Creating a snapshot is a two-step process. The first step, creating a shadow storage area for the snapshot, creates a differences area to store blocks of data before they are changed. The second step uses the VSS COW Snapshot wizard to take the snapshot and create an XML file to store the Exchange and snapshot volume metadata. The VSS COW Snapshot wizard integrates with VSS to quiesce the databases and then simultaneously snapshot the volumes in the storage group. This snapshot is done while the databases are online and without disrupting the email flow.