IBM Spectrum Protect Reviews

The basic objective of this solution is data protection, whether it's at the virtualization layer, physical layer, or database layer. This is basically a whole data protection suite for entire enterprise workloads. It includes your VMware workloads and any physical workloads, bare-metal workloads, databases, and all this, email. This solution is being used for everything for data protection.

All the useful features are valuable actually. You can't ignore any one of them. We also use Spectrum Protect Plus actually, the other product, where you can integrate the VMware Hyper-V or any other solution for the backup, data protection, and using that one, you can protect all the databases also.

Spectrum Protect and Spectrum Protect Plus still have separate use cases. From the IBM side, these two products are running in parallel. But in the near future, they are combining the Spectrum Protect Plus. There will be no Spectrum Protect itself in the near future. But as both are currently separate, Spectrum Protect Plus is mostly for the virtualized workloads, whereas Spectrum Protect is for the bare metal and databases kind of thing.

This solution itself protects the data, but the solution itself should be recoverable quickly in case of disaster on the production side or something. So this solution is not mature in terms of disaster recovery and could be improved. The architecture of the solution needs more flexibility.

I have been using the solution for seven years.

It's a very stable product, and we've never had any downtime with it.

The solution is very good in terms of scalability. We are running almost a petabyte of data protection for our solution, so it's pretty stable. From a scalability point of view, it has plenty of options. The solution will work for any entry to mid-range customer.

We used to have technical support from IBM and it's good. On a scale from one to ten, I would rate it eight or nine, because we get the solution to the problem immediately.

The solution has a capacity-based licensing, front and back-end license. It's yearly with front-end capacity license or back-end capacity license per terabyte; customer's choice.

This product itself has evolved quite a lot. Before it was quite difficult for the administrator, for the end-user, whoever has to manage the product. It was not user-friendly compared to all other data protection solutions. In the last three to four years, IBM has put a lot of R&D and effort into this solution. It's very easy to use, and it has a lot of improved features. Any normal administrator can handle this one now.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

An area for improvement would be the ease of use - the GUI is not up to the mark compared to other products in the market. IBM should also move on from the mainframe mindset and evolve so that configuration does not need to be done via the command line.

I have been using this solution for eight to nine years.

I've had no problems with the stability of this solution.

Technical support for this product is pathetic - whenever we tried to raise support, it took a long time, so we had to resolve the problems on our own, especially in the production environment. 

The initial setup was complex due to the lack of a proper GUI.

This product is very versatile. However, we have now switched to EMC NetWorker as it is much easier to use and does better with data domain. I would rate this solution as five out of ten.

I used IBM Spectrum Protect for backups and archiving.

I find the whole product useful. The backup archive client, snapshot, spectrum for virtual environments are beneficial features.

IBM could improve by decluttering its product lines. There are too many clients, too many names, and overall too many products. They have to decide for the virtual environments, are they going to stick with Spectrum Virtual Environment or Spectrum Protect Plus? They have to decide on this, a final decision. IMB is trying to catch up with Veeam but they have to declutter a lot of products or sub-products that they have.

In a future release, it would be a benefit to have the ability to add an application as a storage target, as a storage pool. Additionally, they should add more functionality to the administration for the Operation Center.

I have been using IBM Spectrum Protect for approximately three years.

I have found IBM Spectrum Protect to be highly stable.

IBM Spectrum Protect is a scalable solution.

IBM provides good support.

I have used other backup solutions, such as Veeam.

The installation of IBM Spectrum Protect has become easy for me but was not always. It's not as easy as others, such as Veeam. But nevertheless, I think it to be more robust than Veeam, and more realistic. The only option for a very small deployment is to use the Windows platform, but you cannot have a very small deployment as a blueprint on the Linux and on AIX. They have to create a very small deployment blueprint for the AIX and for the Linux.

The price of IBM Spectrum Protect is expensive. However, there are a few packages and it is unclear because, for the entry suite they have both options, which are the back-end storage capacity and the front-end storage capacity.

It's really difficult for you as a client to decide the exact size of how many kilos you have to purchase because it really depends on the after operational capacity and after the compression.

My advice to others wanting to implement this solution is if they have a critical enterprise application, then I would recommend TSM. If they have a small network of many workstations rather than servers, then maybe Veeam will be more suitable.

I rate IBM Spectrum Protect a seven out of ten.

We are using it for backing up corporate data.

It helps you protect your data with various retention policies, as required by the business. It would help the company maintain a disaster recovery plan and be able to recover from a failure.

Its incremental forever approach is valuable, so we don't have to load tapes to do a restore.

It does what we need it to do, but it could be better with VM backups. It could be better integrated with virtual machines or VM backups, but that's why they have their Plus out now. Plus version is more geared toward VM backups. The regular version is more for endpoint clients. 

Its licensing and pricing could be improved. Its licensing is complicated, and it is an expensive solution.

I have been using this solution for over 20 years.

Its stability is pretty good.

It is very scalable.

They're decent. They're fine. I would rate them an eight out of 10.

Positive

I have only been with IBM. I'm a consultant, so that's basically what I've worked on.

Its initial setup can be complicated. You would need a certified deployment expert to configure it and install it properly upfront. It isn't for a novice to be able to set up.

The deployment duration depends on the environment, but it typically takes about a week or two. Its maintenance also depends on the size of the company. If it is a small-sized or a medium-sized company, you could get away with one admin, but if it is larger, you might have more than one Spectrum Protect server, so you'd have multiple admins.

I am a consultant, so I would be the one who does the implementation.

Its licensing is complicated. It goes by CPUs, and it is pretty expensive as well.

I would advise others to do proper planning beforehand. You should know the retention policies that you want. You should know what policies you want to set before you go into it, and you should know how much data you're going to be backing up and then make sure it is sized properly.

I'll give it a nine out of 10. It is a good product.

We are using Spectrum as a backup solution. We use it to backup all of our data, which is different kinds of databases and software, with a virtualization environment. Also, we have more than a hundred remote sites. We are taking backups through Spectrum for all of those. 

The most valuable aspect is the fact that it combines all types of data. 

It's compatible with many other products, including Oracle, VMware, and Hyper V products.

The replication is great. 

The solution is robust and problem-free. We have not had any issues with Spectrum since we implemented it around 2012. 

The solution is very stable.

You can scale the product.

The management is pretty good and it covers all of our technical requirements. 

Technical support has been excellent. 

It's difficult in terms of the configuration at set up. In our case, it required another admin, one person dedicated to the backup.

Compared with others, the pricing is high.

There needs to be some sort of personalization within the environment. We cannot back up a shared storage desk through Spectrum.

I've used the solution since 2012 or 2014. I've used it for more than seven years at this point. It's been a while.

The solution is very stable and very reliable. We've had no issues with it. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. Over the years we have not had any issues. 

The solution can scale, however, it's a matter of the license you have. That said, if you need to expand, you can.

We've had a very positive experience with technical support. We are satisfied with their level of service. 

I also have experience with Dell EMC. I use them both.

The initial setup can be a bit complex, specifically in terms of configuring everything. We had to bring on an extra admin to assist us.

The solution is a bit expensive, especially if you look at other competitors. They cost less. The licensing could be more competitive. 

We are partners with IBM.

I would rate the solution at a ten out of ten. We've been very happy with its capabilities. 

We use this solution to monitor our backup tasks and to manage our backup. It also does retention on archives.

We use it for all of our backups.

It is easy to implement and restores very quickly.

It's very simple.

With the SPVE you can migrate from IBM to a different storage box. For example from IBM, you are going to Dell or NetApp. If you want to carry it over, you can.

You can do restores very quickly. You can mount a drive and restore it right from the drive.

Their plans need to be upgraded. It's a 1.0 and needs to be taken to a 1.4. Other solutions have more; Veeam for example, has 2.0, as well as Cohesity, and CommonVault.

When it comes to virtualization in IBM, it's not perfect.

We are going to switch from IBM to Veeam because Veeam is more accommodating to virtual environments. You can restore your Active Directory or your object to your group policy with Veeam.

I have been using IBM Spectrum Protect for three years.

We are using version 8.1.

It's very stable.

IBM Spectrum Protect is scalable. There are archives on the flash that goes into a queue, and when it's available, it goes into flash and retains it for seven days then into the normal storage.

We may require support or we may do it ourselves.

Technical support is good, they are responsive. Once you submit a ticket and depending on the level of priority from level one to level four, they will respond to the ticket with a day to the same day to resolve the issues.

The response time is normal. If you compare with Dell at the same priority level, it may take a day or two to get back to you.

I would rate technical support an eight out of ten.

The initial setup was straightforward. When you log in you can explore further. It will provide you with an explanation and how to do restores on the system. 

It will also let you know if you are backing up a C client or backing up a normal VM.

It's not complex. It's easy.

IMB does all of the updates.

We did no use an integrator or consultant. We completed the installation ourselves.

We are paying for support and maintenance on a monthly basis. It is approximately $124.00 USD per month for the entire company.

We are currently reviewing Veeam. After we have installed it, we will know more about it and some of the similarities.

TSM is moving to the cloud and will be much easier.

IBM Spectrum is coming out with a new version with the option of using Kubernetes, it's called IBM Spectrum Protect Plus.

It's solid, it helps you protect the IDMS and helps you restore your VMware data and the types of data on your VM.

I would rate IBM Spectrum Protect a seven out of ten.

The solution is primarily used for backup and restore and also for DR, for Data Recovery in case of a disaster. We are using replication from two servers, the Spectrum Servers, so they replicate on each other. We are using it for backing up remote sites also. Basically, all the machines are downloading their backup to the Spectrum Server and from then on we are moving that data to tape units so we can have outside data of the building.

IBM allows for the versioning of the data, allowing us to have multiple versions of a file or directory of a server. 

One of the main things that I like about IBM is the versioning of the data - meaning that we can have multiple versions of a file or directory of a server. I could have 10 versions of one file and that file I could keep for as long as I want.

There is the archive for a version of the solution which gave us the opportunity to have, let's say, one full backup every month for a long period of time. Its archiving offers us good flexibility.

The solution is very stable.

We've found the scalability to be very good.

The initial implementation is straightforward for the most part.

The pricing is a bit high. It would be ideal if it was more affordable.

Generally, everything is changing so fast within the product, it's hard to pinpoint what needs to be changed or what is missing. The solution is constantly evolving.

It would be helpful if the solution included some sort of ransomware protection.

The only thing that I haven't tried yet is using it with VMware. I haven't done any tests on it. Let's say that I want to restore a VM, virtual machine, and I would like to access it in a short period of time. This is something that Veeam, for example, is doing. Veeam will permit you to start a VM and start working with it and restore only what is needed to do a prompt work. If it's possible to have the same functionality on this product, that would be ideal.

I've been using the solution since it was called under a different name. I've used it for about 20 or so years at this point. It's been two decades. It's been a while. 

The solution is very stable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. Its performance is excellent.

The scalability of the solution is very good. A company can expand the solution if it needs to.

IBM Spectrum is used in the data center and we don't have too many users that would use the backup facilities. Everything is centralized to enter the data center.

We are not fully using the solution to its full potential at this time. I'm not sure if there are plans to increase usage. We're looking into other options to see if we can get better user-friendly functionality and better pricing.

We've been in touch with technical support. They are very good. We haven't had any issues with them. They are helpful and responsive. Every time I've talked to them, they've solved our problems.

We also currently use Veeam.

The installation is simple. You just click and follow the instruction. Where the complexity is coming up is when you decide how you want to do your backup and restore. Like any other software you have to decide how you want to do it and understand what's going on behind the scene. 

The deployment itself, with my experience, doesn't take long due to the fact that I know the product. That said, for someone that does not know the product, I would say, it will take, just to understand how it works about a week.

We have two or three people on staff that can handle any maintenance required. They are all systems administrators. 

In the beginning, we had a consultant as it was a very long time ago and we did not have the knowledge we have now. However, today I would not deal with anybody from IBM. We have the capabilities we need. 

In general, at the time, we had a good experience working with them.

While it's my understanding that the solution is expensive, I do not directly handle the licensing and therefore cannot speak to how much the company actually pays to use the solution.

We are customers and end-users.

We have the Enterprise version of IBM Protect. It's not the Plus version.

My advice is not specifically for IBM Spectrum, but for any product. I would say, sit down and think about it. Think about what you want to do. There are so many options in any software. It's like getting house insurance. What do you want to do, how do you want to insure your data? It's important to understand what you want so you can see if the solutions you are looking at actually have the required capabilities.

I would rate the solution at an eight out of ten. It's a very good product. It's strong. It's stable. The company's good.

We use it for our enterprise backups. By enterprise, I mean Oracle, SAP, and all other business-critical applications.

Initially, we started using Spectrum for backing up our business-critical applications, such as SAP running on AIX, and then we had Oracle RAC clusters. We also had Veeam for VMware, but then IBM Spectrum came up with their version of the virtual environment. IBM was initially not into the virtual environment, but over a period of time, they got into this.

IBM is providing us a good and cost-effective solution. We also get more robustness for daily backup where we can restore a virtual machine, just like Commvault and Veeam. 

We have been using it for several years, and it is quite reliable and predictable. We are quite comfortable with this solution. They're coming up with new features as well. 

It has good scalability, and it provides good integrations with business-critical applications or databases, such as SAP HANA. It works as expected, and we don't see any issues.

Its management part can be better and simplified. It is kind of a beast as compared to Commvault or Veeam, but they are more user-friendly. They are also easier to learn, whereas Spectrum Protect definitely takes time. They should simplify it. Our teams are pretty comfortable with it because we have been using it for a long time, but from the perspective of a new user who is evaluating or using this solution, it is definitely more complex in terms of manageability.

Its monitoring could be improved so that it can even monitor the jobs that are scheduled by external schedulers. There are situations where a database team might decide to use their own schedulers, but currently, Spectrum Protect is not able to catch those jobs in the Operation Manager console.

I have been using this solution for more than ten years.

We have been using it for several years now, and it is very good in terms of stability and reliability.

It is scalable.

We don't have any issues with technical support. They're okay, and we're fine with their support.

We also use Veeam, which is mainly for the virtual environment. IBM Spectrum covers everything. It covers virtual and physical environments and heavy databases and applications such as SAP HANA. We are using Veeam only for a subset of our environment. 

Its initial setup is complex and not very easy. The deployment duration depends on a lot of factors, but generally, one week should be enough.

It is not very intuitive, and you can't do it all by yourself. You need someone for initial deployment. We have a seller who helps us out. This solution has been here with us for years, so our team is now comfortable implementing it, but it is still not that intuitive that you can do it all by yourself.

Its licensing is complex, and its price is not really reasonable. It is on the expensive side. IBM, in general, is slightly expensive, but with IBM Spectrum for the virtual environment, they are looking into the aspect of helping customers with the cost and providing a cost-effective solution.

It is a reliable tool. It has been there for so many years. It is a good solution that provides many options. I would recommend this solution for large-scale environments with mission-critical applications running on complex hardware, such as AIX.

I would rate IBM Spectrum Protect an eight out of ten.