We compared Commvault Complete Data Protection and IBM Spectrum Protect based on user reviews in five categories. We reviewed all of the data, and you can find the conclusion below.
Features: Commvault Complete Data Protection is highly regarded for its extensive recovery options and compatibility with diverse storage systems. IBM Spectrum Protect is praised for its ability to integrate with tape libraries and its customization options. Users suggest that Commvault Complete Data Protection could offer more Windows security features and a unified console. They said Commvault should expand support for container-based systems and improve its ability to archive large video files. Users also praised Spectrum Protect for its compatibility with various products, scalability, and stability. IBM Spectrum Protect could improve its integration with cloud services and make its interface more user-friendly.
Service and Support: Commvault Complete Data Protection earned mostly positive feedback for its customer service, but some Commvault customers mentioned concerns about network-related support and the need for more direct access during emergencies. IBM’s customer service is described as high quality, friendly, knowledgeable, and responsive. At the same time, some said the support process can be lengthy.
Ease of Deployment: The setup process for Commvault Complete Data Protection is complex, time-consuming, and may require outside help. The lack of sufficient documentation and online resources adds to the difficulty. IBM Spectrum Protect's initial setup is challenging and demands skilled professionals to configure multiple parameters and features. This process can be time-consuming.
Pricing: Commvault may need to lower its price to attract customers in certain regions and customer segments. IBM Spectrum Protect is considered expensive. The pricing model is complex, taking into account factors like processor type and volume.
ROI: Commvault Complete Data Protection offers significant cost savings. Some enterprise customers estimated that they saved between $100,000 to $300,000 by reducing labor costs, speeding up backup and recovery, and implementing remote access. Users have realized benefits from IBM Spectrum Protect’s data protection and retrieval. They appreciate its ability to reduce storage requirements with larger tape sizes.
Comparison Results: Commvault Complete Data Protection is a robust and flexible solution with the potential to save customers money, but users say the setup is too complex and it needs better support for container-based systems. IBM Spectrum Protect is a reliable, customizable solution that allows smooth integration with tape libraries. At the same time, some say that the user interface could be more intuitive and Spectrum Protect could integrate better with the cloud.
"It's very stable."
"The backup and restore capabilities are key. The most useful things to us about Commvault, in general, is the breadth of the applications that it can protect as well as the features inside of it, like deduplication and encryption. When people get their data encrypted, Commvault has a way to tell if somebody is being attacked through a cybersecurity threat because their data changes. So, Commvault has what they call honeypot files out there to look to see if anybody is changing these files. Only Commvault knows which files those are, so nobody should be messing with those files. If it changes, then it will alert you to say, "Oh, I potentially have somebody messing with my files." It will alert you to something going on in your environment that probably shouldn't be happening. We deploy that with all our customers so they have this capability as well."
"The cloud integration is a massive win for us, giving us a single backup service for all of our on-premise and cloud systems."
"The use of hyperscale storage hardware and Commvault software has allowed us to create a large storage pool and achieve significant savings in our back-end storage costs."
"Commvault provides data protection. Their engine is ransomware-agnostic so ransomware doesn't compromise our backup data. Therefore, we can rely on their data protection to recover and back up our production system."
"I like the product because of its simplicity and the fact that it provides one single interface for managing everything, including storage, data, and policies."
"The solution is scalable."
"Metallic helped me to restore the data within an hour, which is much faster than restoring from Microsoft services."
"Our customers have come to trust IBM."
"The business value comes from the capability to overcome data losses."
"Support of the IBM X platform and the backup data replication to DR are the most valuable features."
"The archiving feature is the most valuable aspect of the solution."
"A robust tool which allows us to backup pretty much any environment, virtual or physical."
"It seems very scalable and robust. It can do what we require it to do."
"You can protect your data and keep it for long durations, without it spending too much time on the local disk."
"The amount of data that it protects with very little storage by doing incremental forever is one of its most valuable features."
"Commvault is a rich system that might scare somebody the first time they see it because it feels so huge."
"Just to keep it running is time-consuming. There are five people on my team. Commvault was supposed to be one of the less time-consuming solutions, but in reality it takes 60 percent of our time just to keep it running, and that's not even fine-tuning it; that's just to keep it running."
"The retention log feature could be an issue for us and can be improved. The backup schedule can also be better in terms of how you set it up."
"Its dashboard could be improved to provide a summarized version of all the jobs instead of having to go through each one of them. We should easily be able to glance at all issues. If I had not gone with the on-premise version, I would have had regular reports with the cloud version. It would be an advantage if they increase the compression rate of the backup. I am keeping it on-prem, so I'll need more disks depending on the policies that I have in the retention period. Its price could also be lower. If a good solution can be cheaper, it is always an advantage."
"Support could improve and the initial configuration would be easier with assistance from a professional engineer."
"This solution can be complex and difficult to administer because it supports all of the many platforms, so it would help if they could simplify it."
"The solution needs better Office 365 data backup management."
"The product's migration process and stability need improvement."
"I want a better user interface, support, and integrations."
"IBM Spectrum Protect does have a lot of the features that we need, but I think they need to improve their backup virtualization and backup for container."
"The version that we had when I first started made it look really bad. We are talking about commands that should have run in two seconds, but instead took four to eight hours. Other components were sluggish."
"I find the solution somewhat difficult to use with virtual environments or VMware."
"It needs better connectivity with other non-IBM application hardware and non-IBM platforms."
"Replication services would be nice. If these could be enhanced to be always on so multiple storage backup services could be added as a cluster pool. This would provide a better availability service."
"The product should be improved to save more space."
"For Spectrum Protect Plus, I would like to see more enhanced reporting features and integration with Spectrum Protect."
Commvault Cloud is ranked 3rd in Backup and Recovery with 104 reviews while IBM Spectrum Protect is ranked 17th in Backup and Recovery with 146 reviews. Commvault Cloud is rated 8.6, while IBM Spectrum Protect is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Commvault Cloud writes "Provides excellent visibility and helps reduce costs and time". On the other hand, the top reviewer of IBM Spectrum Protect writes "Performance and recoveries are better, and customers are happier with performance". Commvault Cloud is most compared with Veeam Backup & Replication, Rubrik, Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365, Azure Backup and Veritas Backup Exec, whereas IBM Spectrum Protect is most compared with IBM Spectrum Protect Plus, Veeam Backup & Replication, Cohesity DataProtect, Rubrik and Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain). See our Commvault Cloud vs. IBM Spectrum Protect report.
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