5/30/2019   Syneto OS 4.4.

0 user guide - Google Docs

 
 
 
 

™ 
 
 
 
SynetoOS User Guide 
Version 4.4 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

March 2019    

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COPYRIGHT NOTICE 
 
© 2018 SYNETO SRL All rights reserved. 
™ Syneto - Your Data ● Our Business and the Syneto logo are trademarks of SYNETO SRL. 
All other trademarks in this document are the property of their respective owners.  
No parts of this publication may be used for any purposes other than documentation for 
a Syneto product.  
 
Syneto may have trademarks, copyright, patents, or other intellectual property rights 
covering the subject matter of this publication. This document, and the possession of 
this document, does not give you any license to these trademarks, copyrights, patents, or 
other intellectual properties. 
 
The information contained in this document describes the software configuration of a Syneto 
HYPERSeries appliance for the specific version mentioned on the cover. This document can 
change or become obsoleted by newer product versions without notice. Syneto shall not be 
liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
DEFAULT USERNAMES AND PASSWORDS 
ESXi management interface 
SynetoOS management interface 
IPMI management interface 

ABOUT THIS PRODUCT 

What is it? 
Version 
Document updates 
Product licensing 
VMware vSphere integration 
Used Ports 

GATHERING REQUIRED INFORMATION 

vSphere license 
IP addresses 
Finding IP addresses 
vCenter and ESXi hosts credentials 
Active Directory credentials 

ACTIVATE THE WEB MANAGEMENT INTERFACE 

Access ESXi web console 
Configure basic Management VM networking 
First time quick setup 
Activate the appliance 
Access the management interface 
Configure using IPMI 
Default credentials 
Management interface main components 

INITIAL CONFIGURATION 
Configure ESXi networking 
Install ESXi license 
Configure Management VM networking 
Update Syneto HYPER to latest version 
Join vCenter 
Configure date / time 
Email server and Alert thresholds 

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Recommended thresholds 
Define recurring integrity check intervals 

THE DASHBOARD 

DATASTORES 
Introduction 
Provisioning and managing 
Provision new datastore 
Provisioning new datastore when multiple pools are available 
Deleting a datastore 
Protecting 
Monitoring 
Virtual machines 
Used space 
Recovering data from a snapshot 
Get access to a previous version of the datastore 
Clean up when you are done 
Reverting a clone 
Malware / Ransomware use case 
Registering additional virtual machines from a clone 
Serving non-Syneto hosts 
Defining external hosts 
Mounting datastore to additional hosts 
Unmounting datastore from hosts 

VIRTUAL MACHINES 
Introduction 
Provisioning and managing 
Power Management 
Remote Console 
Protecting 
Consistency levels 
Monitoring 
CPU 
Memory 
Used space 
Additional information 
Analyzing performance 
Dataset IOPS 
Dataset bandwidth 

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Dataset average block size 

Recovering data from a snapshot 
Get access to a previous version of the virtual machine 
Take a manual snapshot 
Clean up when you are done 
Migrating Virtual Machines 
How to migrate virtual machines 

SHARES 
User management 
Active Directory integration 
Managing local users and groups 
Provisioning and managing 
SMB - Create share 
SMB - Manage share 
AFP - Create share 
AFP - Manage share 
Protecting 
Monitoring 
Type 
Used space 
Quota 
Analyzing performance 
Dataset IOPS 
Dataset bandwidth 
Dataset average block size 
Recovering data from a snapshot 
Access a previous version of your share 
Windows previous versions 
Clean up when you are done 
Reverting a clone 

VOLUMES 
Introduction 
Access management 
iSCSI remote initiators 
iSCSI local targets 
Provisioning and managing 
Protecting 
Monitoring 

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Used space 
Provisioning 
Analyzing performance 
Dataset IOPS 
Dataset bandwidth 
Dataset average block size 
Recovering data from a snapshot 
Access a previous version of your volume 
WARNING: Do not change data on the clones. Clones cannot be protected, and after 
the Cleanup process (see below), all changes will be deleted. 
Clean up when you are done 

DRIVES AND POOLS 

Introduction 
Replacing a faulted drive 
Replacing a faulted OS drive 
Replacing a faulted cache drive 
Creating a pool 
Expanding a pool 
Importing a disk pool 
Exporting a disk pool 
Protecting against silent data corruption 

EXPANSION SHELVES 

Attaching expansion shelves 

Expanding a pool with JBOD drives 

DATA PROTECTION AND REPLICATION 

Introduction 
Configuring replication targets 
Adding a replication target 
Removing a replication target 
Editing a replication target 
Configuring virtual machine credentials 
Protecting a datastore 
Configuring the snapshot schedule for a datastore 
Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a datastore 
Canceling a running replication of a datastore 
Monitoring the snapshots of a datastore 
Configuring the type of snapshots for the virtual machines 

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Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 

Protecting a share 
Configuring the snapshot schedule for a share 
Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a share 
Canceling a running replication of a share 
Monitoring the snapshots of a share 
Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 
Protecting a volume 
Configuring the snapshot schedule for a volume 
Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a volume 
Canceling a running replication of a volume 
Monitoring the snapshots of a volume 
Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 
Recovering files from a virtual machine 
Browse file recover 
Download files 
Attach files to a VM 

SYSTEM CONFIGURATION 
Networking 
Ethernet interfaces 
Missing or broken interfaces 
Date/time and timezones 
Password change 
Changing External ESXi Host Password 
Alerts and notifications 
Alerts Page 
New Software Update 
Notification boxes 
Notification emails 

ANALYTICS 
Introduction 
Low level analytics 
Mid level analytics 
Case 1 - I read a lot of data, but I don't see any read activity in analytics 
Case 2 - I write continuously to my Syneto HYPER, but pool graphics show write IOPS in 
spikes instead of a continuous line 
Case 3 - I want to make sure my pool can read data fast enough from the drives 
Case 4 - I have several disk pools and one is very slow 

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High level analytics 

Miscellaneous analytics 

SOFTWARE UPDATES 
Update without restart 
Update with restart 

TROUBLESHOOTING 
A snapshot replication fails 
Cannot enable customer support 
Can’t connect to Active Directory 
Can’t create app-consistent/live snapshots because existing VMware snapshot 
After reinstall, data pool cannot be imported 
Error when creating a datastore, share, or volume 
Datastores are not accessible on vSphere management interface after Syneto HYPER IP 
change 
Datastores are not accessible on vSphere management interface after ESXi host IP change 
I don't know if Syneto Central is accessible 
Dialog appears asking for the new local ESXi password 

APPENDIX A: CREATING A CENTRAL ACCOUNT 

APPENDIX B: ACCESSING CUSTOMER SUPPORT 

Contacting Syneto Customer Support 
Support for VMware ESXi hypervisor issues 

APPENDIX C: SERENITY SERVICE 

   

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DEFAULT USERNAMES AND PASSWORDS 

Thank you for using a Syneto product. For a quick reference, are the default usernames 
and passwords for the various management interfaces. 

ESXi management interface 

Username : root 
Password : Syneto.Default1 

SynetoOS management interface 

Username : admin 
Password : admin 

IPMI management interface 

Username : ADMIN 
Password : ADMIN 

   

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ABOUT THIS PRODUCT 

What is it? 
Syneto HYPER is a modern hyperconverged product specifically designed for the needs 
of the small and medium business. If features built-in virtualization (using industry 
leading hypervisor ESXi), NAS file sharing (SMB for Windows networks and AFP for Mac 
networks) and an embedded backup and disaster recovery service that protects both 
virtual machines and datastores. The operating system is called SynetoOS and it runs as 
a controller VM on top of the hypervisor. 

Version 
This document is for SynetoOS version 4.4.0. 

Document updates 
As we release new software versions and learn more about the way our customers use 
HYPER and SynetoOS, we update and expand the documentation with new chapters and 
new information. 
 
To download the latest version of the product documentation, we highly recommend that 
you periodically check the Central1 account associated with your HYPER machine.  

Product licensing 
HYPER does not require the explicit installation of Syneto license files. The product is 
automatically activated based on your support subscription by our Syneto Central server 
at the first time you log in. See Activate using a Central account for more details. 
 
NOTE: You will need to procure and install a VMware vSphere license.  
vSphere Essentials is the minimum required license. Check with your Syneto 
representative, as Syneto can supply the required VMware vSphere licenses on request. 

VMware vSphere integration 

Syneto products integrate both with standalone ESXi servers and within VMware vCenter 
deployments. 
Each Syneto HYPER comes with an ESXi local hypervisor and it can serve data to any 
other VMware ESXi from your existing network (standalone or in or vCenter clusters). 
From now on, we will refer to the ESXi or vCenter as "vSphere". For example "vSphere 
management interface" will refer to either ESXi or vCenter configuration interface. When 
a distinction is necessary, the document will refer to the particular product. 

1
The official Syneto support portal: https://central.syneto.eu . 

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Used Ports 
In order to allow remote management, VMWare integration, and snapshot replication, 
SynetoOS uses a set of TCP ports. The list of services exposed over the network, and 
their role can be found in the table below. 
 
SynetoOS 
 
TCP Port  Service  Description 

443  HTTPS / Web Server  Web Management Interface. 

80  HTTP / Web Server  Allows accessing the management with 

an http:// prefix. Redirects immediately to 
https:// for security reasons. 

22  SSH  Secure Shell service allows you to 

connect to the CLI management 
interface.  
It is also used for secure snapshot 
replication. 

111, 968, 2049, NFS  Used for sharing datastores to ESXi 

4045  hosts. 

137,138  SMB  Used for SMB sharing. 

548 AFP  Used for AFP sharing. 

2003, 2004, 7002 carbon_cache  Used for Analytics. 

5353 (UDP) mdnsd  DNS resolver. Used to resolve host 

names. 

9000-9099  mbuffer  One port opened temporarily for each 

non-encrypted snapshot replication. Port 
is closed after a snapshot is received. 
These ports cannot be NATed, or you 
have to NAT all of them one-to-one on 
you gateway. 

11211  memcached  Used by the Web Management Interface 

to cache various data in the memory.  

 
 
 

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ESXi Ports 
See official VMware documentation: 
https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/6.5/com.vmware.vsphere.security.doc/
GUID-171B99EA-15B3-4CC5-8B9A-577D8336FAA0.html 
 
IPMI Ports 
TCP Ports: 80, 443, 5901, 5900, 5120, 5123 and UDP Ports: 623    

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GATHERING REQUIRED INFORMATION 

Before starting to use Syneto HYPER, there are several pieces of information you need to 
acquire: 
● A valid serial number for VMware vSphere 
● Networking settings for the hypervisor and controller VM 
● Credentials for accessing existing ESXi hosts or vCenter servers 
○ If you want to host on HYPER datastores for existing hosts 
● Active Directory credentials 
○ For creating SMB shares in a Windows network 

vSphere license 
HYPER machines come preinstalled with a temporary ESXi license (valid 60 days) and 
you need to install a final VMware license for continued use of the product. While the 
temporary license is active, all product features are enabled. During this time frame, you 
should contact the person administering your VMware licenses, and ask for a vSphere 
essentials license key. 
NOTE: The format of the license is: XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX. 
 
More information about how to use the vSphere license can be found in the chapter 
Install ESXi license . 

IP addresses 
To function properly, HYPER needs three IPs in the management network. These can be 
self-assigned via DHCP, or they can be statically configured. If you don't have a DHCP 
server on your network, ask your network administrator for the following IP addresses: 
● Allocate three IPs in the management network , for: 
○ IPMI (machine management) 
○ ESXi (hypervisor management) 
○ SynetoOS (controller VM) 
● DNS server IP address - you can configure between one and three DNS servers in 
the management network. 
● Gateway IP address - you will need this to access the UI and the Central Portal 
NOTE: HYPER uses an internal virtual network (172.16.254.1/24) for communication 
between the controller VM and the hypervisor. Changing this network is not possible. 

Finding IP addresses 
In networks managed using DHCP, the administrator might want to find the management 
IP addresses allocated by the DHCP server. As stated above, there are 3 IP Addresses 
that are required. 

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The ESXi management IP addresses are shown on ESXi’s DCUI splash screen, accessible 
using Alt+F2 on the physical video console: 

 
 
   

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The SynetoOS (and IPMI management - if configured) IP addresses are shown on the 
ESXi service console shell, accessible using Alt+F1 on the physical video console: 

vCenter and ESXi hosts credentials 

HYPER can provision datastores for an unlimited number of existing ESXi hosts: both 
standalone and managed by vCenter. To provide storage for ESXi/vCenter, you will need 
for the following informations: 
● IP address / hostname 
● Username 
● Password 
When adding a vCenter, you will be able to mount the datastores on all the ESXi hosts on 
that vCenter. 
 
For more information about connecting to vCenter, can be found in the Join vCenter 
chapter. 

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Active Directory credentials 

You need Active Directory credentials for provisioning SMB shares in a network 
managed by Active Directory. 
You will need to get from your system administrator the following information: 
● Domain name 
NOTE: The domain name is case sensitive. 
 
NOTE: The format is: domain.mycompany
. 
 
● Domain controller (a server that responds to security authentication requests 
within the Windows Server domain) 
NOTE: The format is: dc.dn.mycompany.com
. Alternatively, an IP address can 
be provided. 
 
● Username - for a user with sufficient privileges to add computers to the domain 
● Password 
 
More information about when and how to configure Active Directory integration can be 
found in the Shares chapter. 

   

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ACTIVATE THE WEB MANAGEMENT 

INTERFACE 
Administration of the appliance is performed via one of the web management interfaces. 
There are three interfaces:  
● IPMI: through this interface you can connect to the ESXi console, the same way as if 
you connected a monitor and keyboard to the machine. You can change the ESXi 
password or network configuration. In case of a reinstall, you can attach the 
SynetoOS ISO and start the installation from your desk. 
● ESXi: from this interface, you can create new virtual machines and upload ISOs. You 
can power off, power on or suspend a virtual machine. You can also mount iSCSI 
volumes. 
● Management VM: the SynetoOS interface. You can monitor and provision 
datastores for virtual machines, AFP and SMB shares and iSCSI volumes. You can 
also backup these entities and replicate them to be able to recover in case of a 
disaster. 
This chapter describes the activation procedure for each of the interfaces. The detailed 
sequence of steps is the following: 
1. Get physical access to HYPER using monitor and keyboard 
2. Activate the ESXi web console 
3. Configure basic networking of the management VM 
4. Activate machine with online Syneto Central service 
5. Get access to the HYPER Management VM web console. 
6. Activate IPMI remote system management interface 

Access ESXi web console 

After your Syneto HYPER is connected to the physical infrastructure, power it on and 
attach a monitor and a keyboard. The monitor will display the ESXi console.  
Press F2
and enter the default ESXi username and password ( username: root ; 
password: Syneto.Default1 ). A menu will open, where you can modify different 
options, set a new password, take troubleshooting actions and more. 
At this point you can configure static ESXi networking (recommended). 
 

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On the ESXi console, you can see the IP address to the ESXi UI. Insert the address in a 
browser (of your choice) and log in to the UI with the default credentials (default 
username: root ; password: Syneto.Default1 ). 
You now have access to the ESXi web console. 
 

Note: For more information about ESXi configuration, please review the Configure ESXi 
networking chapter. 

   

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Configure basic Management VM networking 

After accessing the ESXi web console, go to Virtual Machines → SynetoOS . Open its 
console and log in with the default credentials (username: admin ; password: admin ). 
If DHCP has been enabled on your network, you will see that there are already two IP 
addresses assigned to the SynetoOS virtual machine. If HYPER was connected to a 
network without a DHCP server, only the internal network will be configured 
( 172.16.254.2 ). 

 
 
If you do not have DHCP, or want to override the default values for IP, DNS and gateway, 
run the following commands: 

net ip edit vmxnet3s0 address <IPv4_address>/<netmask>

net dns add <IPv4_address>
net gateway set <IPv4_address>
 
To review the current settings for IP, gateway and DNS, run the following commands: 

net ip show
net gateway show
net dns show
 
Take a note of the IP for vmxnet3s0
as we’ll be using it later on. 
Finally, let’s configure the domain name: 

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net dns setdomain <domain>

 
At this point, we can access the management VM web interface at 
https://<IP_address> . The IP is the one configured for vmxnet3s0 . At the login 
screen, enter the default credentials (user: admin ; password: admin
).  

First time quick setup 

 
Steps: Start 
Click Start to configure your product. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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Steps: Network 
Configure networking settings for the Management VM and the Hypervisor. 
 

 
 
NOTE : A working Internet connection is mandatory for successful product activation. 
Check with your network administrator for proxy or firewall restrictions. 
 
 
Steps: Maintenance service → Central account 
You need to link your product with a Central account. The Central cloud platform tracks 
details about your technical support, hardware warranty and software updates. 
If this is your first purchase, you need to create a new account. If you already have one, 
please enter your credentials below. 

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Linked your account. 

 
 
Steps: Maintenance service → Serenity service 
 

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Serenity frees your inbox of the machine related issues and reports them directly to 
Syneto Technical Support for professional investigation. 
With Serenity your machine issues are solved without you even knowing. 
 
Serenity: Inactive 
The Serenity service is not active on this machine. To activate Serenity you should 
contact your Syneto supplier. 

 
 
   

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You can temporarily stop sending data to the Central servers by disabling the Serenity 
service. Later on, the Serenity service can be enabled or disabled from the Help page. 
 
Serenity: Active & Disable 

 
 
Serenity: Active & Enabled 

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Steps: Password → Management VM (Syneto OS) 
For security reasons we urge you to change the default password for Management VM 
(Syneto OS). 

 
 
NOTE: Once the default passwords are changed, it is important to remember them. In 
case they are forgotten there is no way to reset them. 
 
 
Steps: Password → Hypervisor (ESXi) 
For security reasons we urge you to change the default password for Hypervisor (ESXi). 

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NOTE: Once the default passwords are changed, it is important to remember them. In 
case they are forgotten there is no way to reset them. 
 
 
Steps: Active Directory 
For easier SMB share access management, this system can be joined to your existing 
Active Directory domain. 

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Check → Join to a Active Directory 
 

 
 
 
 

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Steps: Integrity check 

To detect silent data corruption, the system can perform automated checks on all your 
data. The recommended interval is every 4 weeks. 
 

 
 
NOTE: It is not recommended to disable automated integrity checking. 
 
 
Steps: Date and time 
Date and time can be configured manually or automatically via NTP. 
If you joined an Active Directory domain, it's recommended to use the same server for 
automatic date and time synchronization (NTP). 
 

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Steps: Notification → Recipient 
You can receive email notifications regarding relevant system events. If possible, use 
your SMTP server to send these email notifications. 
At least one recipient needs to be defined. 
 

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Add recipient → Insert your email 

 
 
 

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Steps: Notification → Sender 
Configure SMTP server to send these email notifications. 

 
 
 
 

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Steps: Updates 
The system will check for new updates and install them automatically. 
Larger updates may take some time, depending on your internet connection speed. 
 

 
 
 
Steps: Finish 
Please don't reload or close the page. 
You will be automatically taken to the authentication screen when everything is ready. 
 

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Activate the appliance 

Every product has an attached support service, which entitles it to software updates and 
remote customer support. This support service is managed using an online portal called 
Syneto Central. 
When you try to log in for the first time on the management VM, a Central account 
activation screen will appear. This chapter shows you how to activate your product. 

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NOTE : Log in to the management UI is not possible without registering the product to 
Syneto Central first. 
 
Upon receiving your Syneto HYPER, it will already be registered with Central, but in order 
to work on it you must create a Central account. Please read Appendix A to learn how to 
create a Central account. 
After creating the account, enter its email address and password and click Activate . 
After the product is successfully activated, you will be able to log in to the management 
interface.  
If the activation fails, it’s likely that HYPER can’t connect to the Central online service. 
Please make sure that a valid DNS and gateway are configured, and that there are no 
firewall rules blocking the access to central.api.syneto.eu on port 443. 

Access the management interface 

Open a web browser(Chrome, Firefox, Safari etc) and write the management IP address. 
At this point, you should have already activated your product with Central, as shown in 
the chapter above. 
 

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Configure using IPMI 

Each Syneto HYPER comes with IPMI (or similar) remote management support.  
In order to have access to the IPMI interface, make sure a network cable is connected to 
the IPMI ethernet port. 

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The IPMI interface will acquire a network address over DHCP. 

Make sure a display is connected to the Syneto HYPER and note the management IP 
address shown during boot. See bottom right in the image below: BCM IP:.... 
 

Default credentials 
Once you know the IP, open a browser on your computer, and connect to it over the HTTP 
or HTTPS protocol. The default IPMI credentials are: ADMIN
/A
DMIN
( all caps). 

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Management interface main components 

 
These are the main components of the management interface: 
1. Main menu - contains the most important items related to the Syneto HYPER 
management. Expect to use it frequently. 
2. Action bar - presents actions related to the current page, and a set of 
notifications on the right for update, alarms, expired license, missing central 
connection. Finally there is a button to open the secondary menu. 
3. Secondary menu - expect to find here the rarely used options. We included the 
things that you will usually do once. 
4. Main area - the biggest portion of the screen is dedicated for the area where you 
will be performing all the administrative tasks of the HYPER machine.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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INITIAL CONFIGURATION 
Configure ESXi networking 
 
NOTE : Syneto Hyper series comes pre-configured with a virtual switch - vSwitch1 - that 
has no uplink defined, and has two port groups: ‘ Syneto HC VMKernel Network ’ and 
‘ Syneto HC API Network ’. The ‘ Syneto HC VMKernel Network ’ has a vmk1 VMkernel 
interface attached and configured with a static IP address of 172.16.254.1 . The 
SynetoOS VM has the ‘Syneto HC API Network’ attached to vmxnet3s1 and configured 
with a static IP address of 172.16.254.2 . The vSwitch, port groups, vmk1 and static IP 
addresses documented here must not be modified . If you believe that in your case you 
must change any of these, please contact Syneto customer support first. 
Access the ESXi console. This can be done by manually connecting a monitor and 
keyboard to the physical machine or through IPMI. 
 

 
 

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Press F2 and then enter the username and password of the ESXi. A menu with different 
actions will open. 
 

 
 
Select Configure Management Network and press Enter . A menu with network 
configuration options will open.  
 

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Select IPv4 Configuration and press Enter . A dialog for IPv4 Configuration will open. 
 

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You can select a dynamic or static IP. By default, the dynamic IP option is selected. Also, 
the gateway can be set from this dialog. After you have finished configuring , press Enter 
to save and exit. Select DNS Configuration and press Enter .  
 

  
 
You can select a dynamic or static DNS and hostname. If you select static, fill the 
Primary DNS Server and Hostname fields. The Alternate DNS Server field is optional. 
Press Enter to save and exit. 

Install ESXi license 

Go to the ESXi management interface. Log in with your username and password. 

 
 

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Select Host from the Navigator on the left and click on Manage .  

 
 
Select Licensing tab → Assign License .  

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Type or paste the ESXi license key. Click Check License . 

Configure Management VM networking 

Log in to SynetoOS Management Interface. Go to Secondary Menu → Network → Basic 
Configuration . 

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The Network page will open. Here you can set the hostname, domain name, DNS, 
gateway and proxy server. 
 

 
For more information, check the networking section . 
 

Update Syneto HYPER to latest version 

Click on the Software Update button, in the action bar. It is the first button from the left. 
A new page will be opened. SynetoOS will automatically check for a new version. If there 
is a new version, a button Update will appear. Click on it and the update will start. 
 

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For more information, check the software update section . 

Join vCenter 
 
WARNING: This feature is not available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series. 

 
If you have a vCenter you can join our solution to it for easier management. 
Log in to vCenter Management Interface. In the left menu, select Hosts and Clusters . 
 

 
 
Select Actions → Add Host . 

 
 

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A dialog will open which will guide you through the process of adding a host. 
Enter the hostname or IP of the Syneto ESXi. Click Next . 
 

 
 
Enter the username and password of the Syneto ESXi. Click Next. If a security alert 
opens, click OK. 

 
 

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In this view, you can review the host configuration. After that, click Next . 
 

 
 
You will see a list of available licenses. You can assign one of those or add a new one by 
clicking on the green plus . 
 

 
 

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This window lets you configure the lockdown mode. 

When enabled, lockdown mode prevents remote users from logging directly into this 
host. The host will only be accessible through local console or an authorized centralized 
management application. 
If you are unsure what to do, leave lockdown mode disabled. You can configure 
lockdown mode later by editing Security Profile in host settings.  
After you finish, click Next . 
 

 
 
 
   

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Select the virtual machine location. Click Next . 

 

 
 
Review your selections and if you do not want to modify anything, click Finish . 
 

 
 

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Now, we need to add vCenter to SynetoOS. On the SynetoOS Management Interface, go 
to the Datastores page. 
 

 
 
Click on External hosts in the action bar, top of the page. A dialog listing the registered 
external hosts will open.  
 

 
 
Click on Add host . A form will open. In the host field, enter the hostname or IP of the 
vcenter. Enter a username and its password . Click Add . 
 

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This will add the vCenter to SynetoOS. Now, you will be able to mount datastores on any 
of the vCenter’s hosts. 
 
For more information about managing non-Syneto hosts, see chapter Serving non-Syneto 
hosts 

Configure date / time 

Log in SynetoOS Management Interface. Go to Secondary Menu . 
 

 
 
Click on Date / Time option. The Time page will open. Here you can set the date, time, 
and timezone. We recommend setting Automatic time synchronization on.  
 

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For more information, check the date/time section . 

Email server and Alert thresholds 

Syneto wants to keep you well informed about what goes around with your machine. 
Alerts and email notifications are very useful in managing the few errors that may 
appear. 
It is highly recommended that you introduce at least one email address in order to 
receive emails in case there are any issues on your machine. 
You can either use your local email service, if there is no firewall blocking it, or you can 
use an SMTP server. 

To add an email addresses, go to the Alerts page, the bell icon from the action bar. 
To learn more about adding email addresses to receive fast and accurate alerts and 
notifications, please go to Alerts and notification chapter. 
 

NOTE : Some email servers may mark these emails as spam, please also check your 
spam folder. 
 
Alternatively, an SMTP server can be used to send notifications emails. In case you have 
an SMTP server please use this option. 
Recommended thresholds 
Keep disk pool space under 80% utilization for best performance. Disk pool performance 
can degrade when it is close to full. 
 

WARNING: Keep in mind that even with mostly static content in the 95-96% range, write, 
read, and resilvering performance might suffer. 

   

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Define recurring integrity check intervals 

Syneto products have a built-in mechanism for protecting against silent data corruption. 
Data corruption means that data being read is different from the data previously written 
to a drive. Some errors go unnoticed, without being detected by the drive firmware or the 
host operating system; these errors are known as silent data corruption. 
 
To prevent silent data corruption, Syneto uses self-healing w
hich happens behind the 
scenes as blocks are being read into memory. 
Self-healing protects especially hot data, which is accessed frequently and thus checked 
frequently for its consistency/integrity. Less frequently accessed (cold) data is at a 
larger risk because its blocks may accumulate multiple errors, which could render 
checksums useless. To protect cold data, the system is configured by default to 
periodically run a scan of the drives and fix corruptions. This process can also be 
initiated manually. 
To see more about Integrity check, please go to Protecting against silent data corruption 
chapter. 
 
 

 
   

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THE DASHBOARD 
After you log in to the UI, you will be greeted by the Dashboard . 
Here you will have a quick overview of the System resources, Data protection, Hypervisor, 
VM summary, Space saved, Overall health , and the Storage performance . By following the 
links on each widget, you can explore all the functionalities of Syneto HYPER. 
 

 
 
NOTE: The data protection widget does count clones. 
 
As you populate your machine with data ( Virtual machines, Volumes ( This feature is not 
available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series ), Shares, Datastores ), the Dashboard will reflect 
the real time changes.  
 
Here you can easily track the protection level of your data, the health of the system, as 
you will receive real time feedback from the Hypervisor and the storage. You can track 
the CPU and easily manage the space handled by the machine. 
 
On the Actions bar , you can see information about the machine with a simple click on 
About this machine: The Central status and detailed software and hardware info will be 
shown. 

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From the About this machine dialog, you can also Unlink from Central by clicking Unlink . 
A confirmation dialog will pop out saying: “Y
ou will be logged out and need to activate this 
machine with a new Central account in order to access the UI again .” Should you agree 
with the terms, the product will be unlinked from the account. 
 

 
 
You will be redirected to a form in order to insert the new central account you want the 
product to be linked to. Complete the new email address and the password. Press 
Activate . You can now log in to your product again. 

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WARNING: If there is no gateway server set, a working DNS configured, or network 
connection, the Central portal will not be reachable.   

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DATASTORES 
Introduction 
Datastores are entities that allow you to share storage with VMware. When you create a 
new datastore on SynetoOS, a series of entities are created automatically. There will be 
underlying file system, a network share, and a VMware datastore. 

Provisioning and managing 

Provision new datastore 

Your new storage comes with no predefined datastores. When you go to Main menu → 
Datastores you will see an empty list. 
 

 
 
To create a new datastore click New datastore in the action bar.  
 

 
 
 
Provide a name for the datastore, choose a workload type, and then click Create . 
The workload types are as follows: 
● Database - for virtual machines running database servers. The datastore will be 
configured with a block size of 4 KB. 

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● Application Server - for virtual machines that are application servers (ie. email 
server), workstations, or virtual desktops. The datastore will be configured with a 
block size of 128 KB. 
● File storage - for virtual machines providing file storage. The dataset will be 
configured with a block size of 1MB. 
 

 
 
The new datastore will be added to the list, and preselected for you. Under the lists you 
will see the details about it. In the details section you will be able to perform a set of 
actions: 
● Change on which ESXi hosts the datastore is mounted on 
● Change Workload type 
● Protect datastore 
● Browse snapshots related to this datastore 
● Delete datastore 
● View and edit the datastore's description. This field shows by default the time 
when the datastore was created. 
 
At the top of the page you will see, next to the Search field, the Show button. Clicking on 
it will open up a context menu, from which you can select which kinds of items to show, 
like: 
● Originals - datastores created on this machine 
● Clones - datastores cloned from snapshots, marked with  

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● Replicas - datastores received from other HYPER machines, marked with  

Provisioning new datastore when multiple pools are available 

Your device comes preconfigured with either only a hybrid pool, or a flash pool, or both. 
The New datastore form will allow you to choose on which of these to create the 
datastore. 

 
 
Each pool will have its available space specified. Usually, flash pools are very fast but 
small. Hybrid pools are slower but provide a large amount of space. 
Here are some tips to help you choose based on your expected workload: 
● Flash pool 
○ High IO virtual machines 
○ VDI 
○ Database servers with many write operations 
● Hybrid pool 

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○ Normal workload virtual machines 

○ Email servers 
○ Active directory 
○ DHCP servers 
○ Database servers with many read and few write operations 

Deleting a datastore 
There may be cases when you want to completely remove a datastore and all its data. 
Open the details view of the datastore and click on the Delete button. 
 

 
 
After you click Delete a confirmation dialog will explain you that snapshots and virtual 
machines related to this datastore will be also deleted. You will need to confirm it in 
order to proceed further. 
 

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NOTE: Only datastores with no clones can be deleted 
 
NOTE: Only datastores with no running virtual machines can be deleted 
 

Protecting 
Please refer to Configuring the snapshot schedules for the datastore for more details. 

Monitoring 
You can list all your datastores by going to Main menu → Datastores . The page will load 
a table containing various information about the datastores. 
 

 
 
The list contains several columns highlighting the most important information about 
each datastore: number of virtual machines, used space, protection. 

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Virtual machines 
The VMs column shows how many virtual machines are running on each datastore. By 
clicking this column title you can sort the list ascending or descending by the number of 
virtual machines. 
 

 
 
NOTE: We recommend one virtual machine per datastore. 

Used space 
This column allows you to spot the datastores, and virtual machines that are using the 
most space. The column represents the space allocated by the virtual machines by 
VMware on the datastore. 
 

 
 
NOTE: This helps you spot virtual machines, or groups of virtual machines that are using 
up a lot of space.   

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Recovering data from a snapshot 

Get access to a previous version of the datastore 

It sometimes happens that you lose data. This can happen because of a virus 
penetrating your LAN, a user deleting a file by accident, your virtual machine having 
crashed and not starting anymore, or a database upgrade going terribly wrong. 
 
Or perhaps you’d like to get access to a previous version of the data for development or 
testing purposes. For example, you want to run a report on the database, but don’t want 
to accidentally delete live production data. 
 

 
 
For all these, and many more cases, HYPER clones come in very handy. You can recreate 
the data exactly as it was at the time of the snapshot, using the Clone function. To create 
a clone, start by clicking Snapshot tab in the details view of a datastore. 

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Pick a date from the calendar, and click on the contextual menu for a snapshot. 
 

 
 
Click Clone and select the virtual machines you want to recover. 

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If the snapshot stored more than 1 virtual machine, you can select all of them or just the 
virtual machines you need. Only the selected VMs will be registered with the hypervisor. 
 
Click Clone and wait for the process to finish. 

 
 

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Connect to your vSphere configuration interface and note that a new virtual machine was 
created for you.  
 

 
From here you can start the virtual machine and recover/copy the data you need. 
 
After the cloning has finished, the cloned datastore can be identified by the icon in the 
table row, or the blue information box in the details view. In the information box you will 
find details about the clone source (original datastore): datastore name and time when 
the cloned snapshot was taken. 
 

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It is also possible to see all the clones of a datastore by selecting the original datastore. 
In the details view there will be a list of all the clones made from it. 

Clean up when you are done 

One of the more tedious tasks after recovering data is cleaning up. Finding, stopping, 
deregistering virtual machines, removing VMware datastores, deleting storage clones 
are all complex operation. And because they are time consuming and difficult, many 
people ignore these tasks. The data rots, takes up unused space and in the long term 
slows us down due to clutter. 
 

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With Syneto HYPER the whole cleanup process is just one click away. And we take care 
to clean up only what we created. 
 
Go to Main menu → Datastores and select a datastore that has cloned snapshots. In its 
details view you can see a section named Clones. Open its contextual menu and select 
Delete clone . 

 
 
Or select the cloned datastore and click Delete . 

 
 
It will ask you to confirm the process and it will explain all the things that will happen, 
such as virtual machines will be removed, datastore unmounted from VMware, etc. 
 

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The process takes a little time, you will see a step by step progress. 
That's it, all that was created, shared, connected, imported for that snapshot clone was 
reverted. No more mess left behind by the recovery process. 

Reverting a clone 
Once you created one or more clones from your snapshots, you may find a specific clone 
that contains exactly the data and virtual machines you wish to recover. The revert 
functionality allows you to replace your current dataset with the clone. 
To revert a clone, select a clone, then click Revert . 

 
 
A clone revert process will do the following steps: 
● Force stop and unregister all virtual machines from the datastore 
● Unmount the original datastore 
● Delete all snapshots created after the snapshot from which the clone was 
created 
● Replace the original datastore with the clone both on SynetoOS and vSphere. 
● Keep virtual machines restored from the clone with their cloned names 

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WARNING: Once a clone is restored, all data and snapshots newer than the clone will be 
permanently lost. 

 
NOTE: If you have several clones of the same datastore, only the clone from the most 
recent snapshot can be reverted. 
 

 
During the revert process you will see a step-by-step progress. If something goes wrong, 
an appropriate message will be shown. 

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WARNING: On DR unit, on a received datastore, you can create clones but you cannot 
revert the clone.  

After the revert process finishes, the system will update the datastore's Description field 
with the relevant information. 

Malware / Ransomware use case 

Clone revert is a very powerful tool to protect you from malware and ransomware. Let's 
say you have a datastore, DS1 , with a snapshot schedule every 15 minutes. 
The schedule was running for the past 2 hours, and with a retention policy of 6 
snapshots, you have 6 snapshots for DS1 . 
Suddenly, users are starting calling you that something is wrong with their virtual 
machines on DS1 . They doesn't seem to have access to their machines, or they were 
infected with a ransomware. 
You, as a sysadmin, can start creating clones of the snapshots you have on DS1 . You will 
create DS1_clone1 from the newest snapshots. Let's see if things were alright 15 
minutes ago. You realize they were already broken. 
You go on with the second, third, and forth snapshots. Finally, the clone created from the 
fourth snapshot contains healthy virtual machines. 
 

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You decide to revert the data to DS1_clone4 . You know you will not need any newer data 
as all is consumed by malware. 
But you cannot click revert just yet. You will have to first delete all newer clones. When 
done deleting, you can go on with the revert process. 
The datastore will be reverted. All virtual machines registered into vSphere will be 
preserved. If you need to register additional VMs, you will need to use vSphere 
management interface. 

Registering additional virtual machines from a clone 

A datastore snapshot can contain multiple virtual machines. In the recovery process a 
datastore clone is made and you are presented with the option to register the virtual 
machines from the snapshot. If in this process you did not select all the virtual machines 
you don’t need to worry, after the cloning has finished you can register additional virtual 
machines. 
 
Select the datastore from which the clone was made. In the details view identify the 
clone and open the contextual menu and select Register additional VMs . 
Alternatively you can select the clone and click Register additional in the Virtual machines 
sections. 

 
 
A dialog box will appear and provide a list of all the virtual machines you can register. 

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Select the desired ones, and click Register. A nice progress will show you the steps taken 
by the system to register the virtual machine to vSphere. 
 

 
 
After the process finished you can see the virtual machines that were registered by 
hovering over View in the clone's details view. 

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Serving non-Syneto hosts 

In the bottom right of a newly created datastore's details section you can see that the 
newly created datastore is automatically mounted on the local hypervisor (ESXi host).  
If you click Change you will be able to unmount it from this local hypervisor. 
But there are infrastructures that already have ESXi hosts, independent or managed by a 
vCenter. For these architectures, you can mount a datastore on any ESX(i) host. 
 
WARNING: This feature is not available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series. 

Defining external hosts 

Go to Main menu → Datastores . On the action bar you will see a button named External 
hosts . 
 

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By default the dialog will show no host. 
 
NOTE: Local ESXi hypervisor is not displayed on the External hosts list. 
 
Clicking the Add host button will show a form where you can add another host. 

 
 
The Host field specifies an IP address or a DNS resolvable FQDN (host name). 
The Username field must be filled with user having full VMware administrative privileges. 
 
WARNING: If your ESXi is managed by a vCenter, you must specify the vCenter at the 
Host field. Adding the ESXi host may lead to partial or unexpected interaction between 
the Syneto HYPER and VMware. 

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After clicking Add the host will appear in the list 

Mounting datastore to additional hosts 

Go to Main menu → Datastores and click a datastore. In the details section click on 
Change (bottom right). 
 

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If you added a standalone ESXi to Hosts , it will be on the list. You will be able to mount 
the datastore on this host by checking it and clicking Update . 
If you added a vCenter server to Hosts , you will find in this list all the ESXi hosts 
managed by the specified vCenter server. You will be able to mount the datastore on 
these hosts by checking then and clicking Update . 
 

 
 

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NOTE: All ESXi hosts are listed by their name. In case you didn't set up a hostname for 
your hosts and you add several of them, you may see "localhost" listed here several 
times. We recommend you set up a unique hostname on each of your ESXi hosts. 
 
NOTE: In some cases VMware reports the host name as an IP address. In these cases 
you will see the IP address of the host, regardless of the way you specified it in the Hosts 
dialog. 
 

Unmounting datastore from hosts 

Using the same workflow as for mounting a datastore to additional hosts, you can 
unmount them as well. 
 

 
 
Simply uncheck the hosts you want the datastore to be unmounted from. 
 

 
 
Click Update .   

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VIRTUAL MACHINES 
Introduction 
Virtual machines are virtual computers that run on a hypervisor. Syneto HYPER comes 
pre-configured with a VMware ESXi local hypervisor. You can provision, manage, run, 
protect, analyze virtual machines on the device itself. 

Provisioning and managing 

Adding virtual machines to your infrastructure is done using vSphere management 
interface. 
 
NOTE: You can quickly connect to your local ESXi hypervisor web management interface 
by clicking Login to UI on the Hypervisor widget on the dashboard. See THE DASHBOARD 
for more details. 
 
After completing the previous chapter you will see one or several new datastores 
provided by Syneto HYPER. 
All you have to do is provision a new virtual machine on vSphere management interface. 
Specify that it resides on a datastore provided by Syneto HYPER. 

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NOTE: For granular protection and performance analyses we recommend creating one 
virtual machine per datastore. 
 
WARNING: While it is technically possible to attach several datastores to a single virtual 
machine, Syneto HYPER doesn't support this configuration. Data protection will not work 
properly on virtual machines connected to several datastores. 

Power Management 
There are several management actions that can be performed on a virtual machine: 
● Power on 
● Power off 
● Reset 
● Suspend 
● Resume 
 
Let’s start with a virtual machine that is powered off. After clicking it in the VMs list, its 
details pane opens. In the top right corner of the details pane, click Power On . This 
kickstarts the boot sequence of the operating system. 
 

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After a VM was powered on, new actions become available: Power off , Suspend and 
Restart . Also, the virtual machine’s console is displayed on screen. 

 
 
WARNING: P ower off and Reset will perform hard operations, it will behave exactly as if 
you switched off a physical machine by turning off the power. 

If you want to “pause” a virtual machine, click on Suspend . This action is similar to 
closing the lid on a laptop: it dumps the VM’s memory to drive and then deallocates the 
CPU and memory resources it used. 
 

 
A confirmation dialog will open. Click on Suspend if you want to continue. 
 
The transition message Suspending... will be displayed while the memory is being written 
to drive, and the other power buttons will disappear. Power off is still an option if the 
virtual machine is suspended or is being suspended. 

 
 
You can Resume or Power off the suspended virtual machine. Resuming a suspended 
virtual machine will load it from drive in the state it was before the suspend. No boot 
sequence is performed. 

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Remote Console 
If a virtual machine is powered on, you can see its console in the details section. 
 

 
 
If you want to interact with the virtual machine, click on the image of the console. This 
will open a new tab where you are able to do actions on your virtual machine. 
 

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Protecting 
Please refer to Configuring the type of snapshots for the virtual machines for more 
details. 

Consistency levels 
Each virtual machine can be protected by three types of snapshot consistency levels: 
1. Crash consistent - When restoring, the virtual machine will be in a state similar 
after a power outage.  
Recommended for virtual machines resilient to forced reboots. (ie. Linux or 
Solaris servers or workstations)  
2. Application consistent - Before taking the snapshot, a message will be sent to the 
operating system. This will instruct compatible applications to flush all their data 
to the drive. The snapshot will be taken after the flush operation finishes. Drive 
consistency for the application supporting the protocol will be consistent. When 
restoring, the virtual machine will be powered off. 
a. Windows VSS - Volume Shadow Copy is recommended for Microsoft 
servers (Active Directory, MS-SQL, etc) 
b. Hooks only - Allows running a custom pre-freeze and post-thaw script on 
the virtual machine. This works on any operating system with VMware 
tools enabled. 
c. Windows VSS and hooks - Uses both options simultaneously 
3. Live snapshot - Before taking a snapshot all operations on the virtual machine will 
be suspended and saved to the drive. This includes waiting for fisk flush 
operations, persisting RAM, persisting current running state. Unfortunately, during 
this operation the virtual machine is not accessible. The process can take up to 5 
minutes, or even longer for large servers. 
Recommended for mission critical system and only on a daily or weekly 
schedule, run overnight, so that work is not interrupted. 
 
 
WARNING: Live snapshot is not available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series. 

 
WARNING: While it is technically possible to place a VM’s virtual disks on different 
datastores, HYPER doesn't support this configuration. Data recovery will not work 
properly when a virtual machine is stored on multiple datastores.   

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Monitoring 
The main virtual machines page can be accessed by Main menu → Virtual machines . 
This page offers a list of virtual machines. The list contains virtual machines from all 
connected ESXi hosts. You will see that only the virtual machines that are on datastores 
serverved by the Syneto HYPER will be included in the list. 
 

 
 
The list has several columns with information about the virtual machine: CPU usage, 
memory usage, used space, VMware tools status, and protection status. 

CPU 
This column shows how much processing power is used right now by the virtual 
machine. The value is presented in GHz. 
For detailed information click the virtual machine and in the details section on the 
bottom you will see current CPU usage in GHz, maximum allocated to the virtual 
machine in GHz, and the percentage of the current value. 
 

 
 
 
NOTE: it is useful to sort the list descending by CPU when you want to spot virtual 
machines using too much CPU. For example when you observe a virtual machine is very 
slow, it is a good practice to come here and quickly check its CPU usage. 

   

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Memory 
This column show how much memory is currently used by the virtual machines. The 
value is presented in GB (or other multiples of bytes). 
For detailed information click the virtual machine and in the details section on the 
bottom you will see current Memory usage in GB, maximum memory that the virtual 
machine can use, and a percentage of the the current value.  
 

 
 
NOTE: it is useful to sort the list descending by Memory when you want to spot virtual 
machines using too much memory. For example when you observe a virtual machine is 
very slow, it is a good practice to come here and quickly check its memory usage. 
 
NOTE: virtual machines with all their memory reserved will always show 100% memory 
usage. 

Used space 
This column show how much drive space is currently used by the virtual machines. The 
value is presented in GB (or other multiples of bytes). 
For detailed information click the virtual machine and in the details section on the 
bottom you will see current drive usage in GB, maximum drive space available for the 
virtual machine, and a percentage of the current value.  
 

 
 

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NOTE: it is useful to sort the list descending by Used space when you want to spot virtual 
machines using too much disk space. For example when you observe a virtual machine 
cannot write new data or it is very slow with disk operation you may want to check this 
column. 

Additional information 
The detailed information box for each virtual machine show essential data about like 
operating system, datastore, disk pool, network adapter, ip address, protection type and 
snapshots with quick access to clone and restore. The current version of SynetoOS does 
not allow the modification of these properties. To change them, please login to the ESXi 
web console. 
From the Details information box, you can not only see the Datastore the VM is mounted 
on, but you can also access it by clicking on the hyperlinked Datastore Name. 
 

   

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Analyzing performance 
With one virtual machine per datastore you can retrieve some interesting data to 
analyze. 

Dataset IOPS 

Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → IOPS . 

These graphics show the IOPS happening on the datastore from the Syneto HYPER's 
perspective. 
 
NOTE: If you create one virtual machine per datastore, this is the IOPS produced by the 
virtual machine. 

Dataset bandwidth 
Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Bandwidth . 

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These graphics show the data transfer speed on the datastore from the Syneto HYPER's 
perspective. 
 
NOTE: If you create one virtual machine per datastore, this is the bandwidth produced by 
the virtual machine. 

Dataset average block size 

Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Average block size . 

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These graphics show the average block size of the data on the datastore from the 
Syneto HYPER's perspective. 
 
NOTE: If you create one virtual machine per datastore, this is the average block size of 
the data produced by the virtual machine. 

Recovering data from a snapshot 

Get access to a previous version of the virtual machine 

Sometimes, it happens that you lose some data. Maybe a virus corrupted something, 
maybe a user deleted a file. Or simply your virtual machine crashed and it won't start any 
more. 
 

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For all these, and many more cases, you can simply click on the Snapshots tab in the 
details view of a virtual machine. 
 

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Pick a date from the calendar, and click on the contextual menu for a snapshot. 
 

 
Click clone. The virtual machines will be preselected for you. 
 

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Click clone and wait for the process to finish. 
 

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On the Virtual machines page we note that a new virtual machine was created. Using the 
ESXi web interface you can start the virtual machine and recover/copy the data you 
need. 

Take a manual snapshot 

For manual snapshsots click on Take snapshot Insert a unique snapshot name and 
select consistency type. 
 

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To view manual snapshots click on the Snapshots tab in the details view of a virtual 
machine → Manual . 
 

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Clean up when you are done 

One of the more tedious tasks after recovering data is cleaning up after you. Finding, 
stopping, deregistering virtual machines, removing VMware datastores, deleting storage 
clones can be a complex operation. And because it is time consuming and difficult, 
many people just let it there… forever. 
 
With Syneto HYPER the whole cleanup process is just one click away. And we take care 
to clean up only what we created. 
 
Go to Main menu → Virtual machines and select a virtual machine that has cloned 
snapshots. Click Browse in the snapshot section. 
 

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You will see that all cloned snapshots are marked with a label. Click the context menu 
for a cloned snapshot and select Clean up clone .  
 

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The system will ask you to confirm the process and it will explain all the things that will 
happen, such as virtual machines will be removed, datastore unmounted from VMware, 
etc. 
 

 
 
The process takes a little time, you will see a step by step progress. 
 

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That's it, all that was created, shared, connected, imported for that snapshot clone was 
reverted. No more mess left behind by the recovery process.   

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Migrating Virtual Machines 

SynetoOS offers the possibility to migrate Virtual Machines from your existing, 
non-Syneto infrastructure. That is, if you have Virtual Machines running on a different 
hardware, inside an ESXi or vCenter, SynetoOS provides you with a simple mechanism to 
migrate some or all of your Virtual Machines to your HYPER hardware. 
 
NOTE: The scope of this feature is limited to existing installations running on VMware. 
Hyper-V, KVM and other hypervisors are not supported. 

 
NOTE: Though not intended for this purpose, you could also use SynetoOS to import 
Virtual Machines from existing Syneto infrastructure (other HYPER machines). 

How to migrate virtual machines 

After updating your SynetoOS to version 4.4 or higher (or, after installing a new SynetoOS 
4.4 or higher) you will be notified with the following message: 
 

 
 
This way, you can easily begin the process of migrating Virtual Machines from existing 
infrastructure as soon as you have Syneto OS 4.4 (or higher) available. 
 
If you do not want to migrate virtual machines at this time, you can do it later, by 
accessing the Migrate link from the Virtual machines page. 
 

 
 
If you click Migrate (either the button in the notification, or the link in the page), a modal 
will appear, as you can see in the image below. 

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The preparations may take a few minutes. 
 
NOTE: The Migration feature requires a running instance of SynetoFileRecovery Virtual 
Machine. You should not remove this virtual machine from your HYPER installation. 
 
As soon as the migration service is ready, the modal will change into something like 
below. 
 

 
 
Here you can see various resource information about the local hypervisor, which will help 
you determine how many and the kinds of Virtual Machines you can migrate onto the 
machine. 
 
In the image above, there are 4 physical CPUs and 12 GB of RAM installed. Since there 
are 2 Virtual machines running at the time, each with 1 virtual CPUs, the ratio of CPU 
usage is 0.5 (i.e. 2 virtual CPUs running on 4 physical CPUs). Also, the current RAM 
usage is displayed as 6.3 GB. There is one disk pool set up, hybrid , which has a capacity 
of 19.5 GB and a current usage of 749 MB. 
 
If you believe that your HYPER system has enough resources, you can go ahead and 
click Select VMs . The following modal will appear: 
 

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Here you will specify the IP address or hostname of the ESXi / vCenter you wish to 
migrate Virtual Machines from, along with the credentials. 
 
NOTE: Make sure that you specify an external host (ESXi / vCenter), and not the IP / 
hostname of the local hypervisor. Migrating virtual machines from your HYPER machine 
onto the same machine is not allowed. 
 
Attempting to connect to your local hypervisor from here will result in an error: 

 
 
After you filled in the connection details, and clicked Connect , SynetoOS will connect to 
the specified ESXi / vCenter and fetch the list of Virtual Machines and details from there. 
 
 
 

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In the case above, there were 4 Virtual Machines found on the host: 2 are powered on 
and 2 are powered off (as seen in the State column). In the vCPUs and RAM columns you 
can see the associated values configured for each specific Virtual Machine - for 
instance, vm1 was configured on the hypervisor to have 1 vCPU and 4 GB RAM. The 
Storage column displays the amount of disk space associated with the Virtual Machine: 
 
● If all the disks of the VM are thin provisioned, then the value represents the total 
disk usage of the VM (i.e. the sum of disk usage of each disk) 
● If all the disks of the VM are thick provisioned, then the value represents the total 
disk space configured for the VM (i.e. the sum of the disk capacity value of each 
disk) 
● If some of the disks of the VM are thin provisioned and others are thick 
provisioned, then the value represents the combined sum of disk usage and disk 
capacity, for thin and thick provisioned disks, respectively. 
 

NOTE: The symbol means that the migration can happen, but there are things you 
should take into consideration. The symbol gives information why the migration 
cannot be performed on the Virtual Machine. Hover the cursor over the symbols to learn 
the details.  
 
NOTE: If you want to migrate a Virtual Machine that has thick provisioned disks, the 
disks of that Virtual Machine will become thin provisioned on your local HYPER. Also, 
that Virtual Machine will have a warning ( ) symbol next to it. 
 
NOTE: The checkbox will become greyed out if it cannot be checked. 
 
There are situations when the Virtual Machine can’t be migrated. For example: 

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● The VM is in a Suspended state. 

● The VM is Running . 
● The VM is already being imported. 
● The hardware version of the external host is greater than that of the local 
hypervisor. 
 
After you checked the virtual machines you want to migrate, click Select . 
If one or more of the virtual machines has snapshots, then, upon clicking Select , a dialog 
will appear, telling you about the implications, and asking you to confirm. 
 

 
 
Upon confirming (or, if no confirmation dialog appeared, due to no potential issues), you 
will return to the first modal, where you will see the system resources of your local 
hypervisor, along with the Virtual Machines you have selected. 
 

 
 
In the image above, the Virtual Machine centos7 was added for migration. The workload 
was automatically set to Application server , but it can be changed. 
 

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Also, since there is only one pool on this SynetoOS machine, hybrid , the Virtual Machine 
will automatically be migrated to this pool. 
 
NOTE: If the Keep original field is unchecked, the Virtual Machine will be removed from 
the external host (ESXi / vCenter) after the migration is completed. Otherwise, the Virtual 
Machine will simply be copied here. 
 
If you have more than one pool configured on your SynetoOS, then you will be able to 
select which of them you want to migrate the Virtual Machine on. 

 
 
In the image above, there are 2 pools: flash and hybrid - they both appear in the Summary 
section. The Virtual Machine vm1 was selected for migration. However, since there are 
more than one pools, a new column has appeared for Selected virtual machines : 
Destination pool - from here you can choose which of the two disk pools to migrate the 
Virtual Machine on. 
 
After you configured the Workload , Destination pool , and whether to keep the original 
Virtual Machine or not, you can click Select VMs to add more Virtual Machines to the list 
- say, from a different ESXi or vCenter. 

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In the image above, SynetoOS has connected to a different host, where other virtual 
machines are available. 
 
NOTE: If you hover over the information or warning icons, you can read the associated 
information. 
 
Click Select to add the additional Virtual Machines. This will bring you back to the first 
modal, where you can see all the Virtual Machines you have selected, from whichever 
external hosts. 
 

 
 
In the image above, vm_x was configured to have the original preserved, while centos7 is 
set to be moved (i.e. after migration, the VM will be destroyed from the external host). 
 
Once you hit Migrate , the migration process will begin. 
 

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In the image above, centos7 is being migrated while vm_x is failing. 
You can cancel the migration of any virtual machine at any time. 

 
 
In the image above, the migration process has finished. 
 
NOTE: You can anytime access the tasks dialog from the button at the right side of the 
top bar. 
 
After the migration of a virtual machine finishes, the name of the successfully migrated 
virtual machine (in the image above, centos7 ) becomes a link: if you click the name (in 
this case, centos7 ), the page will change to Virtual machines where you will see it in the 
list of virtual machines installed on your HYPER system. 
 
After the migration of a virtual machine finishes or fails, a link will appear in the 
description of the task, Details . Clicking on it will open a modal where you will see the list 
of operations it performed. 
 

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In the image above, the Details link was clicked for the centos7 virtual machine. 
 

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SHARES 
Syneto HYPER products offer traditional file sharing over the SMB and AFP protocols. We 
know that hyperconverged solutions are the trend, but classic, old school sharing isn't 
dead either. So, let's see how to configure file sharing on Syneto HYPER. 

User management 
When we need to share files to several users, the first question that comes to mind is 
"Who can access the files?" Syneto HYPER offers user management and file access 
management in two contexts: Microsoft Active Directory integration or local users on the 
device itself. 

Active Directory integration 

To join Active Directory go to Main menu → Shares and select Workgroup / Domain in the 
action bar. 

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Click on the Active Directory tab. Fill in the form with the required data and click Join . 
Once joined you manage your users from the Active Directory server. File permissions 
are also set from Windows. 
 
NOTE: U
sername must be an Active Directory username with sufficient rights to join 
hosts to Active Directory. 
 
WARNING: You must make sure DNS is set to the Domain controller 's IP address. 
Otherwise joining the Active Directory will fail. See Networking for details about how to 
configure DNS server on the Syneto HYPER. 

Managing local users and groups 

In case you are not using an Active Directory server, or you simply wish to control access 
to shares with users local to the Syneto HYPER, you have the option to do so. 
 

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First, go to Main menu → Shares and select Workgroup / Domain . Click the Workgroup 
tab and join a workgroup. 
 
NOTE: W
orkgroup is the default setting. 
 
When you are joined to a workgroup, you can manage local users and groups. Click on 
Accounts in the action bar. The dialog will present two tabs: Users and Groups . 

 
 
NOTE: By default there are two users created: afp with default password afp and user 
smb with default password smb . 
 
The default users are created for simple networks. They provide a simple preconfigured 
security option. Just make your users use the smb or afp user with the default 
passwords. 
 
If this is not enough for your case, just click Add user and add a new user. 
 

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NOTE: Each user will be created with a default group having the same name as the user. 
You can select secondary groups for each user from the existing groups. 
 
 
   

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In the user list you can click the context menu and manage the user's groups, password, 
and delete the user. 

 
Adding and removing groups is similar to users. 

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Just click Add group and fill in a name fill in a name for the group. 
 

 
And then, click Create to create the group. 
 

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The new group will appear in the list. 

Provisioning and managing 

SMB - Create share 

To create a new SMB share go to Main menu → Shares and click on New SMB share . 
 

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Provide a name for the share and optionally set one or more of the additional 
parameters: 
 
● Allow guest access - makes the share public. Anybody can read, write, and modify 
anything. 
 
NOTE: Creating or setting an SMB share's guest access, will automatically set the 
rights to everybody read/write/execute. 
 
● Set quota - sets a quota on a share. In other words, how much data can be written 
into it. 
● Change permissions - allows setting a user, group, and UNIX type file 
permissions. 
 

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SMB - Manage share 

After the share was created you can see it in the list. 

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Click on it and you can see its details. From the details section you can perform a set of 
management actions: 
 
● Pause - will temporarily disable the share. You won't lose any data, but access to it will be 
impossible. 
 

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When a share is paused its icon changes from the green triangle into an orange pause 
sign. 
 
● Delete - will permanently remove the share and all its data.  
● Permissions → Change - allows changing owner (user), group, and UNIX file 
permissions. 
● Quota → Change - allows changing the quota of the share. You can increase or 
decrease the value. Minimum is 1GB. Set it to 0 for unlimited. 
● Guest access → OFF / ON - toggles the guest access state of the share. 
● View and edit the share's description. This field will shows by default the time 
when the share was created. 
 
NOTE: After setting an SMB share's guest access, the rights to everybody 
read/write/execute will be set automatically. 

AFP - Create share 

To create a new AFP share go to Main menu → Shares and click on New AFP share . 
 

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Provide a name for the share and optionally set one or more of the additional 
parameters: 
 
● Allow time machine backups - enables support for MacOS to send Time Machine 
backups to this location. 
● Enable spotlight search - enables server side indexing of this folder so you can 
search for files in your Mac's Spotlight. 
● Set quota - sets a quota on a share. In other words, how much data can be written 
into it.  
● Change permissions - allows setting a user, group, and UNIX type file 
permissions. 
● View and edit the share's description. This field will show by default the time 
when the share was created. 
 

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AFP - Manage share 

After the share was created you can see it in the list. 
 

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Click on it and your can see its details. From the details section you can perform a set of 
management actions: 
 
● Pause - will temporarily disable the share. You won't lose any data, but access to it will be 
prohibited. 
 

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When a share is paused its icon changes from the green triangle into an orange pause 
sign. 
 
● Delete - will permanently remove the share and all its data.  
● Permissions → Change - allows changing owner (user), group, and UNIX file 
permissions. 
● Quota → Change - allows changing the quota of the share. You can increase or 
decrease the value. Minimum is 1GB. Set it to 0 for unlimited. 
● Time machine → OFF / ON - toggles the time machine functionality. 
● Spotlight search → OFF / ON - toggles the server side Spotlight integration. 

Protecting 
Please refer to Configuring snapshotting without virtual machines for more details. 

Monitoring 
The main shares page can be accessed by Main menu → Shares . This page offers a list 
of shares. The table combines SMB and AFP shares into a single list. 
 

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The list has several columns with information about the share: Type , Used space , Quota . 

Type 
Specified the share type: SMB or AFP. It can be used to quickly determine a share's type. 

Used space 
Show the amount of data written to the share. It can be used to determine space 
pressure on the Syneto HYPER. 

Quota 
Shows the quota set on the share. It can be used along with Used space to determine if 
space limits are reached. 

Analyzing performance 
Syneto HYPER collects performance data and saves them for later analyzes. This 
chapter will describe what analytics can be visualized for shares. 

Dataset IOPS 
Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → IOPS . 

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These graphics show the IOPS happening on the share from the Syneto HYPER 's 
perspective. 

Dataset bandwidth 
Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Bandwidth . 
 

 
 
These graphics show the data transfer speed on the share from the Syneto HYPER's 
perspective. 

Dataset average block size 

Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Average block size . 
 
  
 
These graphics show the average block size of the data on the share from the Syneto 
HYPER's perspective. 

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Recovering data from a snapshot 

Access a previous version of your share 

Sometimes, it happens that you lose some data. Maybe a virus corrupted something, 
maybe a user deleted a file. 

 
 
For all these, and many more cases, you can simply click on the Snapshots tab in the 
details view of a share. 
 

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Pick a date from the calendar, and click on the contextual menu for a snapshot. 

 
Select clone. 
 

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Click clone and wait for the process to finish. 
 

 
 
Now you can access a share with the name specified at the clone step. It will contain the 
data as it was present at the moment of taking the snapshot. 
 

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WARNING: Do not change data on the clones. Clones cannot be protected, and after the 
Cleanup process (see below), all changes will be deleted. 

Windows previous versions 

Microsoft Windows users can benefit from built-in integration between Syneto HYPER 
and Microsoft's "Previous Versions" functionality. 
On your Windows machine, on any given share, you can right click a folder or file and 
choose "Previous Versions". This will show a list with all the versions of the selected 
folder or file that are part of Syneto HYPER snapshots.  
You can see the content for these folders or files directly from your Windows machine, 
no need to do anything on the Syneto HYPER. 

Clean up when you are done 

One of the more tedious tasks after recovering data is cleaning up after you. Deleting 
storage clones and shares can be a tedious operation. And because it is time consuming 
and difficult, many people just let them there… forever. 
 
With Syneto HYPER the whole cleanup process is just one click away. And we take care 
to clean up only what we created. 
 
Go to Main menu → Shares and select a share that has cloned snapshots. Click Browse 
in the snapshot section. 
 

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You will see that all cloned snapshots are marked with a label. Click the context menu 
for a cloned snapshot and select Delete clone .  

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The system will ask you to confirm the process and it will explain all the things that will 
happen. 
 

 
 
The process takes only a second, you will see a little spinner in the list. 

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That's it, all that was created and shared for that snapshot clone was reverted. No more 
mess left behind by the recovery process. 

Reverting a clone 
Once you created one or more clones from your snapshots, you may find a specific clone 
that contains exactly the data you wish to recover. The revert functionality allows you to 
replace your current share with the clone. 
To revert a clone, select a clone, then click Revert . 

 
A clone revert process will do the following steps: 
● Delete all snapshots created after the snapshot from which the clone was 
created 
● Replace the original share with the clone 
 
WARNING: Once a clone is restored, all data and snapshots newer than the clone will be 
permanently lost. 

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NOTE: If you have several clones of the same share, only the clone from the most recent 
snapshot can be reverted. 
 

 
 
During the revert process you will see a step-by-step progress. If something goes wrong, 
an appropriate message will be shown. 

 
 
WARNING: On DR unit, on a received share, you can create clones but you cannot revert 
the clone.  

After the revert process finishes, the system will update the datastore's Description field 
with the relevant information. 

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VOLUMES 
Introduction 
Volumes are virtual block devices shared over the iSCSI protocol. Such volumes can be 
accessed from VMware and from Microsoft Windows or Linux servers. 
 
WARNING: This feature is not available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series. 

Access management 

iSCSI remote initiators 

Before provisioning a new volume, we need to specify at least one initiator. An iSCSI 
initiator is an IQN or EUI from a host that will try to connect to Syneto HYPER. You can 
define any number of initiators and you can organize them by groups. 
Go to Main menu → Shares → Initiators . 
This will show a dialog with the currently defined initiators. 
 

 
 
By default, no initiators are defined. To add a new initiator click Add initiator and specify 
the group name and identifier. 
 

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NOTE: each identifier must be in a group named by you. This is necessary even if there is 
only one initiator in the group. 
 
Once you are done, click Add . The new initiator will be shown in the list. From this list you 
can manage the initiators, move them from one group to another, or delete them. 

iSCSI local targets 

By default no local targets are defined on Syneto HYPER. Defining targets is optional. 
Volumes can be provisioned without specifying them. 
In case you wish more granular access control, you can specify local targets and groups 
by going to Main menu → Shares → Targets . 
By default a list with an empty group named unassigned will be shown. This is a group 
containing targets that are not assigned to any target group. While initiators must be part 
of group always, targets do not need to. All these targets are part of the virtual All group. 
 

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To create a new target click Add target . The form will ask you the group. Options are: 
1. Create new group - creates a new group with the given name 
2. Unassigned - adds the target to no group, accessible through the virtual All group 
3. No group - same as unassigned 
 

 
 
By default the Autogenerate identifier option will be selected. Optionally, you can uncheck 
it and specify an IQN yourself. 
 

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Once you are done, click Add . The new target will be show in the list. From this list you 
can manage the targets, move them from one group the another, turn them on or off, or 
delete them. 

Provisioning and managing 

Provisioning a new volume is done on the Main menu → Volumes page. In the action bar 
click New volume . 
 

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NOTE: An initiator must be defined before provisioning a new volume. 
 
The dialog will require to fill in a set of information: 

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● Name - the name of the volume 

● Size - the size in GB for the volume 
● Block size - the block size for the volume. By default is 32KB as that is a common 
value. However, you should choose one to accommodate the type of traffic your 
applications are using. For example, database with many write operation may 
prefer an 8KB block size. A file server for video would run much better on high 
block size like 128KB. 
● Provisioning → Thin / Thick - specifies if the whole virtual disk should be 
immediately reserved. Thin provisioned volumes allows you to over-provision the 
space you have available on your pool. Thick provisioned disks guaranties that 
there will be always enough underlying storage space up to the size specified by 
you.   
 
WARNING: Be careful when creating snapshots of a thick provisioned volume. In order to 
guarantee the provisioned size, each snapshot will be as big as the provisioned space for 
the volume. The space will be used from the available space on the pool. 

 
● When Provisioning is set to Thick, you will see an informative message when 
creating a schedule: 
 

 
 
● Enable write back cache - enable an iSCSI protocol integration that will receive 
data to the memory first, confirm to the sender that the data is written, and flush 
the data to the drive at specific time intervals. This speeds up write operations a 
lot, but it may lead to data loss at sudden power failures. 
● iSCSI a
ccess - requires you to specify the initiator group that can access this 
volume, and the local targets to which it is addressed. You must also provide a 
logical unit number (LUN). 
 
After you are done, click Create . The Syneto HYPER will create the local volume, it will 
reserve the space if you requested thick provisioning, it will set up all the iSCSI 
configuration for it so that it will be immediately accessible from your network. 
 
Once a new volume is created you will be able to find it on the Main menu → Volumes 
page.  
 

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Volumes can be clicked in the list, and a detailed box in the bottom will appear. Here you 
can take a few volume management steps: 
● Delete - deletes the volume, all the iSCSI shares related to it, all its data and 
snapshots. 
NOTE: Volumes with clones cannot be deleted. See more about clones below.  
● Expand - a volume's size can be increased, but not decreased. So we recommend 
you start with the minimum or nominal size your user will need and expand as 
necessary. 
● Provisioning → thick / thin - you can change the provisioning type any time. 
Changing a volume from thin to thick provisioned will immediately "consume" the 
space from the pool up to the provisioned size. Switching a volume from thick to 
thin will release the space reserved for the the thick volume that is not used. 
● Writeback cache - change the writeback cache type. See details above about this 
is. 
● iSCSI access - this section allows you to allow access for other initiator groups by 
clicking Grant access or revoke access from an initiator group by clicking the 
context menu and selecting Revoke access in the iSCSI access list. 
● View and edit the volume's description. This field will shows by default the time 
when the volume was created. 

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Protecting 
Please refer to Configuring snapshotting without virtual machines for more details. 

Monitoring 
The main volumes page can be accessed by Main menu → Volumes . This page offers a 
list of volumes. 
 

 
 
The list has two columns that can help you monitor what is happening: Used space and 
Provisioning 

Used space 
How much data is written on the volume. 

Provisioning 
Thick or thin, this value, combined with Used space can help you spot issues. For 
example if a user cannot write to a volume, but the user sees there is enough free space, 
you can check the Provisioning volume. Maybe your system is over-commissioned and 
there is no space left on the underlying storage. 

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When Provisioning is set to Thick, you will see an informative message when creating a 
schedule: 
 

 
 
 

Analyzing performance 
Syneto HYPER collects performance data and saves them for later analyzes. This 
chapter will describe what analytics can be visualized for volumes. 

Dataset IOPS 
Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → IOPS . 
 

 
 
These graphics show the IOPS happening on the volume from the Syneto HYPER 
perspective. 

Dataset bandwidth 
Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Bandwidth . 
 

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These graphics show the data transfer speed on the volume from the Syneto HYPER's 
perspective. 

Dataset average block size 

Go to Main menu → Analytics , click Add graph , select Dataset → Average block size . 
 

 
 
These graphics show the average block size of the data on the volume from the Syneto 
HYPER's perspective. 

Recovering data from a snapshot 

Access a previous version of your volume 

Sometimes, it happens that you lose some data. Maybe a virus corrupted something, 
maybe a user deleted a file. 

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For all these, and many more cases, you can simply click on the Snapshots tab in the 
details view of a volume. 

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Pick a date from the calendar, and click on the contextual menu for a snapshot. 
 

 
Select Clone . 
 

 
 
Click clone and wait for the process to finish. 
 

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Now you can access a volume with the name specified at the clone step. It will contain 
the data as it was present at the moment of taking the snapshot. 
WARNING: Do not change data on the clones. Clones cannot be protected, and after the 
Cleanup process (see below), all changes will be deleted. 

Clean up when you are done 

One of the more tedious tasks after recovering data is cleaning up after you. Deleting 
storage clones and volumes can be a tedious operation. And because it is time 
consuming and difficult, many people just let them there… forever. 
 
With Syneto HYPER the whole cleanup process is just one click away. And we take care 
to clean up only what we created. 
 
Go to Main menu → Volumes and select a share that has cloned snapshots. Click Browse 
in the snapshot section. 
 

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You will see that all cloned snapshots are marked with a label. Click the context menu 
for a cloned snapshot and select Delete clone . 

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The system will ask you to confirm the process. 
 

 
Wait a few seconds for cleanup to finish. A green notification in the bottom right will tell 
you when it's done. 
 
 
 
That's it, all that was created and shared for that snapshot clone was reverted. No more 
mess left behind by the recovery process.   

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DRIVES AND POOLS 

Introduction 
In the secondary menu, we have the Hardware section. This contains Drives and Pools . 
On the Drives page you can monitor the health of the drives and replace a faulted drive.  
On this page, you have two tabs that allows you to see the drives details, blink a drive, or 
replace a faulty one. The two tabs are Map and List. 
 
Map tab will show you how the disks are mapped in the rack. By clicking on a disk, you 
will see it's details: Name, Size, Pool, Enclosure, Position, Vendor, Model, Serial number 
and physical block size . 
 

 
 
List tab will show you the drives in a table view.You can see all the details above and do 
all the actions like blinking and replacing drives. Here you can also Search and Sort by 
Name, Size, Pool, Enclosure and Serial. 

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Pools are used to group drives together in order to build redundancy, prevent data 
corruption and provide read cache and write acceleration. 
On the Pools page you can monitor the health of the pools and do different actions 
related to pools. By clicking on a pool, more details will be shown. 
The pool is automatically configured. It can be hybrid(HDD and SSD) or flash (only SSD). 
The hybrid pool on DR-Play and Hyper2000 Series uses an 8GB virtual disk for write 
acceleration and has no read cache. 
You can graphically see how much space is being occupied on the pool. Pools with more 
than 80% of space usage might suffer fragmentation and slower access times. 

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Replacing a faulted drive 

 
Go to Secondary Menu → Drives . 

 
 
The drives page will open. The faulted drive will be highlighted  

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● yellow: it has errors, but still works 

● red: it does not work anymore 
 

 
 

 
 

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Click on a drive to be redirected to the Drives page. See the disk in List view → Replace 
the disk.  
 

 
 

 
 

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Our machines have support for blink, so you can detect the drive easily. To activate the 
blink for a drive, click on the Drive -> Drive details → Blink . 
 
 
NOTE: OS drives do not have support for blinking. 
 

 
 
Go to the physical machine. Identify the faulted drive, take the bay out. Replace the drive 
in the bay with a new drive. 
 
NOTE : Make sure that the replacement drive is of the same size as the one faulted. 
 
Place the bay in the machine. 

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Go to Drives page again. Click the Rescan button, found in the action bar.  
 

 
 
Click on Drive details → Replace . 
 

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There will be a list with the available drives for replacement. Select the newly introduced 
one and click Replace . Now, the faulted drive is being replaced with the new drive. The 
system will automatically start restoring the data on the new drive. 
 
If there was data on the newly introduced drive, a warning will appear. 
 

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WARNING : If you are sure there is no important data on the drive, click on Erase data and 
replace. 

Replacing a faulted OS drive 

Extract the faulted drive and replace it with a new drive. 
The rest of the operation is done automatically by the hardware RAID. 

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Replacing a faulted cache drive 

Go to Secondary Menu → Pools click on the context menu for the pool that has the 
faulted cache drive and click Manage Cache . Remove the faulted drive from cache and 
add the new drive that replaced it. 

Creating a pool 
 
Go to Secondary Menu → Hardware → Pools . The Pools page will open. 

 
 
Click on the New Pool button in the action bar, top of the page. A dialog for creating a 
new pool will open. 
 

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You will have to give a name to the pool.  
 
A pool is constructed of drive groups. There are several types of drive groups:  
● Data drive groups – drives that contain the actual data. Each data drive group has 
a number of drives that may fail before losing data. Choosing data drive groups 
that will support drive failures will result in lower available space on the group – 
depending on the number of drives that may fail (e.g. if a data drive group of 5 
drives will allow 2 drives to fail before losing data then the total available space 
on the drives group will be reduced by 40%).  
Recommended: Select redundancy value 1 and two drives per data group . 
● Spare drive group – the drives in this group are not actively used but will 
automatically replace a data drive that has failed. Adding spare drives is optional. 
● Read cache drive group – this group contains drives that are actively used to 
speed up the data reading process. It is recommended to use high speed drives 
(SSD) in this group. Adding drives to this group is optional. 
● Write acceleration drive group – this group contains drives that are actively used 
to speed up the data writing process. It is recommended to use only high speed 
drives (SSD) in this group. Adding drives to this group is optional. 
 
 

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To add a drive, click on the Plus button. A dialog for selecting a drive will open. 

 
 

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Expanding a pool 
Go to Secondary Menu → Hardware → Pools . Click Expand from the pool's details menu. 
 

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This will only expand the data drives.  

For adding drives, click the Plus button . 

 

 
 
Select the ones you want by checking their boxes. 

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After you finished selecting, click Add then Expand . 
 
 
NOTE: The new data drive groups must be the same size as the ones in the current pool. 
 
To expand a pool with spares drives , click on Details Menu → Spares → Manage. 

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A dialog for adding spare drives will open. 
 

Click on the Plus button . A dialog will open where you can select which drives to 
be used by checking their boxes.  
 

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After selecting the drives you want, click Add then Update . 
To expand a pool with cache drives , click on Details Menu → Read acceleration/Write 
acceleration → Manage . 

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A dialog will open where you can add read cache drives or write acceleration drives . 
 

Click on the Plus button . A dialog will open where you can select which drives to 
be used. 

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After you finish your selection, click Add . 

Importing a disk pool 

 
If you reinstall SynetoOS or you have introduced drives from another Syneto machine, 
you will want to access the data on them. This can be done by importing the pool .  
 
Go to Secondary Menu → Hardware → Pools . The Pools page will open. 
 
Click Import existing in the action bar. If there are drive pools that can be imported, a list 
will be shown.  
 

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Select the disk pool to be imported and click Import . 
 
If a disk pool was previously used in another machine, a warning will appear. You will 
need to force import it. 

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Exporting a disk pool 

If you reinstall SynetoOS or you want to move drives to another Syneto machine, you will 
want to be able to access the data. In order for the data to be saved properly, you need to 
export the pool . 
 
Go to Secondary Menu → Hardware → Pools . The Pools page will open. 
 
To export a pool, click on Details Menu → Export . 
 

 
 
NOTE : The OS pool can not be exported. 
 
WARNING : All virtual machines and datastores related to this pool from all connected 
ESXi hosts will be removed. 

Protecting against silent data corruption 

Syneto products have a built-in mechanism for protecting against silent data corruption. 
Silent data corruption means that data being read is different from the data previously 
written to a drive. There are several ways this could happen, from controller firmware 
errors all the way to natural events like cosmic radiation. 
 
Go to Secondary Menu → Hardware → Pools . The Pools page will open. 
To set integrity check , click on Integrity check. 

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Here you can set the speed and intervals for the integrity check of all pools. 
 

 
 
 
Intervals section allows you to set a schedule. By default, it is enabled every week on 
Friday, at 23:00. You can change the week interval. First, you have to Disable the current 
schedule. 
 
Write the new value you want in the field, between every and weeks . Click Enable . 
 
Change speed section allows you set the speed of integrity check. It can be set to slow , 
normal and fast . Just select the one you want and SynetoOS will change it for future 
checks. 
 
NOTE : A faster speed will consume more resources making the system perform slower. 
 
WARNING: This option also affects the speed of rebuilding redundancy after a drive is 
changed. 

 
You have an entire section, on each pool, with information about integrity checking: Last 
check, Schedule check and the option to Check now . 

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EXPANSION SHELVES 
For most cases, the disks in a HYPER machine are enough to store all your data. 
However, there are IT infrastructures that require the archiving on large amount of 
historical data. For these cases, purchasing a solution with expansion shelves (JBODs) 
is a good idea. 
If you already have a HYPER 3000 Series machine, you can purchase only the expansion 
shelves. 

Attaching expansion shelves 

NOTE: Hyper2000 series and DR-Play do not support expansion. 
 
Connect the JBOD to the Syneto machine (for more information about physically 
connecting the JBOD, please consult the JBOD Quick Start Guide ). Go on Drives page 
and click Rescan.  
On the Map tab, you will see the enclosures for the JBOD(s) connected and their 
available drives. Available drives will appear in pale green. The drives which are part of a 
pool will be white showing a green light in their top left corner. Grey spaces suggest 
empty bays. 
 

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Expanding a pool with JBOD drives  

Once an expansion shelf is connected, the system will suggest expanding current pools 
with the newly detected drives. 
 
NOTE: You can still use the Drives and Pools page to configure a new pool in the 
traditional way. 
 
When new drives are detected, a notification will appear. It will suggest you to "Use 
drives" and go through a wizard. 
If you do not want to expand the pools, you can simply close the notification. Do not 
worry if you need it again, it will appear every time you land on Drives Page, until there 
are no more drives available for expanding a pool. 
 
 

 
 
To expand the pool as the notification indicates, click on the link Use drives . 
A new page will open, where you can see the pool which is about to be expanded and the 
size of the expansion.  
 
 

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The pool will be expanded with drives of the same size as the ones already present on 
the data pool. The existing pool's redundancy policy will be used for all the newly added 
drives. 
 
Remember that once you use the drives to expand a pool, you can not remove them 
unless you export or destroy the pool. 
  
NOTE: Only data pools can be expanded. 

   

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DATA PROTECTION AND REPLICATION 

Introduction 
One of the main features of Syneto HYPER is the disaster recovery solution. Virtual 
machines, datastores, shares and volumes can all be protected and replicated to another 
Syneto machine. In case of a disaster your infrastructure can be up in 15 minutes. 

Configuring replication targets 

 
In case of a machine’s failure, you will want to be able to recover from a backup. For this 
to be possible you will first need to replicate your data to the DR unit. The 
communication details for replication to the DR unit(s) are kept in the replication targets 
list. 
 

Adding a replication target 

 

 
 
 
On the Protect and replicate page, click Replication targets in the action bar. A dialog will 
open, listing the available replication targets. 
 

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Click Add target . Another dialog will open where you can enter the configuration for the 
new replication target . In the field name write the name you want to give to the target. In 
the field Hostname / IP write the hostname or IP of the replication target. In the 
Password field write the admin’s password. 
 

 
 
After filling the form and clicking Add , the list will be updated with the replication target. 
 

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WARNING: It will fail when adding as replication target a HYPERseries machine with an 
OS below ver. 3.2.8. 

Removing a replication target 

 
On the Protect and replicate page, click Replication targets in the action bar. A dialog will 
open listing the available replication targets. For the replication target you want to 
remove, click on Context Menu → Delete . 
WARNING: Deleting a replication target, will also remove it from the snapshot schedules. 

Editing a replication target 

 
On the Protect and replicate page, click Replication targets in the action bar. A dialog will 
open listing the available replication targets. For the replication target you want to edit, 
click on Context Menu → Edit . 

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Configuring virtual machine credentials 

 
To be able to run pre-freeze and post-thaw scripts on a virtual machine during the 
application consistent snapshotting process, you will need to add the virtual machine's 
credentials. On the Protect and replicate page, click on Stored credentials in the action 
bar. A dialog will open listing the available credentials. 
 

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To add a credential, click on Add credential . A dialog will open where you can enter a 
name by which to identify it, and the Username and Password which will be used to log in 
to the virtual machine. 
 

 
 
Click Add . The credentials will appear in the list. 
 

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Protecting a datastore 
 
Note: Cloned datastores cannot be protected because they are temporary objects. 
 
The Protect and replicate page contains 3 tabs: Datastores , Shares and Volumes . Select 
Datastores . 

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The table lists all the datastores. There is a Search bar, useful for searching for a specific 
datastore by specifying its name. 
 

 
 
If you click on a datastore, more details about its protection will be shown. 

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Configuring the snapshot schedule for a datastore 

 
In the details section, there is Schedules tab . Click on it. On the left are the four 
frequencies a user can choose: Minutely , Hourly , Daily and Weekly . You can enable one, 
two, three, or all four frequencies for a datastore.  
 

 
 
To enable one schedule type, click on the switch on the left of the desired interval. A 
dialog will appear, where you can configure the snapshot policy for the selected 
datastore and frequency. 
 

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Here you can specify how often you want the schedule to perform by changing the Every 
field. 
NOTE: We recommend spacing out snapshots taking time with at least 5 minutes. If all 
schedules run at the same time, and then replicate, it can lead to high network traffic and 
high drive IOPS on the replication target. 
 
To the right of the dialog, there is the Keep field. Here you can specify how many 
snapshots should be kept on the Syneto HYPER. If more snapshots accumulate, older 
ones will be deleted. 
 

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NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected 
datastore. 
 
Replicate to section allows you to select to which replication target to replicate. By 
default, no replication is set. If you click on the Target field, a list of the defined 
replication targets will be shown. 

 
 
After you select the desired replication target, two more fields will appear. 
 

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If you want the replication to be encrypted, click on the box below the Encrypt field.  
 
NOTE : Non-encrypted replication is faster than encrypted one, but less secure. If the 
replication target is off-site, we recommend encryption. 
 
You can specify how many replicated snapshots should be kept on the replication target 
under the Keep field. 
 
NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected 
datastore. 
 

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NOTE: We recommend a lower retention policy on the primary unit and a higher one on 
the replication target (DR unit). 
 
After you finished all the configuration, click Save . Your schedules will appear in the 
details section, in Schedules . You can edit a schedule by clicking on Change . 
 

 
 
A schedule can be paused by clicking on the green switch button. This will not pause a 
snapshot or replication which is currently in progress. If you want to resume it, just click 
on the red switch button. 
If you want to delete a schedule, click on Change . A dialog will open. Click on Delete 
schedule . 

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Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a datastore 

 
If you want to check the progress of a snapshot schedule, go to Progress tab in details 
section. 
 
 

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You will see for every enabled schedule the current state. You can click Run now if you 
want to start the schedule in this moment. 
NOTE: First replication will always copy all the data found in the datastore. Subsequent 
replications will transfer only the differences between the last successful replication and 
current snapshot. 
 

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Canceling a running replication of a datastore 

A replication that is currently running can be canceled. As a consequence, the replica will 
not be created on the destination. 
 

 
 
After you click on the cancel replication icon, you will receive a confirmation saying that 
the Snapshot replication was cancelled. 

 
 

Monitoring the snapshots of a datastore 

If you want to check the list of snapshots of a datastore, go to Snapshots tab in details 
section. 
 

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On the left, there is a calendar. On the right there is a list of snapshots from the date that 
is selected. You can change the day of the month by clicking on the desired day or you 
can go to another month by clicking the left or right arrows at the top of the calendar. 
Only dates with snapshots will be available for selection and the current date. 
To check the history of a snapshot, click on it in the right section. 
 

 
 

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Configuring the type of snapshots for the virtual machines 

If a datastore has virtual machines on it, in the snapshot schedule dialog there will be a 
list of virtual machines and their protection level . 
 

 
 
There are three main types of protection levels for a virtual machine: 
● Crash consistent - When restoring, the virtual machine will be in a state similar to 
a restart after a power outage.  
Recommended for virtual machines resilient to forced reboots. (ie. Linux or 
Solaris servers or workstations)  
 

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● Application consistent  
○ Windows VSS - Before taking the snapshot a message will be sent to the 
operating system. This will instruct compatible applications to flush all 
their data to the drive. The snapshot will be taken after the flush operation 
finishes. Drive consistency for the application supporting the protocol will 
be consistent. When restoring, the virtual machine will be in a state 
similar with a power off.  
Recommended for Microsoft servers (Active Directory, MS-SQL, etc). 
○ Hooks only - Before taking the snapshot, the pre-freeze hook will be 
executed. After the snapshot of the virtual machine is done, the post-thaw 
hook will be executed. For information on how to configure this type of 
schedule go to configuring snapshot hooks . 
Recommended for Linux Databases and Windows databases that do not 
have VSS integration (Oracle, MySQL, etc). 
○ Windows VSS & Hooks - Executes both Windows VSS and hooks.  
● Live snapshot - Before taking a snapshot all operations on the virtual machine will 
be suspended and saved to the drive. This includes waiting for drive flush 
operations, persisting RAM memory, persisting current running state. 
Unfortunately, during this operation the virtual machine is not accessible. The 
process can take up to 5 minutes or more for large servers. 
Recommended for mission critical system and only on a daily or rarer schedule, 
run overnight, so that work is not interrupted. 
 
By default, the protection level of a virtual machine is set to crash-consistent . If you want 
to change it, click on the right of the virtual machine name, in Protection level column. A 
dropdown will open where you can select the protection level you want for the virtual 
machine. 
 
It will contain a list with all the virtual machines contained by the selected datastore. 
Each virtual machine can have one of the three available protection levels: Crash 
consistent , App consistent and Live snapshot . Select your desired options and then click 
on Update . 
 
WARNING: Live snapshot is not available on Syneto HYPER 2000 Series. 

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The details section will be updated with the new information. The following snapshots 
will take the virtual machine snapshots with the new configuration. 
 
NOTE : For the minutely schedule smaller than 15 minutes, the protection level will 
always be crash consistent. 
 
Configuring snapshot hooks for a virtual machine 
 
If you want to make a hooks only snapshot of a virtual machine, select the datastore on 
which is mounted on. Select the schedule type on which you would like to apply hooks 
only.  
 

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To select the Protection level of a virtual machine, click on the right of the virtual 
machine name in the Protection level column. A list will appear with the available 
protection levels. 
NOTE : To be able to set any of the application consistent protection levels, you need to 
have VMware Tools installed on the virtual machine.  
 

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Select Hooks only or Windows VSS and hooks . 
 

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You have to add the path of the pre-freeze script and post-thaw script . You also have to 
provide credentials which can connect and execute the scripts. To see how to add 
credentials, check configuring virtual machine credentials . If you want to test the hooks 
configuration, click on Test button. This will only execute the scripts, not take a 
snapshot. 

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If the scripts are executed successfully, a green check will appear. 
 

 
 
If one of the hooks fail, an error message will be displayed with the failure reason. 
Note: If the hooks fail during a snapshot schedule run, the virtual machine snapshot will 
be crash consistent. 
 

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Note: Hooks must execute in less than 30 seconds. If they take longer than that, 
SynetoOS will kill the process. 
 

Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 

 
The Minutely and Hourly schedules allow you to exclude time intervals - ranges of hours, 
throughout the days of the week. Snapshotting & replication will not happen in those 
time intervals. 
 
Excluding time intervals can be useful if you want to backup your data at high granularity, 
but you know that one time or more during the week there is an important operation that 
your system needs to perform. If that operation could interfere with the scheduled 
backup, or is computationally expensive (e.g. intensive disk IO), it might be better to 
simply exclude that time interval from the backup schedule. 
 
In order to use exceptions in the backup schedule, look for the Exceptions field in the 
Minutely / Hourly schedule, and click the link (initially stating No exceptions ). A green 
coloured table will appear, with the days of the week as the row and hours of the day as 
the columns. 
 

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In order to exclude intervals from the schedule, click and drag, so as to draw rectangles 
in the green area: grey blocks represent hours in the week when the backup will not run, 
while green blocks represent hours in the week when the backups will be allowed to run. 
 
NOTE: You can also draw rectangles in grey areas - this will cause blocks within the grey 
area to turn back green (and thus allow the backup to run in those hours). 
 
NOTE: You can also drag within a single block - this will cause that block (hour in the 
week) to toggle from being excluded (grey) to not being excluded (green), and vice versa. 
 
This is how you use, click and drag to draw a rectangle: 

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This is how the time interval looks like after you draw a rectangle: 

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NOTE: In the image above, the hours 06:00 -> 18:00 of the days Monday -> Friday have 
been excluded. That is, in those time intervals the backup schedule will not run, even 
though the schedule is otherwise configured to run every 1 minute. 
 
A time interval that has all the blocks green means that there are no hours in the week 
excluded from the schedule: 

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A time interval that has all the blocks grey means that the snapshot backups will never 
run: 

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After you save the schedule, with the exceptions specified, you will be able to see the 
changes in the lower pane of the Protect and replicate page. Below, you can see that the 
Minutely schedule had been configured with exceptions . If you click on the exceptions 
link, you will be able to see the configured exceptions (hours in the week when the 
backup will not run). 

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Protecting a share 
 
Note: Cloned shares cannot be protected because they are temporary objects. 
 
The Protect and replicate page contains three tabs: Datastores , Shares and Volumes . 
Select Shares . 

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The table lists all the shares. There is a Search bar, useful for searching for a specific 
share by specifying its name.  
 

 
 
If you click on a share, more details about its protection will be shown. 

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Configuring the snapshot schedule for a share 

 
In the details section, there is Schedules tab . Click on it. On the left are the four 
frequencies a user can choose: Minutely , Hourly , Daily and Weekly . You can enable one, 
two, three or all four frequencies for a share. 
 

 
 
To enable one schedule type, click on the switch on the left of the desired interval. A 
dialog will appear where you can configure the snapshot policy for the selected share 
and frequency. 
 

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Here you can specify how often you want the schedule to perform by changing the Every 
field.  
 
NOTE: We recommend spacing out snapshots taking time with at least 5 minutes. If all 
schedules run at the same time, and then replicate, it can lead to high network traffic and 
high drive IOPS on the replication target. 
 
To the right of the dialog, there is the Keep field. Here you can specify how many 
snapshots should be kept on the Syneto HYPER. If more snapshots accumulate, older 
ones will be deleted. 
 
NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected share. 
 
Replicate to section allows you to select to which replication target to replicate. By 
default, no replication is set. If you click below Replicate to , a list of the defined 
replication targets will be shown. 
 

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After you select the desired replication target, two more fields will appear. 
 

 
 

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If you want the replication to be encrypted, click on the box below the Encrypt field.  
 
NOTE : Non-encrypted replication is faster than encrypted one, but less secure. If the 
replication target is off-site, we recommend encryption. 
 
You can specify how many replicated snapshots should be kept on the replication target 
under the Keep field. 
 
NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected share. 
 
NOTE: We recommend a lower retention policy on the primary unit and a higher one on 
the replication target (DR unit). 
 
After you finish all the configuration, click Save . Your schedules will appear in the details 
section, in Schedules . You can edit by clicking on Change . 
 

 
 
A schedule can be paused by clicking on the green switch button. This will not stop a 
snapshot or replication which is in progress. If you want to resume it, just click on the red 
switch button. 

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If you want to delete a schedule, click on Change . A dialog will open. Click on Delete 
schedule . 

Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a share 

 
If you want to check the progress of a snapshot schedule, go to Progress tab in details 
section. 
 

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You will see for every enabled schedule the current state. You can click Run now if you 
want to start the schedule in this moment. 
NOTE: First replication will always copy all the data found in the share. Subsequent 
replications will transfer only the differences between the last successful replication and 
current snapshot. 

Canceling a running replication of a share 

 
A replication that is currently running can be canceled. As a consequence, the replica will 
not be created on the destination. To cancel it, click on the cancel icon on the right of the 
Running … message. 
 

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After you click on the cancel replication icon, you will receive a confirmation saying that 
the Snapshot replication was cancelled. 

 
 

Monitoring the snapshots of a share 

 
If you want to check the list of snapshots of a share, go to Snapshots tab in details 
section. 
 

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On the left, there is a calendar. On the right there is a list of snapshots from the date that 
is selected. You can change the day of the month by clicking on the desired day or you 
can go to another month by clicking the left or right arrows at the top of the calendar. 
Only dates with snapshots will be available for selection and the current date. 
To check the history of a snapshot, click on it in the right section. 
 

 
 

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Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 

 
The Minutely and Hourly schedules allow you to exclude time intervals - ranges of hours, 
throughout the days of the week. Snapshotting & replication will not happen in those 
time intervals. 
 
Excluding time intervals can be useful if you want to backup your data at high granularity, 
but you know that one time or more during the week there is an important operation that 
your system needs to perform. If that operation could interfere with the scheduled 
backup, or is computationally expensive (e.g. intensive disk IO), it might be better to 
simply exclude that time interval from the backup schedule. 
 
In order to use exceptions in the backup schedule, look for the Exceptions field in the 
Minutely / Hourly schedule, and click the link (initially stating No exceptions ). A green 
coloured table will appear, with the days of the week as the row and hours of the day as 
the columns. 
 
In order to exclude intervals from the schedule, click and drag, so as to draw rectangles 
in the green area: grey blocks represent hours in the week when the backup will not run, 
while green blocks represent hours in the week when the backups will be allowed to run. 
 
NOTE: You can also draw rectangles in grey areas - this will cause blocks within the grey 
area to turn back green (and thus allow the backup to run in those hours). 
 
NOTE: You can also drag within a single block - this will cause that block (hour in the 
week) to toggle from being excluded (grey) to not being excluded (green), and vice versa. 
 
This is how you use, click and drag to draw a rectangle: 

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This is how the time interval looks like after you draw a rectangle: 

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NOTE: In the image above, the hours 06:00 -> 18:00 of the days Monday -> Friday have 
been excluded. That is, in those time intervals the backup schedule will not run, even 
though the schedule is otherwise configured to run every 1 minute. 
 
A time interval that has all the blocks green means that there are no hours in the week 
excluded from the schedule: 

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A time interval that has all the blocks grey means that the snapshot backups will never 
run: 

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After you save the schedule, with the exceptions specified, you will be able to see the 
changes in the lower pane of the Protect and replicate page. Below, you can see that the 
Minutely schedule had been configured with exceptions . If you click on the exceptions 
link, you will be able to see the configured exceptions (hours in the week when the 
backup will not run). 

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Protecting a volume 
 
Note: Cloned volumes cannot be protected because they are temporary objects. 
 
The Protect and replicate page contains 3 sections: Datastores , Shares and Volumes . 
Select Volumes . 
 

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The table lists all the volumes. There is a Search bar, useful for searching for a specific 
volume by specifying its name. 
 

 
 
If you click on a volume, more details about its protection will be shown. 

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Configuring the snapshot schedule for a volume 

 
In the details section, there is Schedules tab . Click on it. On the left are the four 
frequencies a user can choose: Minutely , Hourly , Daily and Weekly . You can enable one, 
two, three or all four frequencies for a volume. 
 

 
 
To enable one schedule type, click on the switch on the left of the desired interval. A 
dialog will appear where you can configure the snapshot policy for the selected volume 
and frequency. 
 

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Here you can specify how often you want the schedule to perform by changing the Every 
field.  
 
NOTE: We recommend spacing out snapshot taking time with at least 5 minutes. If all 
schedules run at the same time, and then replicate, it can lead to high network traffic and 
high drive IOPS on the replication target. 
 
To the right of the dialog, there is the Keep field. Here you can specify how many 
snapshots should be kept on the Syneto HYPER. If more snapshots accumulate, older 
ones will be deleted. 
 
NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected volume. 
 
Replicate to section allows you to select to which replication target to replicate. By 
default, no replication is set. If you click below Replicate to , a list of the defined 
replication targets will be shown. 

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After you select the desired replication target, two more fields will appear. 
 

 
 

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If you want the replication to be encrypted, click on the box below the Encrypt field.  
 
NOTE : Non-encrypted replication is faster than encrypted one, but less secure. If the 
replication target is off-site, we recommend encryption. 
 
You can specify how many replicated snapshots should be kept on the replication target 
under the Keep field. 
 
NOTE: The retention policy applies to a type of interval only and for the selected volume. 
 
NOTE: We recommend a lower retention policy on the primary unit and a higher one on 
the replication target (DR unit). 
 
After you finish all the configuration, click Save . Your schedules will appear in the details 
section, in Schedules . You can edit by clicking on Change . 
 

 
 
A schedule can be paused by clicking on the green switch button. This will not stop a 
snapshot or replication which is in progress. If you want to resume it, just click on the red 
switch button. 
If you want to delete a schedule, click on Change . A dialog will open. Click on Delete 
schedule . 

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Checking the progress of a snapshot or replication of a volume 

If you want to check the progress of a snapshot schedule, go to Progress tab in details 
section. 
 

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You will see for every enabled schedule the current state. You can click Run now if you 
want to start the schedule in this moment. 
NOTE: First replication will always copy all the data found in the volume. Subsequent 
replications will transfer only the differences between the last successful replication and 
current snapshot. 
 

Canceling a running replication of a volume 

 
A replication that is currently running can be canceled. As a consequence, the replica will 
not be created on the destination. To cancel it, click on the cancel icon on the right of the 
Running … message. 
 

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After you click on the cancel replication icon, you will receive a confirmation saying that 
the Snapshot replication was cancelled. 

Monitoring the snapshots of a volume 

 
If you want to check the list of snapshots of a datastore, go to Snapshots tab in details 
section. 
 

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On the left, there is a calendar. On the right there is a list of snapshots from the date that 
is selected. You can change the day of the month by clicking on the desired day or you 
can go to another month by clicking the left or right arrows at the top of the calendar. 
Only dates with snapshots will be available for selection and the current date. 
To check the history of a snapshot, click on it in the right section. 
 

 
 

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Exceptions: Excluding time intervals from Schedules 

 
The Minutely and Hourly schedules allow you to exclude time intervals - ranges of hours, 
throughout the days of the week. Snapshotting & replication will not happen in those 
time intervals. 
 
Excluding time intervals can be useful if you want to backup your data at high granularity, 
but you know that one time or more during the week there is an important operation that 
your system needs to perform. If that operation could interfere with the scheduled 
backup, or is computationally expensive (e.g. intensive disk IO), it might be better to 
simply exclude that time interval from the backup schedule. 
 
In order to use exceptions in the backup schedule, look for the Exceptions field in the 
Minutely / Hourly schedule, and click the link (initially stating No exceptions ). A green 
coloured table will appear, with the days of the week as the row and hours of the day as 
the columns. 
 
In order to exclude intervals from the schedule, click and drag, so as to draw rectangles 
in the green area: grey blocks represent hours in the week when the backup will not run, 
while green blocks represent hours in the week when the backups will be allowed to run. 
 
NOTE: You can also draw rectangles in grey areas - this will cause blocks within the grey 
area to turn back green (and thus allow the backup to run in those hours). 
 
NOTE: You can also drag within a single block - this will cause that block (hour in the 
week) to toggle from being excluded (grey) to not being excluded (green), and vice versa. 
 
This is how you use click and drag to draw a rectangle: 

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This is how the time interval looks like after you draw a rectangle: 

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NOTE: In the image above, the hours 06:00 -> 18:00 of the days Monday -> Friday have 
been excluded. That is, in those time intervals the backup schedule will not run, even 
though the schedule is otherwise configured to run every 1 minute. 
 
A time interval that has all the blocks green means that there are no hours in the week 
excluded from the schedule: 
 

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A time interval that has all the blocks grey means that the snapshot backups will never 
run: 
 

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After you save the schedule, with the exceptions specified, you will be able to see the 
changes in the lower pane of the Protect and replicate page. Below, you can see that the 
Minutely schedule had been configured with exceptions . If you click on the exceptions 
link, you will be able to see the configured exceptions (hours in the week when the 
backup will not run). 
 

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Recovering files from a virtual machine 

 
To recover files from a virtual machine you can go to the Snapshots tab on the Virtual 
machines, Datastores or Protect and replicate page. 
 
To recover files click Recover files on the desired snapshot context menu. 
 

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Browse file recover 

 

 
 
After selecting the folders and files choose the recovery method you want to use, 
Download or Attach to VM . 
 

Download files 
Click the Download tab → Create archive. 

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This will compress the selected folders and files to a zip archive and make it available 
for download in file recovery progresses.  
After the archive was created , click → Download 

 
 

Attach files to a VM 

Click the Attach to a VM tab → select in which VM to attach the files → Attach. 
NOTE: Virtual machines without a CD-ROM or powered off can not be selected. 
 

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WARNING: The selected files and folders will be attached to the selected virtual 
machine’s CD-ROM. Current content of the CD-ROM will be ejected. 

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During the restore process the recovered files will be bundled into an ISO.  
This will use the system resources to archive files and mount it to the selected virtual 
machine. 
 

 
 
NOTE: Creating the ISO may take a long time if it the selected files and folders have a big 
size. 
 
Open the CD-ROM to view the selected files and folders. 

 
 
You will be able to copy the files and folders. 

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NOTE: After 24 hours, the ISO will be automatically ejected and deleted. 
 

SYSTEM CONFIGURATION 
Networking 
 
Select Secondary menu → Basic configuration , in the Network s
ection. 

 
 
The Basic network configuration page allows you to configure the following: 

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● Hostname - the name of the SynetoOS machine 
WARNING: This will require a reboot. 

 
● Domain - a domain name to append to hostnames during DNS name resolution 
and up to three domain name servers to be used when resolving internet names  

 
 
● Gateway - a router used by the storage to connect to the internet 

 
 
● Proxy - the host and port of the HTTP proxy server  

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Ethernet interfaces 
 
Select Secondary menu → Interfaces , in the Network s
ection. 

 
 
Syneto HYPER comes preconfigured with two network interfaces. The first one is the 
management and the second one is used for interaction with the ESXi host. These are 
not physical interfaces, they are virtualized interfaces provided by the local ESX. 
 

 
 

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The Network interfaces page allows you to view the state and configuration of all the 
ethernet interfaces. It also allows you to configure the ethernet interface of any interface 
other than the one for communication with the local hypervisor. 
 
Click the Edit option in the context menu. 
 

 
 
A dialog will open where you can configure the network interface. You can have a 
dynamic or static IP. Also, you can configure a limit for the data being transmitted 
through that interface in the MTU field. 

 
 

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NOTE: SynetoOS 4 does not offer support for aggregates or VLANs. 

 
The IP address of the vmxnet3s1 interface cannot be modified. Hovering the cursor over 

the button associated to this interface (which cannot be clicked, for editing) will 
bring out a notice mentioning this. 

Missing or broken interfaces 

In case one or more of the ethernet interfaces are faulted, the system will display the 
message: missing: removed or broken ! 
 
If the interface was intentionally removed , click on delete. 
 
If the interface was replaced with another type of virtualized network , the system will 
detect the new interface. The faulted interface will still be shown and can be removed by 
clicking on Delete , in the Context menu . 

Date/time and timezones 

Select Secondary menu → Date / Time , in the System s
ection. 

 
 

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The time page allows you to configure the following: 

● Date / Time : The date and time can be automatically synchronized with a 
NTP server or set manually. 
Recommended: Enable automatic time synchronization . 
 

 
 
● Timezone 

 
 
WARNING: This will require a reboot. 

Password change 
There are two sets of users and passwords that you need to manage regarding Syneto 
HYPER: local ESXi password, and SynetoOS management interface password. 
 

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NOTE: We highly recommend changing default passwords for obvious security reasons. 

Changing local ESXi and SynetoOS passwords 

The passwords can be changed by going to the Secondary (Cog) Menu and clicking 
Change password .  
 
WARNING: If a wrong current ESXi password is provided, after 5 failed attempts the 
account will be locked for 60 seconds. 

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Changing External ESXi Host Password 

If an external ESXi password is changed from the vSphere management interface the 
password must be updated in SynetoOS too. In SynetoOS go to Datastores → External 
hosts and select Edit from contextual menu. 
 

 
 
Then a dialog will open, where the new password can be introduced. 
 

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After hypervisor password is updated successfully, a confirmation message is displayed. 

Alerts and notifications 

Syneto wants to keep you well informed about what goes around with your machine. 
Alerts and email notifications are very useful in managing the few errors that may 
appear. We feel it is important that you receive feedback for every action you take, at all 
times. Also, you are the first to see when a new software version is available. 

Alerts Page 
Alerts are important because they let you know when something went wrong. There can 
be Warnings (Orange Alerts) or Errors (Red Alerts). You will also be shown the number of 
issues on your machine. 
 

 
 

To see the Alerts page, go to action bar and select the bell . 
 

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Here, you will find information about the System errors , CPU health, Memory health, 
Drives health, Storage health, Virtual machines health and Sensors health . 
 

 
 
You can access support by following the Get help links,, or you can go directly to the 
advised page by following the See more links. 
 
Some issues don't need support help. You can clear them by going on the alert → more 
→ Mark as repaired.  
 
NOTE : Mark as repaired is not recommended unless you know and understand what the 
problem was, and you cleared it first. 
 

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NOTE: It is highly recommended that you introduce at least one email address in order to 
receive fast and accurate emails in case there are any issues on your machine.  
 
To add an email address, go to Email recipients → Add recipient . A form will open, 
where you can add as many valid email addresses as you need. 

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In order to check that your email can be reached, go to Email sender service → Send test 
email . 

 
 
You will receive an email on all added addresses. 
 

New Software Update  

When there is a new software version available, you will see, besides receiving an email, 

that the Software update icon in the Action Bar turns blue . After update, the color 
will change back to grey.  

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You can read more information about New Software Update in Software updates 
Chapter. 

Notification boxes 
With every action you take, there will be a feedback, a confirmation box in the bottom 
right corner of the screen. 
This box lets you know what has changed with your action, if the operation was 
successful or not, if there is a process about to start (for example: replications, 
snapshots). 
 
There are four types of notification boxes in Syneto HYPER: 
● Green boxes - when an action is successful. 
 

 
 
● Red boxes - when an action is not successful. 
 

 
 
 
 
   

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● Yellow boxes - when there is a connectivity issue or when the session expired, 
and the user will be redirected to the authentication page. 
 

 
 
● Blue boxes - when an action is received and underway. 
 

 
 
After several seconds, the notification boxes (except errors) will disappear, but you can 
also remove them from the screen manually. You can remove the notification boxes 
either one by one, by clicking the Close button on each box, or you can remove all boxes 
at once by clicking Hide all notifications button under all notifications on a page. 

Notification emails 
Notification emails will be sent when:  
● Snapshot or replication fails 
● Maintenance expires or becomes invalid 
● New updates are available 
● Network IP state changes 
● Disk pool and datastores usage is above defined limits 
● Operating system faults occur 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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ANALYTICS 
Introduction 
Analyzing the performance and the correct behavior of your Syneto HYPER is an 
essential task. There are many scenarios when you want to look at performance data. 
For example you may want to check to graphs to confirm your device is working within 
specified parameters. In other cases there may be some issues that are not obvious and 
you need to take a look at the analytics to pinpoint the issue. 

Low level analytics 

The lowest level of analytics concern physical HDDs or SSDs. 
Most of the time when drives fail, they do so immediately and fatally. In these cases it is 
easy to figure out what went wrong, and the drive is simply replaced. 
However, in some cases, problems are more subtle. The drive may appear healthy and in 
working order, but it works at a much slower speed as it should. Even more, it may 
behave erratically only from time to time. 
In order to analyze these cases, go to Main menu → Analytics → Add graph and select 
Drives → Average service time . Then add the Drives → IOPS graphics. Then add the 
Drives → Transactions graphics. 
  

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The most important indicator is the Drives - active average service time (asvc_t) . This 
represents the time required to process active transactions. But looking at it in isolation 
is not enough. There are legitimate cases for this value to be high. That is why we need 
other graphs as well. We need context. 
In the images above we are interested in the blue lines on the graphs. We need to 
correlate asvc_t with Drives - IOPS write (ws) and with Drives - busy transactions in 
progress (%b) .  
Usually a high asvc_t will determine a high %b as well. In other words, it takes a long time 
to process active transactions so the drive is busy. 
The key indicator for a problem is the correlation with ws . A sudden burst of write will 
normally determine a higher %b and asvc_t . The images above depict a normal situation. 
When a drive misbehaves, you will see high asvc_t and %b but unchanged or low IOPS . 
Most of the times another indicator is the rise of Drives - wait average service time 
(wsvc_t) alongside with asvc_t but no high IOPS . 
In a simplified way, if you see increased time to process transactions, and the drive is 
busy, but it is not doing a large amount of reads or writes, something seems to be wrong. 
The drive may need to be replaced. 
 

Mid level analytics 

Drives are organized in pools on Syneto HYPER. The overall performance of a pool 
depends on the type of data it writes or reads, and its structure. 
Similar to drives, you can analyze pool performance with several graphics and correlate 
between them. 
The most important indicators are similar to drives: service time, IOPS, and transaction.  
But pools are more complex than simple drives, so additional indicators must be taken 
into account for particular cases: Pool → ZIL operations , System → ARC size and hit ratio 
are two sets of graphics that can help correlate observed behavior with recorded data. 
In this document we will present some typical cases only, for detailed performance 
analysis services contact Syneto customer support. 

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Case 1 - I read a lot of data, but I don't see any read activity in analytics 
Syneto HYPER employes read cache (called ARC in the graphs) all the time. By default all 
our products come with ARC placed in RAM, and L2ARC on an SSD drive. 
 
NOTE: HYPER DR Play and HYPER 2000 Series products don't have L2ARC caching. 
 
When you access recently or frequently used data, you will not see any read IOPS on the 
pool itself. You will see on the ARC or L2ARC graphics. 

Case 2 - I write continuously to my Syneto HYPER, but pool graphics show write 
IOPS in spikes instead of a continuous line 
All our products come with write acceleration (ZIL) preconfigured. The drive assigned to 
write acceleration, a fast SSD, takes over all the write operations and data from the 
clients. Every few seconds the system takes the data from the ZIL, optimizes it for 
writing, and writes it to the pool.  
The pool write IOPS may show spikes instead of continuous writing. 
Using a ZIL has significant performance benefits even with all flash pools. 

Case 3 - I want to make sure my pool can read data fast enough from the drives 
If you have an infrastructure that need to read very different data from a large pool, the 
read caches may not be effective for you. In these cases you need a the pool to be able 
to provide a certain read IOPS for you. 
To run such a test, generate a large quantity of random data. Reboot the Syneto HYPER 
to clear any caches. Read the data generated before the reboot, for example by copying 
it over the network to another device. 
Then follow the Pools → IOPS read ( rs) graphics to confirm the pool is capable retrieving 
data as fast as the client can consume it over the network. 

Case 4 - I have several disk pools and one is very slow 

Correlate the pools IOPS graphs with asvc_t . If there is high traffic on the pool, see High 
level analytics. If there is normal traffic on the pool, but you have high asvc_t go one step 
down and check Low level analytics. Probably a drive is misbehaving or broken. 

High level analytics 

Until now we were talking mostly about hardware issues with the Syneto HYPER. 
However most issues are not related to the Syneto HYPERS functionality or 
performance. Rather they are problems with misconfiguration or misbehaving of some 
infrastructure components. 
As these systems are very complex, interaction between virtual machines, or a wrong 
sharing of resources between virtualized components can lead to unexpected behavior. 

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For example one virtual machine can consume all available resources and make other 
virtual machines starve for resources as well, leading to general slowness of the whole 
infrastructure. 
 
NOTE: For easy analyzes of such situations, we recommend creating one virtual machine 
per datastore.  
 
From a storage perspective, a datastore is a dataset. And the analytics page has a set of 
tools to monitor dataset performance. The Dataset → IOPS, Dataset → Bandwidth, and 
Dataset → Average block size graphs will help you spot virtual machines monopolizing 
drive activity. 
 

 
In the image you can see two virtual machines competing for dataset IOPS and 
bandwidth. If one of those virtual machine would take all IOPS, the other would have no 
resources left to operate properly. 

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Additionally you can add networking graphs and correlate virtual machine activity with 
network activity and ARC size and hits graphs. 
In these images you can see that at about the same time the two virtual machines 
started to read data, the ARC cache size started to increase. It just happens that these 
two virtual machine were reading the same thing, and you can observe a slight increase 
in ARC hits for the same time period. 

Miscellaneous analytics 
Finally we will mention another set of graphics that can help pinpoint software issues 
with the SynetoOS operating system running on a Syneto HYPER product. 
These are in the Add graph → System category. The most important graphs are Load, 
CPU and memory, CPUs idle and wait, and CPUs system and user . 
You can check these to ensure that storage part of the Syneto HYPER is not overloaded. 

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SOFTWARE UPDATES 
SynetoOS checks for updates automatically once every night and will notify the 
administrator via email when a new update is available.  

You can see the current software version either by going mouse-over the Syneto | 
HYPERSeries tag, or by going to Dashboard → About this machine → Software version . 

Internet access is required to check for updates. If the storage needs a HTTP proxy to 
access the internet, configure the proxy on the Network → Basic configuration page. 

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When updates are available, the icon in the top right menu will be highlighted . 
Click it in order to start the update process. If a reboot is required, you will be told so by a 
tag next to the update option. 
 

Update without restart 

There are two types of updates. If the changes in the new version do not apply to the 
core of the operating system, the update will be installed without needing to reboot the 
machine.  
 

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1. Click View release notes to read the list of changes provided by the new version. 
2. Click Install updates and confirm your action. 
 

 
 
3. The update to the new version starts. Based on your internet speed, downloading 
the new version can take up to tens of minutes. 

 
 
4. Wait for the update to finish. 
 

 
 

5. If the software update was not successfully finished, you will be notified. This 
could happen if there are some issues with the connectivity. Check your internet 
connection and try again. Please contact support if you need any assistance. 
 

 
 

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Update with restart 

New versions that contain changes which touch the core of the operating system will 
require a reboot. Versions requiring reboot are marked with a red warning label. We 
recommend the scheduling of this type of update outside working hours.  
 
1. Click View release notes to read the list of changes provided by the new version. 
2. Click Install updates and in the next dialog confirm you would like to continue. 
3. The update to the new version starts. Based on your internet speed, downloading 
the new version can take up to several tens of minutes. 
4. For the update to finish please Restart . 
5. Wait for Syneto HYPER to restart. 

   

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TROUBLESHOOTING 
A snapshot replication fails 
If you have received the following email or you have seen the Last Replication field 
highlighted with red on the Protect and Replicate page, it means a replication has failed. 
 

First of all, check that the replication target is running. There are various reasons like 
power outage, hardware failure, system error that can prevent the proper functioning of 
the machine. 
If the replication target is running, check that the machine which replicates can connect 
to it. Go to the replication targets list and you will see on the right the status, online or 
offline. If the status is offline, but the machine is up it means there is a network 
connectivity problem between the two machines. 
 

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If it can connect to it, check the available space on the machines (both the primary and 
disaster-recovery). This can be done by opening the Pools page. 
 

 
 
If it has enough space, remove the replication target and try adding it again. Wait for the 
next scheduled replication or click on Run for the desired schedule to start now. 
 
If it still fails, please contact Syneto customer support. 

Cannot enable customer support 

 
 
If you can’t enable remote access for Syneto customer support, it means there is a 
network connectivity problem. First of all, check the internet connection. If you are on the 
same network as the machine, you can simply try to connect to a website. 

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If the internet connection seems to be working, check the network configuration of the 
SynetoOS. Verify if you have the correct domain name, DNS server and gateway set. 
Also, if your network uses proxy be sure you have specified the right address of the proxy 
server and port. Check the network configuration section . 
If network configuration checks out, contact your network administrator and ask them to 
verify the network firewall. 

Can’t connect to Active Directory 

 
 
If a notification error is displayed when trying to connect to Active Directory, or if the 
SynetoOS lost the connection ensure the following network configurations are set in the 
right way: 
● The DNS must be configured to a DNS server part of the Windows domain. In 
most of the cases the AD server also acts as a DNS server 
● The Domain Name of the SynetoOS must be identical with the AD domain name. 

Can’t create app-consistent/live snapshots because existing VMware 

snapshot 

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There are two situations that can cause this problem. 
 
First one, if the user creates VMware snapshots intentionally. In this case, if the user 
wants to manage the virtual machine snapshots himself, SynetoOS will not interfere. To 
not receive emails with the warning, select crash-consistent state for the virtual machine 
snapshots from SynetoOS Management Interface , Protect and Replicate p age.  
 
Second one, if a VMware snapshot fails it will remain attached to the virtual machine. In 
this case, it will have to be deleted manually. Enter the vSphere Management Interface , 
select the virtual machine and right click on it. A menu will appear with the Snapshots 
sub-menu. Place the mouse over (don’t click on it) and another menu will appear. Click 
on Manage snapshots .  
 
A dialog will open listing the virtual machine’s snapshots. On the upper section of the 
dialog, there are a few buttons. Click on Delete all . This will remove the snapshots and 
SynetoOS will be able to make app-consistent/live snapshots of the virtual machine. 
 

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After reinstall, data pool cannot be imported 

This affects Syneto HYPER 2000 Series and Syneto HYPER DR Play Series . The write 
acceleration drive is a virtual one, and after a reinstall it will be recreated. As a 
consequence, the pool cannot find the old drive. 
 
Connect to CLI, switch to unsupported shell by running this command: 
un s

 
Import the pool without write acceleration: 
zpool import -m hybrid

 
By default the pool is named hybrid . If you created your own pool, replace hybrid with the 
name of the pool. 
 
Go to Secondary menu → Pools and select the data pool (hybrid). Go to Write 
acceleration on Details view and click Manage . From the Write acceleration drive group 
remove all drives. Click Update . Go to Manage caches again and select the drive that has 
8GB (usually c1t1d0) and then click Update . 

 
   

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Error when creating a datastore, share, or volume 

When you try to create a datastore, share, or volume, you may see an error similar to this: 

 
Make sure there is a data pool imported. Go to Secondary menu → Pools and confirm 
you can see data pools (other than the OS pools). If no data pool is present, please 
create a new one or import an existing one. 
If the problem persists, contact Syneto customer support. 
 

Datastores are not accessible on vSphere management interface 

after Syneto HYPER IP change 
If this happens, go to Main menu → Datastores , unmount and mount again the affected 
datastores. 

Datastores are not accessible on vSphere management interface 

after ESXi host IP change 
If this happen, go to Main menu → Datastores , unmount and mount again the affected 
datastores. 

I don't know if Syneto Central is accessible 

My Syneto HYPER was activated before, but I want to know the Syneto Central 
connectivity status. 
Go to Main menu → Dashboard → About this machine. The first section in the dialog is 
called Central . If something is wrong it will be shown there. 
 

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Dialog appears asking for the new local ESXi password 

If a user changed the ESXi password from the vSphere management interface, in 
SynetoOS a dialog will ask to introduce the new ESXi password. If a wrong password is 
provided, after 5 failed attempts the account will be locked for 60 seconds. 
 
Please note that the recommended way to change ESXi passwords is using the 
SynetoOS web interface. 

   

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APPENDIX A: CREATING A CENTRAL 

ACCOUNT 
 
In order to create a Central account, you must follow the link to the Central Portal 
( http://central.syneto.eu/ ) .  
On the page that opens, go to Don’t have an account → Sign up . A form will open, where 
you have to configure your profile. 

 
 
Type in the email address of the person who will be using the product and choose a 
password. Also insert a backup email address. Complete the name and phone number 
for the person in charge with this account, but also complete the information fields for 
your company. 
 
 
WARNING: Please make sure that you completed all fields correctly. Failure to do so 
might prevent you from obtaining full support on your product. 

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After all the required fields are completed, press Sign up. Your Central account is now 
ready. You can start activating your products . 
For more information about activating a product with Central, please go to Activate using 
a Central account chapter. 

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After you start activating products, they will all show up on the page with information 
about their Name, Support type, Expiration date, Hardware ID and Model . 
 

 
 
 
If you forgot your password to the Central account, from the login page, go to Forgot? 
Link . A new page will open , where you insert your email address and click on SEND 
RECOVERY INSTRUCTIONS.  

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An email with password recovery instructions will be sent to the provided email address. 

 
Follow the click here link in the email, and you will be redirected to a new page, here you 
can insert a new password. Make sure you confirm it by inserting it twice and then click 
on CHANGE PASSWORD. You can now log in to your Central account with the same 
username and the newly changed password. 

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APPENDIX B: ACCESSING CUSTOMER 

SUPPORT 
With Syneto HYPER it i s very easy to get in touch with support. There is a Help icon 
in the Actions bar that you can follow. 
Here, you can View support page, Open a ticket, or Enable/Disable remote access. 

 
 
Because your product is registered with Central, when opening a ticket, the data will be 
already filled with the information provided in your Central profile . All you have to do now, 
is Describe your request . 

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Enabling remote access, will allow our support engineers to connect and 
troubleshoot any existing issues.Make sure you have a working internet 
connection before enabling remote access. You can disable the remote access 
anytime you want. 

After enabling remote access, just click the button in order to copy to 
clipboard the numbers provided, and paste them (ctrl + v) to your open 
conversation with our support engineers. 

 
 
You can also access support when you see Alerts , by simply following the Get 
help links you can find on the Alerts page . 
 
NOTE : Please note that the Support services differ with the Maintenance type you 
have. 
 
 
Contacting Syneto Customer Support 
Via the web https://syneto.eu/support/ 
Via e-mail support@syneto.eu 
Via phone +39 0809 080 522 
Via customer support portal https://helpdesk.syneto.eu 

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NOTE: In order to have support access, you need a Maintenance plan and a 
Central activated product. 
 
Support for VMware ESXi hypervisor issues 
Syneto Hyper Series products use VMware vSphere as the hypervisor. Support for 
issues related to the ESXi hypervisor, will be escalated by Syneto’s support team 
directly to VMware, and Syneto’s support team will manage the issue through the 
joint TSANet support platform. Please be aware that Syneto’s support team will 
require a valid and current VMware support contract in order to fully support you 
on issues related to VMware products. 
 

APPENDIX C: SERENITY SERVICE 

 
There is a new service, for proactive support: Serenity. 
Serenity relieves the customer of the burden and worries associated with receiving 
emails in case of failures and warnings, and contacting Customer Support. When 
Serenity is enabled, our support team will automatically be notified of the events (failures 
and warnings) on your system. We will connect on the machine via a remote support 
tunnel to investigate and fix the problems. 
 
You can check the availability of the Serenity service from two locations: The Alerts page 
and the Help page. 
 
If your support plan does not include the Serenity service, then you will find that it is 
inactive. 
 
In the Alerts page: 

 
 
In the Help page: 

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After you purchase a support plan that includes Serenity, a popup notification will appear, 
asking you whether you want to enable the service or not. By default, it will be enabled. 
 

 
 
If you have a support plan that includes the Serenity service, but you wish to be notified 
via email for errors and warnings, you can opt out of using it. If you do so, you will be 
able to see in the Alerts page and in the Help page that the service is available, but is 
disabled. 
 
In the Alerts page: 

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In the Help page: 

 
 
Disabling Serenity will also disable Remote support: 

 
 
 
 
You can use the toggle to enable Serenity. Once you do so, you will see the Alerts page 
changed: 

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And you will see on the Help page as well that Serenity is now enabled: 

 
 
By enabling Serenity, the Remote Support access will be automatically enabled: 

 
 
If you choose to disable Serenity, you will be asked to confirm. 
 

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After your support plan expires, if you had purchased Serenity, the errors and warnings that will 
occur will cease to be sent to Serenity for proactive support. Instead, you will receive emails. 

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