Cross Instance VSS Restore

Question

The SQL Writer Service had a limition to only restore VSS backups to the same SQL instance where the backup was performed(http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/library/cc966520.aspx#EFAA).

With availability groups where backups are being stored in a central storage location while backups are being performed on a subset of replicas, would it be possible to restore a VSS backup to a different SQL instance?

Answer 1

You can only do this by changing the logical path of the component in the backup document xml. But this is an undocumented feature.