Hardware Appliance System Image Installation

If you cannot recover a malfunctioning instance, or if you want to restore an instance to a pre-configured state, you can install an RSA Authentication Manager 8.4 or later system image on the hardware appliance. Installing an original system image is not supported on the virtual appliance.

Installing an original system image on a hardware appliance removes all data associated with an RSA Authentication Manager instance, including all data, logs, and configured settings, such as the network settings. This operation also removes any files that you saved on the hardware appliance.

Installable System Images for Hardware Appliance Models

Consequences of Installing an Original System Image

Before installing an original system image, RSA recommends that you consider the consequences.

The following applies when installing an original system image on the primary instance:

• You cannot administer the deployment until a primary instance is available. If a primary instance is unresponsive, RSA recommends that you promote a replica instance to reduce administrative downtime. For more information, see Replica Instance Promotion for Disaster Recovery.

• Authentication requests are redirected to a replica instance when the primary instance is unavailable. If replica instances are not available, users cannot authenticate until a primary instance is available.

• Data that accumulates on the replica instance while the primary instance is unavailable is lost.

• If you restore a backup file on a primary instance after installing an original system image, the primary instance will not contain data for changes that were made after the backup file was created.

• You cannot reattach the replica instances to the primary instance after installing an original system image. In this case, you must redeploy new replica instances and attach the replica instances to the deployment.

If you perform a replica instance promotion for disaster recovery, you avoid redeploying and reattachingthe replica instances. You also reduce the total amount of data that is lost. In this case, the data that exists on the promoted replica instance is preserved. However, the promotion processrequires that you synchronize the remaining replica instances with the new primary instance. Any data that was recorded on the these replica instances while the original primary instance was unavailable islost during synchronization. For more information, see Replica Instance Promotion for Disaster Recovery.

The following applies when installing an original system image on a replica instance:

• Data on the replica instance that did not replicate to the primary instance is lost.

• Authentication requests are redirected to other available instances.

• You must remove the replica instance from your deployment before restoring an original system image.

When installing an original system image to an instance and then adding an instance to your deployment, you also must consider how these actions affect your network topology. For example, if you promote a replica instance and restore an system image on the original primary instance, you may decide to configure the restored appliance as a new replica instance. These actions may require that you restart the web tiers.

Because restoring an original system image removes any files that are saved on the appliance, you must transfer any files that you wish to save, such as backup files or log files, from the hardware appliance to an external, accessible location. This is especially required if you wish to restore a hardware appliance and then restore a backup file that is stored on the appliance.