression features, Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure serves as a viable solution for any organization working with business-critical systems running in VMware environments.” Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure is compatible with VMware ESX Server versions 3 and later, and VirtualCenter version 2 or later. Other key features include: Agent-less Installation – No “agent” software is required, resulting in easy management and rapid deployment of protection scenarios; Enterprise Ready – Installs on a single server in the environment; the management console client may be installed on multiple desktops for remote management and monitoring; Protection Wizard – With just a few mouse clicks, and in less than a minute, a virtual machine protection scenario can be created and deployed; Virtual Infrastructure Browsing – Leverages the logical groupings and hierarchies available in VMware VirtualCenter, making it possible for administrators to easily navigate through configured virtual machines; Compression Options – Provides options for compressing the replicated files, providing flexible trade-offs between host system resource consumption and network bandwidth usage; Replication Frequency Options – Provides flexibility to configure the frequency of change replication based on either the amount of change or the time that has elapsed since the last replication window. Software Development