Configuring launch settings in AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery - AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery
Preparing for drill and recovery instance launchLaunch settings

Configuring launch settings in AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery

Launch settings determine how your drill and recovery instances are launched in AWS. They are composed of DRS launch settings and EC2 launch template, allowing you to fully customize your drill and recovery instances by configuring key metrics, such as the subnet within which the instance will be launched, the instance type to be used, licence transfers, replication status, and a variety of other settings. AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery ensures that your drill and recovery instances constantly abide by the latest AWS security, instance, and other updates by utilizing EC2 launch templates. EC2 launch templates always use the latest EC2 instance and technology. EC2 launch templates integrate with AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery in order to give you full control over every single setting within your drill and recovery instance.

Preparing for drill and recovery instance launch

Prior to launching your instances, make sure that your environment is set up properly to ensure successful launches. Check the following prior to continuing:

  • Prepare your subnets for launch – Plan which subnets you will use to launch your drill and recovery instances. You will use these subnets in your EC2 launch template when you configure launch settings.

  • Create security groups within the subnets – Create the security groups you want to use within your prepared subnets. You will set these security groups in your EC2 launch template when you configure launch settings.

Note

If you want to run a proof of concept, you can skip this step. AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery will automatically use the default subnet and security groups. Ensure that you have not deleted your default subnet.

Important

When launching a drill, recovery, or an in-AWS failback, you can launch up to 100 source servers in a single operation. Additional source servers can be launched in subsequent operations.

Launch settings

The launch settings are a set of instructions that are comprised of two sections: DRS launch settings and the EC2 launch template that determine how a drill or recovery instance will be launched for each source server in AWS.

Launch settings, including the EC2 launch template, are automatically created every time you add a source server to AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery.

The launch settings can be modified at any time, including before the source server has completed its initial sync.

Note

  • Any changes made to the launch settings will only affect newly launched drill and recovery instances.

  • For many customers, there is no need to modify the DRS launch settings or the EC2 launch template in order to launch drill or recovery instances.

Launch settings can be changed for a single server or for multiple servers via the AWS DRS console. This option allows you to quickly make changes to multiple servers at once. You can also modify launch settings for multiple servers via the AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery API.

To access the launch settings of a specific source server, go to the Source servers page and click the server's hostname.

Source servers list showing hostname, recovery status, and data replication status.

Within the individual server view, navigate to the Launch settings tab.

DRS launch settings and EC2 launch template configurations for server recovery options.

You can also access the launch settings of a single server by checking the box to the left a single source server on the Source servers page and choosing Actions > Edit DRS launch settings or Actions > Edit EC2 launch template.

Source servers interface showing options to edit launch settings and other actions.

The Launch settings tab is divided into two sections:

  • DRS launch settings

  • EC2 launch template