HPE StoreOnce Reviews

Our primary use case of this solution is for deduplication of the backup. We have a professional partnership with HPE and I'm a technical consultant. 

I am already well-versed with the solution and configuration of the product - it's been simplified over time which is great. I find the deduplication feature the most valuable. 

I'd like to see the cloud integration simplified. It would also be good if they could reduce the cost of the product. 

I've been using this solution for the past 10 years. 

It's a stable solution. 

The solution is scalable. 

The technical support of HPE is very, very, very good.

The initial setup is straightforward.

Everybody would like the cost to be minimized.

I would highly recommend this product. 

I rate this solution a nine out of 10. 

The primary use case of this solution is for backing up data in the production process.

The most valuable feature of this solution is the ability to browse and get upgrades from the webpage. I can just go browse, then upgrade and update the firmware package. I manage StoreOnce from the OneView, which is an added advantage. The view of the portal is very good now.

From a centralized system, I can manage the interface, the backup policies, and the status of the database.

The new version is offering a cloud backup. It has keyboard data enclosed. It is also connected to the cloud storage.

In the next release, I would like to have a connection to the cloud.

The repository should have an extension to connect to the cloud and deposit the backups.

I would like to have it perform data deduplication on Azure through the WAN optimizer and some of the featured hardware.

This solution is stable to use. 

We have four people using this solution, three of them are system administrators and one is a solution architect.

Each license has its capacity. 

We are using it minimally, and we don't plan to increase our usage.

In terms of expanding, it depends on the type of license you have.

You have to purchase the license before you can add additional storage and space to expand.

We have not contacted technical support for the new version, but my experience with the previous versions, I would rate them an eight out of ten.

Overall I am satisfied with the technical support.

The initial setup was straightforward and simple.

The deployment was slow at first. The configurations process took several hours to complete.

The implementation was done through a consultant.

There are costs for additional storage and space.

This is a good product.

We are customers but we have partners for purchasing only.

I would recommend this product for its usage, the installation, the storage, and its management. It's easy to use compared to other products.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We use this as a backup solution in conjunction with Veeam Availability Suite.

This solution has allowed us to feel confident in that we have a mechanism for the full recovery of service, and not only our data.

The deduplication feature in this product is amazing.

This product would be improved with the inclusion of more features to security or WORM.

Our primary use case is disk backup and dedupe technologies.

This solution has improved our organization because it provides faster backup, more efficient storage, and operational continuity.

I have found the dedupe technology to be the most valuable feature. It results in more efficient storage utilization, cutting capital expenditure in half.

The product could be improved with better support for data protection.

I think the most valuable feature is the catalyst technology, which is in the StoreOnce appliance. It allows us to really hit our backup targets. It also allows us to make the most of the appliance and make the most of the technology as a whole.

It's really given us more confidence in our backup procedures and our DR. It's also really just been beneficial because it's kind of replaced a lot of older equipment and consolidated our back-up plan into one device and made things a lot more streamlined, runs a lot faster.

It's easier to manage because we were running a VTL device, a Virtual Tape Library, and it became a headache to manage tons of virtual tapes, whereas the StoreOnce is a one place one stop shop for back-up for stores, so that's really help me train other people on how to use the system and not have to go here, there, and yonder to figure out what you really need.

The biggest thing I think can be improved upon would be direct tape from the StoreOnce device so that we could actually ... We archive our backups on tape, so I feel like if we could somehow plug our tape drive directly into the StoreOnce device and set it up to where it would archive based on, if some kind of rules based engine or what have you, that would really be an improvement for us.

So far, we've been really impressed with it. We've had no downtime. We're coming off a D2D4312 system, and we had greater than 99.9 percent uptime on that device. We're very confident in the StoreOnce device, the uptime stability, everything is going to be just as good. We're a long-term HP customer, and we will probably remain so because it just works.

Scalability, we bought the device with one external expansion option, and I think it'll scale up to four. For the next five to seven years, it should scale out for all of our needs. It's very good, we're a mid-size enterprise, so it will more to meet our needs unless something disruptive happens.

It's very good, the questions I had were answered probably within, I think, maybe two to four hours, so it was a really good experience for that.

Due to a lot of retention, we've been having to retain a lot of things for compliance. We were running out of space on our older system, and we've been looking at the catalyst technology as an upgrade to the older system, but it was determined that we should just buy a new system and migrate forward because the old system was 5 or 6 years old, I think.

It was prior to HP bringing the catalyst technology, it came out on the 6,000 units down to the 4,000 level. It never had catalyst, it was a straight VTL backup to disk solution.

It was a pretty easy process. We basically stacked it racked it, plugged it in, went through the start-up guide. We did have some help from Avnet, they were kind of our partner, but we actually did it all in house, and they were kind of our Tech Support.

I looked a few EMC solutions and a couple other vendors, but basically the price point and feature set was not there for any other vendor. HP has earned a reputation in our organization for reliability and stability, and they get first pick on things due to that reputation because it just works. I actually have one server sitting in a closet from 1997 that's still running, so that's kind of a testament to how much we believe in HP.

Really to talk to a reseller. Our reseller that helped us out a lot was CDW, and we really talked to a reseller. If at all possible, to make that extra investment in the catalyst technology because it's really going to make their lives a whole lot simpler, whole lot easier, and I think that's the number 1 thing is look at the HP offerings, look at the catalyst offerings, and it's really going to simplify your life. Backups are kind of one of those things where you don't want to worry about it, you don't want to be up at night fiddling with it. I've probably gone from spending anywhere from maybe four to six hours a week tending backups to about 30 minutes a week. Just in my time, and our backup window has been cut by 75%, it's probably taken about 25% h time as before we implemented the catalyst technology.

We've only just put it in, so I think for us it's a more efficient way of storage. Time efficient, man power, all of it. We have a very small team, so it just frees up the guys to do other things.

It's only been in for a couple of weeks, so can't really comment too much about what it's done yet.

I'd like it to be quicker.

So far, we've had no issues.

One of my engineers might have called, but I haven't.

We were using EMC, and my engineers put some pressure on me. They said we need to spend some money, so that's how I knew we needed to get something else.

It really came down to relationships. At the time it wasn't just going from EMC, it was also going from Cisco to HPE Networking. We went through a pretty good process, where we talked about our needs and requirements, and also comfort levels of technology change. Some of my engineers were a little reluctant to move away from Cisco. But HPE ecame and sat down and just said "We'll do whatever it takes. What do you need? What are your concerns?" Just worked with us in real detail: able to understand what our concerns were, where we were going, and making sure that the engineers were made comfortable. But also making sure, which was the last part which comes across the line, was that the technology was what we needed, was enough for growth. Whereas Cisco was just a "here's a quote, sent it to us" which I think for me swung me over to HP. The commitment to the customer.

Think about the next 10 years, where are you heading. Personally, I say HPE's a pretty strong organization. They send the right messages, saying the right things. They seem like a very digital company which is all about customer, and that stuff matters to me, whereas some of the competitors, they don't have that mindset. Cisco definitely doesn't have that mindset. I really think long-term about. Sure, Cisco had a lot more features, but we didn't really need them. So, that made the decision easier. For me, when I think about HPE, think about longevity. You want to invest in technology, you're almost investing in the company.

We don't have to go to a separate console to manage StoreOnce and another one for our backup application, one console. It's meeting our requirements now. For us, it's just a question of we've only been running it for about 3 to 6 months now. I'm looking for a full year. We are trying to test out some of the new features like the RMC product which helps integrate the StoreOnce with 3PAR and we're going to be bringing in our 3PAR storage very, very soon. We're looking forward to the ability of StoreOnce to integrate with other HP solutions that we purchased. We've looked at dedup technology for quite sometime, but we're primarily an HP shop. We wanted something that would integrate well into what we currently have.

One of the things we liked about StoreOnce is that it is a technology that scales very well. They have hardware appliances at the high end and they also have a virtual appliance. In our deployment, in our infrastructure, we needed both ends. It's the same interface, the same functionality. That's one of the things that we were really liked about it.

We've had some ongoing challenges in our backup infrastructure being able to complete the job successfully, have good knowledge that our data was secure. We knew we needed to improve upon that. StoreOnce and a dedup technology was where we wanted to go. As far as once we've implemented the StoreOnce, it's achieved what we thought it would do and then some. One of our, it wasn't my primary objective, our secondary objective was to reduce the tape out. By implementing StoreOnce, we've been able to dramatically reduce the number of tapes that we have to keep in our environment.

We've had a real challenge with our resorts in making sure the backups are performed and completed and we're able to do that and bring the dedup images back to our central location. We are a much higher rate of success in our backups. It's built on HP hardware, no problem there.

The virtual appliance, it's virtualized so no problems at all with stability.

Scalability, that's one of the other features that I really like about it, especially in the virtual plans. All you do is if you run out of space, you add another VMDK and it just scales up seamlessly. You don't even have to reboot.

We've had a couple of challenges where we've had to engage them and they're fantastic. I mean they listened, problems get escalated if they need to get escalated. They're extremely helpful and what really impressed me is it's like they're very knowledgeable of the BURA environment. They were well aware of the challenges that I was facing with my users. If we had an outage, they were well aware of that I had to find a different place to store the data, what the risks were. Yeah, they're fantastic. I love the technical services that we get from them. We had some bumps as far as implementation. Part of the challenge that we have is our primary data centers are hosting centers, so they're lights out.

We used HP's technical support for the startup services. They helped us with the implementation.

We don't have staff at our data center. That was a bit of a challenge for scheduling, but then that is agnostic of the product that you're trying to install. Through the startup services that we purchased from HP services help desk because we have to integrate this with our backup product which we were a semantic shop, so we had to integrate that, the StoreOnce technology with that. They were very helpful in getting that done. Yes, it's slips in very well. One of the things we really like about it is that you managed everything from the backup console. Our backup administrator, well he is aware, but he manages it just like it's another store. The deduplication, all that happens in the background.

It's just amazing. No cost. As long as you have the StoreOnce appliance with catalyst, there's no cost for that. It is a nice feature that's going to keep my DBAs happy.

That's not only HP, it's the support. We get pre sales support, we get post sale support. We get it in the implementation, so not just the product, but it's the people behind the product as well. If I had a peer asking me about the StoreOnce, I'm a technical consultant from background so I'd asked him what problem are they trying to solve and make sure they got the right one.

With StoreOnce, it's not a point solution. It has to fit well into your environment. You have to understand what problems are you trying to solve so that you implement it properly. We had to integrate like in our case, we had challenges with remote circuits that we had to make sure the low bandwidth replication. We had to integrate it with semantic. Unless you have the same problem as I am, you wouldn't necessarily implement the same solutions. Through that implementation, I learned a lot about the product and then coming to events like this, HP Discovery you learn more. You learn some trips that you didn't. For example during this trip, I learned about the catalyst plug in that I can use for my database products so that my DBAs can do their backups direct to StoreOnce. I didn't know that was available.

Our client is a government office. They use StoreOnce to store information about the weather as they specialize in meteorology data.

Most of our clients are medium-sized enterprises.

I think it's a good solution. The hardware is strong and all the equipment has a good infrastructure. Personally, I think it's the best storage product in HPE for small to medium-sized businesses.

HPE StoreOnce should come with a detailed installation guide. 

I have been using HPE StoreOnce for two weeks.

With StoreOnce, there are many different options for increasing the storage. I believe it's a good solution if a company needs more space for a reasonable price — it's easy to scale this solution.

The technical support is good. I used their technical support for assistance when I was trying to download the console management software — they resolved that problem in an hour or so. 

StoreOnce is very easy to install. No specialized software is required in the installation process. Deployment is also very easy.

The initial setup is not complex but it really depends on the type of server. For example, when you use a normal server, it requires a unique process to install the complete solution. With the StoreOnce server, you have to use another method to install the solution because it's very different. This server has its own software pre-installed in the equipment, so it's different than a normal server.

Overall, deployment took two days. One day to install the hardware, and another day to deploy the software.

Our client evaluated Dell, Lenovo, and Synology. Synology is a cheaper solution for storing data. However, our client was looking for reliable equipment with full-support — Synology doesn't come with support. With Dell and Lenovo, it was also complicated to obtain support in Ecuador. HPE provides the best support in Ecuador.

I would absolutely recommend HPE StoreOnce — it's a good product. Overall, on a scale from one to ten, I would give HPE StoreOnce a rating of ten.