Multi-Site Failover Without Doubling Servers
Vega Systems Inc, Sept 2025
Executive Summary
Resilience at Scale — Failover Without Server Sprawl.
The Vega Systems solution stack — XPort + RMF — enables a shared failover model, providing multi-site redundancy without the need for proportional server expansion.
The Challenge: One-to-One Failover
Industries such as transportation, utilities, education, and retail often run many distributed XProtect sites. Most rely on all-in-one servers, where recording, management, and client services run on a single machine. These remote sites are typically connected to a central location through XProtect Interconnect, which aggregates feeds for monitoring.
This architecture made sense at the time of deployment, when bandwidth was limited. However, with improved connectivity, continuous video availability has become increasingly critical for operations and compliance.
The simplest way to add failover is to place a second server at every site. However, this approach effectively doubles the infrastructure, thereby raising costs and maintenance overhead. Customers require a more innovative approach to achieving resilience without replicating hardware at each location.
The Vega Approach
The Vega Systems solution stack provides a path to resilience without server sprawl, while also strengthening the cybersecurity profile of deployments.
Step 1: Amalgamate Sites with XPort
XPort automates the amalgamation of distributed sites into a single SQL database, while retaining remote recorders. Customers can choose the consolidation ratio — e.g., four sites into one (4:1) — or even centralize all sites when high-bandwidth connectivity is available.
Without automation, this process is labor-intensive. With XPort, database merges, role privileges, views, access rights, and archived media are preserved, while time and effort are reduced by up to 60%.
Site consolidation requires no additional servers and creates the foundation for a shared failover model. (See testimonial: a U.S. school district cut weeks of work and significant costs using XPort. Link.)
Step 2: Add Resilience
Option 1: Native XProtect Failover
After consolidation, resilience can be added with native XProtect failover mechanisms:
Management Server failover protects SQL and services.
Recorder failover protects recorder functions.
For example, starting with four all-in-one servers, a 4:1 consolidation, plus two extra failover servers, results in a six-server architecture with redundancy — achieving resilience without doubling the infrastructure. Streams received at the central site via Interconnect also fail over automatically.
Option 2: RMF Cyber-Secure Redundancy
Native failover works but has limitations:
Management failover uses byte-for-byte replication, which is not cyber-secure.
Recorder failover is a service-level, not stream-level, feature, which leaves video gaps and requires one failover recorder per primary recorder. Archived content is also unavailable during recorder failure.
RMF addresses these gaps:
Works at both the Management Server (XProtect Expert/Corporate) and Recording Server (XProtect Professional+ and above).
Provides near-instantaneous stream-level failover at clients, avoiding video gaps.
Enables dual recording for uninterrupted playback.
Allows M→N coverage — fewer redundant recorders can protect many primaries simultaneously. (See: https://youtu.be/jaGwtBUrb4E)
Introduces cybersecurity benefits by using API-level synchronization instead of raw SQL replication.
Extends to Interconnect environments — RMF at the central site's Smart Client can provide stream-level failover for remote feeds (pending implementation).
In the 4:1 consolidation example, two additional servers can be added:
One configured as Management + SQL + core services.
One as an active-active redundant recorder streaming directly from all cameras.
This design reduces infrastructure, increases resilience, and strengthens the overall cybersecurity posture.
Conclusion
The Vega Systems solution stack — XPort + RMF — provides a clear path to resilient, cyber-secure multi-site XProtect deployments. By consolidating sites with XPort and adding redundancy with RMF, organizations can achieve continuous video availability without doubling server counts.
Compared to native failover alone, RMF delivers stream-level protection, dual recording for uninterrupted playback, and M→N coverage that scales more efficiently. At the same time, API-driven synchronization enhances the cybersecurity posture of the deployment.
In short, customers gain the availability and compliance assurance they need, while reducing infrastructure cost and complexity.
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