Greetings fellow Veritas fans!

Recently, I have been looking for a procedure to restore an Exchange Server
to test our restore process.  I want to restore to a server that is *not*
our production server- seems reasonable, hence a different host name.  This
seems to cause issues in documentation that I have found in support of this.
Below I found documentation on the MS web site saying that you should never
need to do something like this.  On the Veritas web site, I performed
searches in the KnowledgeBase database using keyword searches like
'Exchange', 'Exchange Restore'...but I did not get anything in return.  I
also looked at the White Paper section on the Veritas web site and did not
see anything in support of a specific procedure.  I also looked at the
Veritas Netbackup book caled 'Veritas NetBackup for Microsoft Exchange
Server'.  There is a section in there about restores and Methods- they
mention 3 ways to do a restore: 

1) Server-Directed Restore(on the Exchange Server itself)- seems pretty
straight forward, but I don't want to test to my production server host
name;
2) Alternate Client Restore (being on the master server [in our case UNIX]
and pushing the restore out to an alternate client.  Here they mention that
'Exchange directory database contains machine and security information, it
can only be restored to the original computer or a clone of the original
computer'- i.e. do they mean you can't have a different host name?????
Also, they mention 'The Microsoft Exchange Information Store databases may
be restored to an alternate Microsoft Exchange Server'.  This seems like you
can do half, but not the other half to a different host name- I don't
understand the usefulness of this then.
3) Alternate Folder Restore- again appears to be to the same host name, but
I don't want to restore to my production server host name, even in a
different folder.

I am at a dead end for looking at places that might have this information.
Any additional ideas?  If you have developed this procedure in house to test
(and have used a different server host name other than your production
server to perform your testing...:-)...), I would really appreciate your
help.

My background is UNIX, and I am working with NT people to perform this
restore...just to set the stage.  I may not have the background in Exchange
to really understand if this is technically possible, i.e. to take a backup
of an Exchange Server and restore to a different host name (non-production
server) for testing purposes.  Please set me straight!

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http://www.microsoft.com/technet/exchange/chapt12.asp#i
Restore Using Third-Party Backup Software such as ARCserve or BackupExec 
The restore operation is simple. Select the appropriate Exchange database as
the source, leave the destination to default to the original location, and
start the restore process. Generally, you should leave the backup software's
restore defaults alone: do not select Erase All Existing Data or Start
Services After Restore. The restore may take some time (even assuming a
maximum restore rate of 20 to 25 GB/hour), after which the following should
have happened: .........

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Lisa Myers, UNIX Administrator
Pacific Life Insurance Company
Annuities Technology
V-mail: (949) 219-7909
E-mail: lmyers AT pacificlife DOT com