Dell Avamar alternatives and competitors

Our primary use case is on-premises backup and cloud DR. We're using the Rubrik appliance with their CDM technology for our on-premises solution. We are also using their CloudOut technology to leverage their cloud DR as part of their offering.

We're backing up Windows infrastructure and on-premises applications such as SQL and Exchange file servers, and we're storing that locally on their appliance. Then, we replicate our environment to the cloud so that in the event of a true disaster, where we lost our physical infrastructure, we'd be able to spin up in the cloud, using their CloudOut technology. This would allow us to be up and running in the cloud until we were able to get infrastructure back online.

The environments that we are backing up are physical and virtual. We don't have any cloud-native environments, so we're not doing any cloud backups right now. We use the cloud, although it is a DR target. Our main task is VM backup, which is between 75% and 80%. We have a few physical boxes that we're backing up, as well. For example, I have the actual hypervisors to back up, and then a few miscellaneous other servers that haven't been virtualized.

The applications and servers that we protect include Microsoft Hyper-V for our virtualized infrastructure, Microsoft SQL server for the SQL side, and all of the other infrastructure, in terms of applications, that is Windows-based. We are very invested in the Microsoft platform and using Rubrik to back all aspects of that up. We do have a couple of Linux-based services running, but I would say that we're 95% Windows-based, whether that's Hyper-V VMs or Microsoft SQL, or Microsoft file servers or IAS app servers. 

One of the ways that Rubrik has improved the way our organization functions is time savings. Coming off of the backup solution we had before, we were spending several hours a week, every day sometimes, dealing with backups that fail. Other issues include trying to make space or deal with an archive target that was offline. We were just spending a lot of time on it.

Being a smaller team, when we spend time just dealing with the backups, that takes away from us being able to work on other projects that support the business growth and support other functions within the organization. With Rubrik, there'll be weeks sometimes that I never log into it. Maybe two, three weeks at a time, I never log into Rubrik because we get email alerts and they have great error handling. If there's an error or something happens, we get an email.

A lot of times, the appliance will take care of itself and then deal with that missed backup, or whatever happened. But that's very rare. It'll go for several months without having an error. A lot of times, the errors are not a Rubrik issue. It's always that Windows did something that caused the backup to fail and Rubrik reruns it, then it works.

Not having to spend any time in the console because we can rely on the alerting and automated reporting has allowed us to focus on other areas of the business and not deal with backups. Essentially, it gives us peace of mind that Rubrik works. It was definitely a change to get used to, not logging in to it. We buy this really cool piece of technology and turns out that we're not in it a whole lot, but that just goes to show Rubrik has a robust solution that we can depend on.

This product has definitely increased productivity because we're not dealing with backups. They work on their own and it does its thing. We made the investment into Rubrik to not have to deal with backups and it delivers on that. This leaves us time to focus on other things because we're not dealing with a backup that failed.

It is difficult to put an exact number on the amount of time that we're saving by using Rubrik, although, with our previous solution, there were weeks where we had to spend several hours dealing with failed backups. On a bad week, it may have been between six and eight hours. On average, by not dealing with backups at all, we are saving several hours a week.

Using the SLA-based policy automation has simplified our data protection operations. We are no longer scheduling backups or trying to figure out availability, or time slots, where we can back up our systems. For example, we don't have to consider things like we've got backups running at 1:00 AM, 2:00 AM, or 3:00 AM, and we're trying to find a slot. Instead, the SLA engine that they have is super easy to use and does that job for us.

It was really good for us to move to the SLA-based approach from a traditional backup because we were able to, for business use, cover tasks such as retaining email for one year. In their SLA engine, it's very easy to find that. Another example might be backing up a set of test-SQL servers where we only need 14 days. Through the policy engine, you set what you want the retention to be and it takes care of scheduling and managing those backups.

Once we have them set, they are stable and continue to work because we don't change SLAs often. We define the retention that we need for each app and each service, and then it just works. Overall, the SLA-based approach makes it very easy to achieve your backups.

Luckily, we have not used their ransomware recovery. We've not had any incidents or ransomware where we needed to, but we have tested recovering assets in the event that happens and we've always been able to recover in our test scenarios, in our tabletop exercises. This is the type of feature that you never want to rely on outside of testing because it means that you're having a bad day, so hopefully, we never have to use it. That said, if we do have to, we're confident that it would deliver.

Similar to the case with ransomware, we have been lucky in that we haven't had any major disasters where we had to fully recover anything. In the usual case, where files are lost because something is overwritten, or something gets deleted, it has definitely saved a lot of time with the instant recovery.

Using the predictive file search, we're able to put those files or directories back or roll back a database in a few minutes. It's very quick and has definitely reduced our recovery time. We've not had to do a lot of restores, but when we do have to restore the occasional file or put a database version back, it's very quick and has saved us quite a bit of time from what the old Unitrends system would have looked like.

This product has also saved us time with respect to managing backups. Prior to Rubrik, every day of the week, we were spending an hour or two hours or sometimes longer dealing with backups, and that's now completely gone. There are some times that we go for weeks and don't even log into the appliance because we get the reports and they tell us everything we need. We trust Rubrik because we've had it long enough now that we know that when it says it completed the backup, the backup's there, and if we need it, we can get it back.

The most valuable feature is the Instant Recovery, where we can restore a VM or SQL database or any server or application, and have it up and running on their appliance within a few seconds. The recovery time of the instant restore is instantaneous and there is no complexity to it. What we're recovering doesn't matter to them, and we don't have to wait for it to mount a recovery image or do anything like that. When they say instant, they mean instant.

The ease of use is important to us, as well. It's super easy to get set up. Within a few hours of them deploying the on-premises appliance, we were backing up data locally into the cloud and able to test restores.

Rubrik is really good about releasing updates and we have had no issues with the process. They make it very easy, working with their support when they do put out an update, and they assist with doing the health checks beforehand to ensure that there are no issues. They do a pre-flight check on those updates to ensure that they're compatible with the appliance. Then, we schedule a time off-hours to apply it. They are normally pretty quick and we've never had issues where we had to roll back. They've always been flawless updates.

The CloudOut technology allows us to replicate data in our environment to the cloud, and then it can be spun up and used in the cloud if our physical environment is not available.

The VM backup and the SQL backup are blazingly fast for both backup and recovery.

The web interface is really good. and it's only gotten better with every update. It was good, to begin with, but they've improved the speed and added features in each update. It is a modern interface that works in any browser, and we can get to it from a tablet or computer. The type of device you access it from doesn't matter because it fits all screens, and it's intuitive and easy to use.

The archival functionality is very good. It is very easy to archive data to the cloud, and this is something that we were looking for. You can do it all from their web interface, which is a plus. You don't have to jump into the command-line interface or run scripts or anything to make it work. It is all configurable in the UI and very easy to dump data off to the cloud and pull backups back from the cloud archives.

We have used the predictive search functionality and hands down, it's the easiest way that I've ever recovered files. It's just like searching Google, but it searches your own files for recovery. It's easier than if you told somebody you could use a Google-like search to recover files, I don't think they would believe you until they've used Rubrik, because it does work that well. It's quick to search, no matter if you're searching a VM or even a physical box, it works across them.

With their new global file search in the latest version of their CDM, you don't even have to know what host that file was on. You can just type in a file name or a part of the file name and it'll find it. When a user comes and says, "We lost the file and it was called something like this," with any other solution, I don't know how you would find it. I think it would take a lot of work. With Rubrik, within a few seconds, you have file results. It's a pretty great feature.

We would like to see more support for Hyper-V. They support Hyper-V and it works with our CloudOut, the cloud DR, but they seem to add features for VMware first and Hyper-V gets added second or sometimes several releases after the VMware feature comes out. Seeing more support for Hyper-V would be a plus.

We have been using Rubrik for about a year and a half.

This solution is very stable, dependable, and reliable. We've had it for a year and a half and nothing has ever happened with the appliance, or come up where we'd think differently.

Their updates have been really good and we've never had an issue after applying an update where something didn't work.

Knowing that Rubrik has built a robust platform, which is what we're dependent on, gives us peace of mind.

This solution is highly scalable. You can add nodes as needed and expand the environment. There are no limitations to it in terms of hardware or Rubrik's support.

In order to expand, you would have to purchase licensing. Depending on the company's budget, that could be a limiting factor. As long as you can afford the licensing, if you grow then Rubrik can grow with you.

There are three of us in the company who use the product from a management standpoint. I am the system administrator, the CIO has access, and then the support tech has access to the system. I am responsible for maintaining it.

It is integrated 100% within our organization. We have no plans to do anything more with it because it's being used in every aspect of the business for backup and protection. We're fully invested and committed to it.

The vendor has world-class support, and some of the best support we have for our solutions. Rubrik support has been great to work with when we do have to work with them, which isn't often.

Prior to Rubrik, we were using the Unitrends solution for our backup. We switched because we couldn't depend on the Unitrends product. It was missing backups, for example. There were some times where every day, every week, five days a week, we'd spend a couple of hours a day, or maybe an hour a day, in Unitrends trying to get backups to run because they would miss a whole set of SQL servers or miss VMs.

We also couldn't do cloud archiving with it. It just wasn't capable of that.

I think we had outgrown the Unitrends solution. I think Unitrends is great for a small company, but anything small to medium and larger, Unitrends just isn't a good solution.

It seems like a very traditional backup solution. It's not forward-thinking and innovative and new like Rubrik is. So, we just knew that we needed something that we could depend on because, with Unitrends, we knew that if there was a disaster, we couldn't recover and so that's why we started looking at something else. We were very happy when we found Rubrik. It restored the peace of mind that we didn't have with Unitrends.

The initial setup is straightforward. Rubrik sends out a technical engineer when you get the appliance to help you get it online. Within a couple of hours of them being on-site, we were backing up data locally, as well as to the cloud. By the time they left, we had tested restores and our environment was backing up locally and into the cloud.

We did not have an implementation strategy and just followed Rubrik's guidance on how to implement it. They had a plan that was based on information that we provided them about our environment. That way, when they were on-site, we maximized our time with them to get it deployed. We really just trusted Rubrik with it.

There were two people from our company and one person from Rubrik involved with the deployment. I was on the technical implementation side, and our CIO was involved in the purchasing, decision-making, and ultimate sign-off on the solution.

The deployment was handled by Rubrik's technical support engineer, who is assigned to you during the sales process. They are somebody local, in fact. They are based in Iowa where we are.

You work with them through the whole sales process and then they help you get the appliance set up and then they're even your contact even after it gets set up. This means that if you ever have questions or you need assistance, they're the person to help and they're very knowledgeable. Our engineer was able to answer any questions we had.

In the sense that we're not spending IT resources on managing the solution, that's really been the return on investment.

Rubrik is definitely a premium solution, but if you can afford it and put it in your budget, they're definitely the way to go. They're not the cheapest solution on the block and I don't think they would tell you that they are. You pay a premium for Rubrik, but you're getting a premium service that comes with immutable backups, instant recovery, and world-class support. It's well worth the investment into Rubrik.

In the subscription, they have an appliance renewal program, and the maintenance is set up so that you know, upfront, what the potential increase is. They give you a range.

Before choosing Rubrik, we evaluated other solutions including Dell Avamar, which is their data protection solution. We also looked at Cohesity and with respect to Unitrends, we knew that they were out, so we didn't re-evaluate the product.

The results of our evaluation showed that Rubrik really outperformed the others, with just their support of Hyper-V. They all seem to support Hyper-V to some extent, but Rubrik seemed to have the best support for it at the time.

The speed of Rubrik and the ease of use also stood out, compared to the others.

The Dell solution was very much a traditional backup system and we wanted to get away from that. We wanted to go to something that was cloud-ready for archive and DR. We also wanted a product with great support for virtual machines because that's where our infrastructure was going. We just didn't get that feeling with the Dell solution. I'm sure that it is a great product and they probably sell a lot of it, but it wasn't the new solution we were looking for.

Then with Cohesity, we just didn't see it as a good fit. Overall, Rubrik just looked better and fit our needs better. We had to consider the infrastructure and the workloads we were protecting, as well as the features that we were looking for in terms of the easy backup and the immutable backup protection for ransomware, the CloudOut, and cloud DR technology. It all just was a little bit better in Rubrik and just beat out Cohesity.

We are heavily virtualized and have lots of SQL as well, which is why we picked Rubrik. These are two things that they are very good at.

They're definitely a forward-thinking and future-thinking company in terms of offering their VM backup and their SQL backup, so they really shine over the competitors we looked at.

Although the updates are really good, we are a little bit behind for some compliance reasons. However, we have access to all their features and we try to stay as current as possible. We're on almost the latest version.

My advice for anybody who is considering this product is that it's a world-class solution. If you want peace of mind at night, immutable backups, cloud-native support, cloud DR support, all within a single solution with world-class technical support, Rubrik is the way to go. If you can afford it, you're getting the best. You're getting a premium solution and everything that they say they can do, they can do. They can prove it to you or customers can prove it. They've never oversold on what they can offer.

My biggest takeaway is that it's a good investment in your backups. It's not the cheapest solution, but the investment you're making protects your business and ensures that if you ever need your backups, they're going to work. You can trust Rubrik.

I would rate this solution a ten out of ten.

We are a part of a global team for data protection. We have multiple regions around the globe that we are supporting 24/7. This is our presence with respect to the data protection environment.

We are backing up around eight petabytes of data in our organization. We have multiple platforms that are being backed up. We have OS servers, and we are also backing up multiple applications such as Exchange. We are using different databases such as Oracle and SQL Server. We also have NAS shares originating from NAS devices.

We have a hybrid environment, and we also have on-prem. We are backing up on-prem, and we also have a cloud for which we are using Azure Backup. Currently, I'm using version 11 and service pack 22. I started with version 7, and I have worked on versions 8, 9, and 10.

We have a global presence, and we are backing up a lot of remote sites. We have integrated a couple of cloud services by using Commvault. For the cloud environment, for a few regions, we have not directly backed up. We have implemented the Commvault solution inside the cloud. So, we are using it as a normal backup application rather than using the native backup solutions in the cloud, but for on-prem, we are completely using Commvault. 

Commvault has a concept of workflows. It has a lot of default workflows, and it also allows you to customize your workflows, which minimizes the manual intervention of the admins. If these workflows were not in place, the admins would spend a lot of time in manual intervention. On average, we save 25% to 30% of workload with the automation of tasks.

Commvault is helpful in reducing storage costs. There is a concept called deduplication, and Commvault has extensive technology and a lot of features when it comes to deduplication. It is one of the backbone features of Commvault that helps in reducing the space consumed on storage devices, which reduces the storage cost. On average, we can reduce up to 80% of the storage costs by implementing the deduplication technology by Commvault. 

IntelliSnap for snapshot collection is one of the most efficient and easiest ways to back up large amounts of data.

It is user-friendly. Commvault offers all kinds of solutions to integrate with multi-cloud, and it is very easy to deploy and integrate.

Commvault’s coverage for applications, databases, and virtual workloads is very good. I've been working with Commvault for the last 12 years. Commvault can support any workload that you have in your environment. They are also evolving with new technologies. They are being able to adapt to the upcoming and emerging new technologies. You can back up anything by using Commvault. When MongoDB was quite new in the market, Commvault was already supporting backup for MongoDB. Commvault is evolving at a very good pace.

Commvault offers a lot of solutions for disaster recovery. Previously, they had only native or legacy disaster recovery for standalone backup services. Then, they came up with something SQL Log Shipping where you can have two servers, primary and secondary, and you can do SQL Log Shipping between the two. So. when a primary server goes down, it can bring up to the secondary server by restarting the SQL instances. Commvault also offers high availability. It offers global DNS, and there wouldn't be any manual intervention when one of the backup services goes down. So, it supports the cluster mode. These are the three options right now that Commvault is offering with respect to disaster recovery. They are also offering some cloud-based solutions for disaster recovery.

Commvault can adapt to multiple storage platforms. There is a vast list of storage arrays that are supported by Commvault. The software drivers are provided with Commvault. It has the IntelliSnap feature, and Commvault is doing well to support multiple storage arrays from different storage platforms.

We do not use Command Center, but we are using CommCell Console. We're navigating and manipulating the entire environment by using CommCell Console, and we are comfortable with it. We didn't find Command Center user-friendly. We found it a bit difficult to use. It decreases the efficiency of the tasks to be performed. It was probably implemented as a centralized application to manage all environments, but it was probably not a good idea. I and my colleagues across the globe are comfortable with using CommCell Console rather than Command Center.

Commvault is doing releases very often. The services packs and maintenance releases come quite often. They should slow down a little bit because quite often, when we implement a feature release or a bug-fix release, it causes some issues, and some of the options do not work.

It is more expensive than other solutions.

I've been working with Commvault for the last 12 years.

The frequent releases from Commvault impact the stability. When we implement a feature release or a bug-fix release, quite often, it causes some issues, and some of the options do not work. This is one of the cons that we have related to the stability of the Commvault application.

It is very flexible. We did not find any issues with regard to scalability. We are backing up eight petabytes of data. 

In terms of users, we are a team of six people providing 24/7 support. We are a part of the Global Data Protection team in our organization. In our team, we have Data Protection Engineer 1, Data Protection Engineer 2, and Data Protection Engineer 3. Apart from that, we have Architect 1 and Architect 2. These are the standard roles in any team across the organization.

We have very well-versed and capable engineers in our team. Our team is capable of planning, designing architecture, and managing operations. We have distributed these roles across the team. There is no dedicated person. Recently, we implemented Metallic in our environment, and as a senior member of the team, my role in that project involved planning, designing, and coordinating with the vendor. I also had to coordinate with different internal teams. We have something called Architecture Review Board. We plan and come up with a solution, and then we propose it to the management and get all the approvals. I have been a part of that. In addition to this, I do the regular normal BAU activities. I spend around 40 hours a week working with Commvault because I am from the core backup and the core data protection team. 

Commvault is the only enterprise application that we have for this purpose. It is being used in our organization for protecting data, and we plan to continue with Commvault. We don't have any plans to switch.

To my knowledge, over the last five years, we have used their professional services only once, and that was to upgrade our Commvault environment from version 9 to version 10. We don't use their technical support much. We haven't had any major issues for which we had to contact them, but we are quite satisfied with their technical support. I would rate them an eight out of 10.

I have worked on Veritas NetBackup and Dell Networker. Commvault was offering more options and solutions. We also found it to be very user-friendly and easy to deploy. 

Its initial setup was straightforward. It didn't take much time.

After the planning is done, if all approvals are there for the budget and other things, the implementation takes at least two to three months. When the hardware is in place, the deployment of Commvault is not that difficult. Within a day, you can complete all Commvault configurations. It is quite easy to deploy. Only the hardware part consumes a lot of time in terms of approvals, budget, etc.

Until now, we haven't reached out to the vendor or Commvault professional services. Commvault has an implementation team that offers services to deploy the solutions in our environment, but we haven't opted for these services. However, a couple of years ago, when we were upgrading our environment from version 9 to version 10, we did opt for their professional services. We required only one staff member from our end and one staff member from their end.

I do not have the exact number. Its return on investment is probably more than 50%.

It is quite expensive when compared to other applications in the market.

Its license is completely based on workload capacity. If I buy a license for 100 terabytes, I can back up anything. I can back up any platform, technology, or application, which is an advantage. Previously, we had to buy an agent for a particular application, and the cost was different for each agent. Now, the cost is completely based on the storage capacity. The license for one terabyte can cost around $1,700 for backing up anything from your environment.

We evaluated EMC Avamar and TSM, but we stuck with Commvault.

I have recommended this solution to a lot of people based on the experience I had. It is very easy to use and deploy, and it is not that complex. The only con is that it is a bit expensive as compared to other solutions.

I have been working with Commvault for the last 12 years. They are constantly evolving and coming out with a lot of innovative ideas, which is quite inspiring. The biggest lesson that I have learned by using this solution is that we have to adapt and evolve along with the changes.

Commvault provides multiple solutions, not only to back up on-prem but also to the cloud. Commvault has a cloud-based SaaS solution called Metallic. We have Office 365 in our environment, and for its backup, we have implemented Metallic. Commvault is playing a huge role in backing up different kinds of environments, such as on-prem, cloud, or hybrid.

Commvault HyperScale X helps to minimize not only the OpEx cost but also the CapEx cost. Commvault HyperScale X offers a lot of hardware solutions. It is easy to manage. It is just plug-and-play.

For storing the data on tapes, we have hardware encryptions in place. We have software and hardware encryption, but we do not use Commvault's encryption solution. Commvault does ensure that encryptions are in place for sending the data to the public domain or outside the environment, but we are using third-party encryption tools. Similarly, Commvault provides security solutions that have a lot of things, but we are not using any Commvault-based cybersecurity solution. We have our own solutions that are managed by our cybersecurity team. We have been using them for a couple of years, and we are good with them.

I would rate Commvault an eight out of 10.

We've got two data centers, and for any of our applications that are not in some kind of a load-balanced or high-availability cluster, we use Zerto to replicate them, to make them as highly available as possible, without building that into the solution. We replicate between 100 and 150 different VMs from our North Carolina data center to our Chicago data center.

A small example of the way it's made things simpler is that we were building out a new product, and the original recommendation from the vendor when we were deploying that product was to have the application server closest to the end-users and the database server at our main data center in North Carolina. Once it was implemented, we found out that wasn't the case. We used Zerto to fail over the database to the same data center that the application server was in. We were able to do that really quickly and easily, without having to do a whole lot of extra work, such as having to rebuild the database server. That's one example of how we use Zerto, not just in a standard failover scenario. It made the process a lot easier than it would have been had we not had Zerto.

We have also used it when something happened to a configuration or a database file and it had become corrupted. It happened in the evening, after-hours. Rather than getting the backup engineer involved and trying to restore the files from a backup, we used Zerto to grab the file from a couple of hours previous, restored it, and got things back up and running really quickly. It's definitely a time-saver. We were able to handle it ourselves without needing to get anybody else involved.

One of the most valuable things about the solution is the ease of use when it comes to failing things over. The ability to easily test your failover capabilities is really nice. We can actually stand up a VM in an isolated environment, validate that the VM is up and running and that it boots properly, and we can do that in a matter of 30 seconds. Being able to show that to upper management, and that it's working the way it should, provides a lot of value.

It's one of the easiest products out there, as far as managing and using it go. The UI is pretty dead simple.

If everything is set up and configured properly, a failover of one or two systems can be done by one person. Nobody has to be involved other than the application owner, to validate everything, once the failover is done. It's a one-man show.

Continuous data protection is what it's supposed to do. Being able to bring a system up within a matter of minutes is the next best thing to having an actual high-availability cluster. If you're not building high availability into a solution itself, Zerto is the next best option. If we're talking about one or two applications or one VPG (Virtual Protected Group) a failover takes under five minutes, from the point of clicking "Start Failover" to the point of validating everything on the application end.

The only thing we've noticed that needs improvement is the backend cleanup within VMware. There are some little issues there. I would like to see tighter integration with VMware. From a recoverability standpoint, it's great when using VMware. But what we have noticed is that orphan data is an issue within VMware. It doesn't clean up properly when you're moving stuff around.

Our company has been using Zerto for several years. I took over management of it within the last six months, but I've dealt with Zerto in the past as well.

We've had no stability issues. We've had to open one or two cases on small issues, but they've been pretty trivial. There haven't been any critical issues with its stability.

It scales really well. Out of 500 VMs, we're using it for about 150 of them. That's probably not a lot compared to other Zerto customers. But as you add more ESX hosts to your environment, you just add new VRAs to the ESX host. There's not too much to have to worry about when you're scaling up.

We utilize it for everything that we don't build in a high-availability cluster. A lot of our stuff is designed as an HA cluster, but anything that is not designed that way is automatically protected by Zerto.

The technical support is as good as, if not better than, most of the technical support that we deal with. Opening tickets is easy. The support portal is easy to use. Depending on the severity—I've never had to open a Sev 1 case—Sev 2 and Sev 3 cases are answered within 24 hours.

Positive

We didn't have a previous solution.

I did not do the initial setup of the solution, but the upgrade from version 8.5 to 9.5 was very simple.

Our engineering team members, three systems engineers, are the main users of Zerto. We don't have segregated roles. I'm the point person for Zerto, and the other guys are backups for managing it and doing recoveries. Maintenance only requires one person.

We have seen ROI from a time-management standpoint.

I don't know if Zerto reduces the number of people that we need to have involved in a recovery scenario, but it definitely simplifies the process compared to using Commvault, which is our backup solution. If it's something that we need recovered from within a day or two, it's much simpler to recover that file with Zerto than it is from a backup solution like Commvault.

Anybody on our engineering team can probably recover a file using Zerto. I'm not so sure that's the case for Commvault. Our backup admin would probably have to get involved if we're doing a recovery from Commvault. Using Zerto, the UI is so much simpler.

There may be a small possibility that we will look at Zerto to replace Commvault whenever we do replace Commvault. That's a possibility, but it hasn't been brought up yet. We do know we are getting rid of Commvault at some point.

I've used other solutions, like Dell Avamar and Veeam. Veeam is definitely pretty easy to use and on par with Zerto. It's 100 times easier to use than Avamar. Ease of use is one of Zerto's strongest points.

Go for it. It's the best-of-breed for high-availability replication solutions. It really is dead simple to use and easy to implement and maintain. It's not one of those solutions that you have to spend hours a day managing. You look at it for five minutes a day and forget about it.

The biggest lesson I've learned from using Zerto is that high availability, having a good replication solution in place, doesn't have to be a big, complicated, scary mess. It can be simple. It doesn't have to be some huge hurdle that you have to overcome.

The primary use cases are file system backup, endpoint backup, and virtualization backups.

We are using it with Quantum and Dell Data Domain.

The GUI is user-friendly.

The performance is improving. It used to be that NetWorker's performance was not very good but after integration with Data Domain, and after they switched to a quality-based network solution, the performance increased.

Over the past five to six years, the speed that NetWorker connects between networks and servers has improved. It used to take a long time.

We are using DD Boost and it is helpful.

The integration of the web API should be improved. There has been new functionality added to the API but it should be easier to understand.

The Backup module should be improved, especially the functionality for SharePoint and SQL Server. We are having issues when we are trying to backup up Microsoft applications, and it happens when the data is very large. For example, our database is 19 terabytes and this is very large for NetWorker, so it runs slowly. We are not able to tune it and segment it. If it were a file system, then we could split it into smaller pieces. In cases like this, it is very fast. However, because we are not able to divide it, the backup is slow. This is one area that can be improved because often, people don't need to take a full backup. Sometimes, then just want a snapshot of some data.

The capability of incremental backups should be included. As it is now, when DD Boost tries to compare the current backup with the previous one, it has trouble with the large versions and it can take three to four days. They cannot perform an incremental backup using VSS technology for SharePoint or MS SQL Server. Definitely, backup for Microsoft applications needs to be improved.

They should improve the support for backing up containers.

The process of upgrading versions should be improved because as it is now, you have to completely uninstall the old version first, and then install the new version. If we compare this to another product, like Veritas NetBackup, it also has good features but when you upgrade to the latest version, everything is automatic.

I would like to see better cloud integration, such as with AWS or Azure.

I have been using Dell EMC NetWorker since 2007.

I am not in the operations team right now, but my impression is that it's stable.

It is easy to scale and I have not found any issue in doing so. However, there can be issues when a proper sizing tool hasn't been used. We have had trouble with giving requirements based on what the sizing tool reports.

We have approximately 100 people user NetWorker and supporting the customers.

The technical support from Dell is very good and very fast. We have a very good collaboration with Dell, and we are one of the valued partners.

I have been dealing with issues related to one of the solutions that we have provided. One of the ones in the past two months is that the SharePoint Backup was supposed to be done using the Microsoft SQL Server writer. They do not support the third-party's product, which is fine, but it's an accountability issue. Ultimately, I don't think that they do all of the investigations properly.

We are currently using EMC Avamar in addition to NetWorker.

I have also worked with Commvault and Veeam, and the integration with virtualization is better with these products. They also support backup using VPN, which is something that NetWorker lacks.

I cannot name a feature that NetWorker has that you don't find in other products. There are, however, features lacking in NetWorker that do exist in other products. They need to keep pace with the ongoing requirements that are in the market.

I have been working with this product for a long time, so I find the installation very easy. This is also an area that has improved over time, as it has because easier than it used to be.

The length of time required for deployment varies between environments. Recently, I deployed it and it took approximately 20 minutes end-to-end, with configuration.

We deploy with our in-house team. Our operations team is responsible for maintenance.

The pricing for NetWorker is in the mid-range. It is not very expensive and not very cheap. There are some extra features that required an additional license. For example, we save a separate data protection suite (DPS) license.

I have been evaluating EMC PowerProtect to compare the performance of it with EMC NetWorker.

For a file system backup or one that is on disk or in a tape library, or for virtualization, I recommend using NetWorker. I say this because of ease of deployment, ease of use, and the user-friendly GUI. 

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We use ExaGrid EX Series for backing up our Veeam Backup, vSphere, or VMware environments.

The solution easily integrates with the backup targets, such as Veeam.

The solution could improve by switching to a flash-type solution rather than the spinning drives that they currently use. However, we have not had any failure with the spinning drives. The flash-type drives are more up-to-date and are something that is in their roadmap.

I have been using this solution for approximately three years.

The solution is stable. It is one of the most stable appliances that we own. We have never had any issues with it, such as bad hard drives. It just runs well.

ExaGrid EX Series is scalable. You can connect another ExaGrid Appliance to it to provide more disk space. I have been told it is simple to upgrade, you do not need to dispose of the current hardware, you can add to it. There is de-duplication and other features that use space but we have not needed to add disk space and we are only at one quarter used so far. 

We had the Barracuda Backup Appliance previously called Barracuda Backup, and it was not flexible, we were running out of space. Some companies do proper specification and then others try to bring their price point down by getting you in. Then in a year or two down the road, you start running out of space, which is what happened to us with the Barracuda solution.

One of the most valuable aspects of the ExaGrid EX Series is the support. They dedicate an engineer to us that we deal with. We do not have to call to create a support ticket. We only need to contact our support engineer which is very convenient. Usually, with other companies you contact support and you hope you receive someone half-decent. Their support is excellent and it is easy to set up too.

We have previously used other backup solutions, such as Barracuda Backup and Unitrends.

The Barracuda combines two products, the Backup Appliance and the software for backing up. It is similar to having Veeam and ExaGrid together and it is the same with Unitrends. We had Unitrends for approximately five years. it was quite a few years ago and they have improved their product since then. We had many failures and after the fourth hard drive failure with Unitrends is why we first started to look for another solution. If we did not have the failures we most like would still be with them.

The support services guide you through the whole installation process, which was very helpful.

We did the implementation with the help of their support.

The previous solutions I have used both included the Backup Software and the Appliance making it hard to compare to this solution. However, overall the solution is reasonably priced for the features you receive. ExaGrid EX Series is priced better than HP, Dell, and possibly Commvault which I have compared in the past.

I have evaluated Commvault, HP, and Dell solutions.

I would advise others that this solution is hands-off and is easy to implement.

I rate ExaGrid EX Series a ten out of ten.