Backing Up and Restoring Federated Database Servers
In a federated-database-server tier, built using distributed partitioned views, the member servers form one logical unit; and you must coordinate the recovery of the member databases to ensure that they remain synchronized properly.
Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2000 does not require that you coordinate backups across member servers. Backups can be taken from each database independently, without regard for the state of the other member databases. Because the backups do not have to be synchronized, there is no processing overhead for synchronization and no blockage of running tasks.
The most important aspect of recovering a set of member databases is the same as recovering any other database: plan and test the recovery procedures before putting the databases into production. You must set up processes to restore all the databases to the same logical point in time. SQL Server includes features to support the recovery of all member databases to the same point in time.