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Dell Avamar vs Dell Data Protection Advisor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Dell Avamar
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
10th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
89
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (3rd)
Dell Data Protection Advisor
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
24th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Dell Avamar is 3.4%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Data Protection Advisor is 0.5%, down from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Rahul Sarangdhar - PeerSpot reviewer
Works excellently for on-prem backup but not the best for Azure backups
Avamar is not the best tool when it comes to taking Azure backups. Like Commvault, if Avamar can support VM-level backups for the cloud, that would make it a bit better. There is another Dell EMC tool called NetWorker, which is a bit centralized tool. If you deploy a storage node locally, you can use the same UI tool for central management, but in the case of Avamar, it needs to be deployed individually on a site, irrespective of whether it's small or big. So, if I have 10 sites, I have to manage 10 Avamar. That's a bit of a headache. The Dell EMC solution professionals who connect with the clients should suggest NetWorker to clients with multiple sites rather than Avamar. That's because NetWorker gives more centralized control, but they keep recommending Avamar, which isn't the best practice. There are no free or cheaper training plans. Unless your company is a partner with Dell, you don't get the student guide training, etc. Their administrator guide does not have all the information required for a new person. It doesn't cover the basics. The student guide is good, but it's not free. If you are a partner, only then it's free. Otherwise, there is a cost of $2,000 to $3,000. For people who are new to Avamar, there should be some resources to enable them to study on their own at least 50% of the basics. If I want to study Commvault, I get so many documents and resources to study, but in the case of Dell EMC products, there aren't any free resources. Only if you're a partner, the resources are available for you to learn. The user manuals and administrator guides are just for deployment. They aren't good for learning the basics for a fresher.
ErmiasGirma - PeerSpot reviewer
Proactive support with predictive insights and seamless integration
As a system engineer, I am deploying Dell Data Protection Advisor solutions, especially in the areas of protection like Avamar, NetWorker, and Data Domain. Our team has deployed these solutions for three organizations in Africa and India Dell Data Protection Advisor provides proactive support by…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Dell EMC Avamar is easy to work with and is user-friendly."
"The fast backup and recovery and the Full Backup features are valuable."
"Scheduling is valuable. It does a good job of backing up, and it does a good job of restoring. Nobody has got a problem with that. The agents are well supported."
"The most valuable feature for me in Dell Avamar is the automation, which is good for completion."
"The solution is easy to use and has high performance."
"Dell EMC Avamar is very good with endpoint backups."
"I found the most valuable features of Dell Avamar are the user-friendly interface and ease to use. Our clients have administrated this software and there is no additional training required."
"We love the instant recovery functionality. It's very useful."
"I can increase the tool's licensing as per my requirement with no conditions applied."
"The reporting feature and the Dell's continuous improvement of the solution are the most valuable features. The solution not only supports Dell Power Products but also other products."
"The initial setup is very straightforward. Deployment typically takes about one hour. You just need one person to handle the deployment process."
"It has a lot of stock reports. I believe over 300 canned reports, which for the most part meet a lot of generic needs."
"The platform's most valuable features are data protection and retention."
"The most valuable aspects of the solution are the compression and the duplication."
"It supports our chargeback process by identifying resource users, which helps ensure that departments are billed accurately for data protection services rather than receiving them for free."
"The solution is easy to use, flexible and has a lot of out-of-the-box functionality. You can configure the dashboards or you can use a script. However, to fully utilize its capabilities you will want to use a lot of scripts which you will need advanced training. The reports can be customized for many things, such as chargeback billing."
 

Cons

"The solution could be a bit easier to use in the sense that they need to make it simpler to backup products and restore items."
"It would be helpful if the product offered more integration potential."
"Avamar needs a greater emphasis on storage targets. If it's going to keep pace with the times, it needs more ability to leverage cloud storage."
"It would be better if we could integrate easily with other platforms."
"The interface has room for improvement. It's not ideal right now."
"Some customers need to back up to tape, but Avamar lacks support, so it costs a lot."
"The solution, in the future, should offer support for mobile."
"The screen design is a bit back-dated."
"The functionality of the Data Protection Advisor is limited and is something that is lacking in this solution. Other solutions like CloudIQ and DDMC provide a much better outlook on how data protection should be done."
"The solution requires more integration with our other solutions. I know that they have full integration with VMware because it is also from EMC. However, we have to have better integration with Microsoft and Nutanix as well."
"It is difficult to manage the solution with the available tools. You need to know exactly what are you are doing."
"We have encountered issues where we were unable to pull data from the database server. It should also improve the backward compatibility."
"It's a bit difficult for first-time users."
"The stability of the solution needs improvement for stand alone users."
"They should empower their customers with the ability to upgrade this solution as long as it's in the same major release."
"The product could be improved by addressing intermittent collector failures affecting status reports' accuracy."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"On a scale of one to five, I would rate the pricing policy of Dell Avamar as five. The solution has a very good price, and a lot of improvements were done to it."
"It was approximately $70-80,000 when it was under support, but right now EMC has not been supporting this product for two years."
"There are licensing costs for Dell EMC Avamar and it is paid annually."
"Regarding pricing, I would say Avamar is slightly expensive compared to its functionalities. It's not high-priced or low-priced but somewhere in between."
"This is a fairly expensive solution. It cost approximately 21,000 each year."
"Dell EMC needs to lower Avamar's price and add more features to stay competitive."
"Avamar's pricing is quite competitive compared to other vendors."
"Dell Avamar is expensive."
"The product pricing has been satisfactory, particularly with the economy of scale in our agreement."
"You have to procure the license when you are ordering or quoting for Dell Data Protection Suite (DPS). DPS is bundled with the suite and comes with a license. However, if you purchase NetWorker separately then you will have to procure the license for DPS separately."
"The product is affordable."
"You need to make an upfront payment for three, five, or seven years and renew the licenses for support. We can do an annual maintenance contract with Dell. I would rate the product's pricing a six out of ten."
"For pricing, I would rate Dell 2 out of 5. It's affordable."
"If the customer has huge lineup of Dell Products then they receive discount on the pricing."
"It's not very expensive — I think the price is fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What's the difference between Dell EMC Avamar and Dell EMC NetWorker?
From the very beginning, Dell EMC NetWorker considers users and those who might potentially become users. In terms of both pricing and setup, this product offers an experience that is significantly...
What do you like most about Dell Avamar?
Easy to configure and highly reliable for backup.
What do you like most about Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The platform's most valuable features are data protection and retention.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The product pricing has been satisfactory, particularly with the economy of scale in our agreement.
What needs improvement with Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The product could be improved by addressing intermittent collector failures affecting status reports' accuracy. Additionally, enhancing bulk update capabilities for items like cost centers would be...
 

Also Known As

Avamar
DPA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Dodge County, St Laurence's College, FieldCore (a GE Company), Comanche County Memorial Hospital, Getronics, Lewisville Independent School District, EnvisionRxOptions, Cincinnati Bell Technology Solutions
Nielsen, Trek Bicycle, Cal-Israel Credit Cards
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Avamar vs. Dell Data Protection Advisor and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.