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A database availability group (DAG) environment can contain multiple passive copies of databases that are distributed across multiple Exchange servers. When you back up either active or passive database copies in the DAG environment, all DAGs use the federated backup method to best handle fail-over scenarios.
The federated backup method provides the following benefits:
The following figure shows three servers in a DAG (MBX1, MBX2, and MBX3) and four databases (DB1, DB2, DB3, and DB4). According to the preferred server order list (PSOL), MBX3 first backs up all passive copies available (DB3 and DB4), MBX2 backs up DB2, and then MBX1 backs up only DB1.
The following steps describe the sequence of operation: