Metallic OverviewUNIXBusinessApplication

Metallic is the #1 ranked solution in top Disaster Recovery as a Service providers, #1 ranked solution in top SaaS Backup tools, #1 ranked solution in top Container Backup Software tools, and #10 ranked solution in top Cloud Backup tools. PeerSpot users give Metallic an average rating of 9.8 out of 10. Metallic is most commonly compared to Veeam Backup & Replication: Metallic vs Veeam Backup & Replication. Metallic is popular among the large enterprise segment, accounting for 55% of users researching this solution on PeerSpot. The top industry researching this solution are professionals from a computer software company, accounting for 24% of all views.
Metallic Buyer's Guide

Download the Metallic Buyer's Guide including reviews and more. Updated: May 2023

What is Metallic?

Metallic is an integral component of Commvault’s robust Intelligent Data Services Platform. Metallic allows enterprise organizations to preemptively clarify and easily administer the intricacies of enterprise data. Metallic is a flexible, durable SaaS product that integrates effectively with most of today’s popular solutions, such as Microsoft, Google, AWS, Oracle, Splunk, VMware, and more. Metallic is very user-friendly; users do not have to be tech-savvy to use this solution, and is very cost-effective. Metallic offers automatic upgrades, super-easy deployments, no hardware costs, and very flexible subscription options. Metallic successfully achieves enterprise-grade cutting-edge data protection made effortless as a SaaS solution.

Metallic Features

  • Excellent Coverage: Metallic offers complete coverage across on-premises, cloud, and SaaS/BaaS workflows.

  • Flexibility: Recovery is super flexible with granular search and restore options (out-of-place and point-in-time)
  • Scalability: Seamlessly scale from 1TB to 10k+TB

  • Easy Deployment: Metallic offers quick and easy deployment; the solution can be working effectively in minutes.

  • Cost-effective: Metallic is a SaaS solution; there are no infrastructure, hardware, or network costs. Zero capital investment is needed and it is maintenance-free.

  • Security: Full visibility and immediate insights regarding any potential at-risk files, suspicious activity, and any other anomalous behaviors.

  • Data Backups: Metallic offers daily seamless automated backups and also provides data isolation for highly available air-gapped immutable backups.

Metallic also provides excellent backup for Microsoft 365, Vmware, and Kubernetes in addition to endpoint and object and file backup. Metallic can act effectively as a BaaS for cloud environments, protecting Azure VM, VMware, Kubernetes, and more. Metallic has the capability to guard against deletion and corruption across all of Microsoft 365. Metallic also provides an excellent endpoint and object and file backup to maintain speed, productivity, and performance to keep an organization's network running smoothly.

Reviews from Real Users

Nav., ICT Consultant at U.K. Local Government, shares, "Restoring is very fast. In testing, I did a restore for a single item from a mailbox. Within a minute, I had the message back in my mailbox. So, it didn't take hours or days. Obviously, there will be a limit. If we suddenly go into DR and have to restore five terabytes of emails for people, then it will take a couple of days, which would be acceptable. For general usage, where we have to do the odd restore, we have never had issues. It happens within minutes."

Modi S., VP of Technologies at MindU, relates, “Quick backups and restores of data are the most valuable features. It is important that it is an easy solution to integrate with the SAML authentication of the tenant, so we can have the users log into the systems and do their own restores if needed. Metallic's backup & granular recovery of data for Office 365 works great. We have tested it many times for production reasons. We have done some tests and have always managed to do the recovery as we wanted and without any issues.

Jeffrey D., Systems Team Supervisor at the State of Nevada, tells us, "It is just about as flexible as you can get; simple. You can put it anywhere you want. You can put it on-prem or in your cloud. I could see where a team that's looking for more of a follow the bouncy ball type of solution might get a little confused. "Oh, no. What do you mean I might have to do it this way or I can't do it that way?" Sometimes, people just want to be told what to do. For an enterprise environment, like we are at NDOT, everything we do is not standard. It is not industry standard; it is not normal. We have all kinds of one-offs. We do need flexibility in the solutions that we get. I will say that Metallic has been extremely flexible in that sense, where we are able to follow the bouncy ball if we wanted to. Obviously, we didn't. We did it our way and Metallic, as a whole solution, provided that to us with no issues."



Metallic Customers

Learn more at Metallic.io

Metallic Video

Archived Metallic Reviews (more than two years old)

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Network Engineer at Rosnet
Real User
Reduces the amount of manual work required to manage our backup operations
Pros and Cons
  • "Integration with Active Directory and the Azure platform make it a complete solution."
  • "It's very easy to set up the storage across all platforms. This allows us to be dynamic and change on-the-fly."
  • "There is room for improvement in the Knowledge Base and error reporting. I would like to see best practices in the Knowledge Base, and have the ability to diagnose errors without contacting support."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for backup and disaster recovery. We protect Windows and Linux servers, Windows 10, SQL, and Office 365.

How has it helped my organization?

It has streamlined data recovery, via a SaaS solution, to provide overarching protection. Metallic has also reduced the amount of manual work required to manage our backup operations by about 20 percent. In addition, it provides us with more predictable costs for our backup requirements because the egress charges are known.

What is most valuable?

  • The SaaS offering is the most valuable feature because it provides endpoint, Office 365, and core server backup.
  • The overall ease of use is good. The user experience is very in-tune and they are constantly making improvements as a result of feedback from customers.
  • Its performance for both backup and recovery, and security, as an enterprise solution, is good. Integration with Active Directory and the Azure platform make it a complete solution.
  • It's very easy to set up the storage across all platforms. This allows us to be dynamic and change on-the-fly.
  • Metallic is also very nice because you're not connecting to a VPN to use the endpoint recovery.

What needs improvement?

There is room for improvement in the Knowledge Base and error reporting. I would like to see best practices in the Knowledge Base, and have the ability to diagnose errors without contacting support.

Buyer's Guide
Metallic
May 2023
Learn what your peers think about Metallic. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2023.
706,951 professionals have used our research since 2012.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Commvault Metallic for three months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's stable. I've had some outages over the last week, but overall, it's stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It seems very scalable. We have plans to increase our usage of the solution.

How are customer service and support?

Commvault's technical support is responsive.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

There are multiple systems in place. We're in the process of replacing them.

As for the process of switching to Metallic, planning goes a long way. It's at an intermediate level between simple and complicated. We did the free trial and it was easy to get going.

We went with Metallic because it's a SaaS offering. It was one of the few solutions that offered SaaS with their own storage.

How was the initial setup?

After doing it, it's straightforward, but it does require a little bit of understanding. It's in the middle between straightforward and complex. We're still in deployment but the initial setup took about one month.

Our implementation strategy is to cover critical applications: Office 365, Windows 10, and both Windows and Linux servers.

I've ran into some issues, which has made the configuration interface for configuring the solution for data protection more complex, but overall, if the instructions work, it's very simple.

What about the implementation team?

The Commvault Success team helped. Other than that, it was just me. Their team was responsive. They pride themselves on making the product work for the client.

In terms of administrators of the system, there is just me in my role of network engineer. The individual users don't log in. We're a small business with under 200 users.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated Veeam and Rubrik. The pros for Metallic were that the costs were up-front and that it was a SaaS with dedicated cloud storage for endpoint and dedicated cloud storage for Office 365, separating those silos.

The drawback with Metallic is that it takes a bit of work to understand the process for registering clients, but once you have it down, it goes quickly.

What other advice do I have?

Take your time to run the trial and understand what you're getting yourself into.

The move from on-premise to a cloud solution is definitely a change. Be patient with the process and open to understanding the SaaS solution.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Aviation Attorney at Gagliano Law Offices
Real User
Eliminates the time I spent on manual backups and protects my OneDrive data
Pros and Cons
  • "In terms of the speed of backup, it operates seamlessly, so I'd rate it as excellent... with my daily use and workload, quite honestly I don't even notice when it backs up."
  • "The setup was a little bit difficult for a non-IT person like me. My OneDrive is protected by multifactor authentication, and to get the backup to begin behind that multifactor authentication took a little bit of almost customized support, even though I was following the instructions and the videos. That process could have been easier."

What is our primary use case?

It is used as a single backup for my small office's Microsoft 365 account, particularly the OneDrive files.

How has it helped my organization?

The best example is that it hasn't impacted my operations, which is exactly how it's supposed to work. It's supposed to provide a backup in the case of an unforeseen event or emergency, if something happens to the OneDrive. That's what it's there for. Otherwise, it shouldn't have an impact and it doesn't.

It provides daily backups and, since I'm not doing manual backups anymore, it has greatly reduced the time that it was taking me to do those. I was doing them every day so it has greatly reduced my workload. In addition, it has provided much higher reliability and efficiency. It's saving me on the order of 20 hours a month, as it does backups more efficiently and more often than I did or would have.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is the one that I'm using, which is the backup of my OneDrive. Thankfully I haven't had to use a backup yet, but the solution itself seems to be working very well.

In terms of the speed of backup, it operates seamlessly, so I'd rate it as excellent. The first backup took a while because I already had quite a bit of information residing on my OneDrive, but now, with my daily use and workload, quite honestly I don't even notice when it backs up. It's completely seamless.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Metallic for about a year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I have not had any issues with its stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It seems like it has good scalability, which is another thing that I'm interested in because hopefully I won't be a small business for long. I've never run enterprise-level software, but I'm very happy with Metallic, as the owner of a small business.

As the business grows, as I add users, the ability to add backup features is there. It's something I've discussed with their customer support and tech support. I'm comfortable that as I add users and begin to use more features in my Office suite and elsewhere, Metallic will be able to provide backup. That's really the primary reason I have it: data backup and security.

I use it every day for the business. It's in OneDrive now but at some point I'm going to have employees and it will have to migrate over to SharePoint. I will then need it backed up in SharePoint as well for use by my team.

How are customer service and technical support?

In terms of ease of use, I'm not an IT professional. I own a small business. So it was a little challenging to get running, but Metallic's customer service — their technical support and their sales and customer contact representatives — were world-class; among the best customer service interactions I've had with anyone, anywhere, for any reason. That was very much appreciated. I appreciate their follow up, their diligence, their responsiveness. That was just world-class. There's no other word for it.

They're very responsive. When a question comes in, they follow up, even when they haven't heard from me. They check to make sure everything is working properly, and they answer any questions preemptively. I have the utmost regard for their customer service and their tech support and their ability to solve issues. They have done a phenomenal job of customer outreach, problem solving, and tech support; the whole nine yards.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I had a physical hard drive that I backed everything up to, manually. That was my backup plan, which was not a good backup plan. I'm much more comfortable with how things are operating now.

The reason I moved to Metallic was that my OneDrive files got too big. The manual backup was taking too long and it was not being accomplished as often as I wanted it to be. I knew I needed an automatic cloud backup.

How was the initial setup?

The setup was a little bit difficult for a non-IT person like me. My OneDrive is protected by multifactor authentication, and to get the backup to begin behind that multifactor authentication took a little bit of almost customized support, even though I was following the instructions and the videos. That process could have been easier. But considering that I needed the additional support, Metallic was phenomenally responsive and I give them the highest marks possible for their responsiveness and support.

It was configured through Azure. That was hands-on on my part. It was simple to understand. But even though I followed the instructions, I wound up doing a screen share with tech support that uncovered some additional items that the instructions did not cover. That was the source of the initial problem. But tech support and customer support helped me overcome those efficiently and they were really responsive and helpful.

I knew the setup would take a little bit of time and I set the time aside. When it didn't work and the backup wasn't occurring or was having trouble, I got in touch with customer support and technical support and they provided assistance. And then I would get busy and not be able to respond to them for some time, and then they would get back with me. The plan was to sit down and have it all done but it didn't work out that way. It took a little bit longer than planned, but that was not Metallic's fault.

I got everything installed, but I didn't have any backups accomplished till after the free trial expired. But again, that was not Metallic's fault.

What about the implementation team?

It was just me and the Metallic support. One of the customer support agents at Metallic, Alix, was fantastic. I don't recall the names of the tech support people who I spoke with, but they were also excellent.

I'm the only one using and maintaining it at the moment.

What was our ROI?

It hasn't saved money for my company on infrastructure costs but the idea is that in the event that something unforeseen or catastrophic happens, it will save me money. It's like an insurance policy.

It certainly provides me with more predictable costs for my backup requirements. And there is ROI because I've got a backup that I don't have to do manually. That saves me time and headache.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I looked at this at the beginning of the year and I don't remember what the prices were for all the other services, but I thought that Metallic's was fair. It was also highly rated, which was even more important than cost because I need a reliable, secure, backup method.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I looked into other options but Metallic seemed like it had the greatest ability to scale up, add features, and it had a good price.

What other advice do I have?

I would highly recommend it.

The biggest lesson I've learned from using it is that when I expand, I'm going to need an IT consultant to assist, so that I don't have to spend the time doing it. I will want someone who can deal with the issues efficiently.

With the caveat that I haven't needed a backup yet, since nothing catastrophic has happened, I would rate Metallic and their team as a 10. I can only assume and hope that if, God forbid, something were to happen and I were to need the backup, it would be as good as the service has been so far.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Metallic
May 2023
Learn what your peers think about Metallic. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2023.
706,951 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Backup and Recovery Specialist at Parsons
Real User
Leaderboard
Handles Linux, Mac, and Windows and requires no effort on my part to manage it
Pros and Cons
  • "There's no impact on the endpoint. It runs in the background and it's something that you install and then forget about."
  • "The compression and deduplication are great for optimizing bandwidth and speed. I don't have to worry about it or think about it, and, because it's a SaaS solution, I don't have to worry about the storage size."
  • "I would like to see more customizable reports. I have reports going right now, but the daily report, for example, shows something like 40 jobs that ran when there are just a few endpoints on there. I'd like to just know if the endpoint was successfully backed up, not how many times. More customizable reports would be nice to have."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for endpoint backups. They are laptops and we needed a solution that could handle Linux, Macintoshes, and Windows, in different locations, and Metallic was the best option available.

How has it helped my organization?

We needed a solution that could handle Linux and Macintosh and Windows, all together. Metallic seemed to be the only one on the market that could provide an all-endpoints SaaS solution.

In terms of the manual work required to manage our backup operations, I don't have to manage it that much. There is not much that needs to be done or manual work involved. It works well. There's not much I have to do on our side and I don't have to dedicate any time to it.

Metallic has also saved our organization money on infrastructure costs because the price was amazingly affordable, and we didn't have to create an on-prem solution. Especially since we're moving the Parsons data centers to the cloud, we're reducing our on-prem footprint. This SaaS gives us a full cloud solution to take care of that . There's a huge cost savings for us with this. 

What is most valuable?

We're only using the endpoint backup solution part of it. It works very well. There's no impact on the endpoint. It runs in the background and it's something that you install and then forget about.

It's very easy to use. You don't really need to change anything or do anything different. For non-technical people it can be a little challenging trying to understand the GUI options because it can go a little bit deeper, but for basic use it's very simple to use.

It's definitely appropriate for an enterprise-level environment. Its performance for both backup and recovery is amazing. It runs very well. I don't even know when it's running and that's true during the backups as well. It completes successfully and there's zero impact on the endpoints.

The compression and deduplication are great for optimizing bandwidth and speed. I don't have to worry about it or think about it, and, because it's a SaaS solution, I don't have to worry about the storage size.

It's also very flexible in terms of where data is stored. You can choose what you would like. We're going to Azure cloud and the issue for us was more whether the security protocols were in place, and they are. As long as they met the security requirements, we were okay.

It has the AES-256 encryption. It meets that requirement and there is no issue with the amount of time it takes. The backups are very quick. There's no delay.

What needs improvement?

Adding new users who are non-technical can be a little challenging. You can push the software out through SCCM and install it that way, and that works great, but it would be nice to have another option where somebody could download an executable and run it and it would work. It's a little challenging to get it on other systems. I work from home but I have to go and help them because sometimes they don't know. I might send them the authentication code and they'll try to install it... I'm still working out the details, trying to figure out where they went wrong, but I've had several users try to do it and it hasn't worked.

I would like to see more customizable reports. I have reports going right now, but the daily report, for example, shows something like 40 jobs that ran when there are just a few endpoints on there. I'd like to just know if the endpoint was successfully backed up, not how many times. More customizable reports would be nice to have.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Metallic since it was released. We jumped onto it as soon as possible.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is great. It just runs. I've had zero issues with it.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability is great. It's very scalable.

Currently, I only have 10 endpoints that I'm protecting and I'm trying to roll it out to more. There are a lot of employees in our company. Right now, we're using Metallic for just critical systems, critical endpoints. I'm hoping to create more awareness throughout Parsons so that others learn about it and see it and, maybe, start using it. But for now, it's going slowly trying to get Metallic in through the door.

How are customer service and technical support?

Commvault's technical support for Metallic is great. I really enjoy working with Commvault tech support. They're very knowledgeable and I love how they handle tickets. They're on top of things. They're always kind and polite and understanding. I wouldn't want to go through third-party support. I'd want to go directly through Commvault.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Our company used to use PC Backup but that's gone away and now they want to use OneDrive. A lot of executives feel that OneDrive is sufficient and that we don't need an actual backup solution.

The reason for going to Metallic was that PC Backup couldn't do Linux or Macintosh. We needed something that could do everything. It is a complete SaaS solution, backing up to the cloud.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was straightforward. It was me that set it up. We got our plan configured on the website and I installed it for myself and for somebody else. It was pretty straightforward and pretty easy to configure. The instructions work well. 

The interface was a simple webpage, which is something I like about it. It's something I'm used to and there wasn't much to add. You just add the endpoint into the policy and away it goes. You don't have to really configure it.

We enabled it with SAML, so it uses our Active Directory and automatic login, and that worked out pretty well. It's been a long time since I've dug into it and done it. I tried to add some other users and they just emailed me and said they couldn't get it to work. I'm not sure what they're doing. Somehow they went wrong and I'm not sure yet how.

Overall our initial deployment took about 10 to 15 minutes. It was quick. In terms of deployment and maintenance, I'm the sole person who is working with the solution.

We didn't have an implementation strategy. We were trying it out. I had a certain number of laptops that I knew that needed to be added to it. I went through and configured them to work with Metallic. It was a really quick, easy setup, and it just runs with no issues. It doesn't matter where the laptop is at, where it's connected.

What was our ROI?

For me, it works great and it does exactly what it says it does. I love having it. I would put it on my home computers if I could. I'm still working on trying to get it implemented throughout all of Parsons.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We looked at PC Backup. We also looked at other cloud solutions. Metallic was the one that offered all the options.

What other advice do I have?

It's simple and it has very low-to-no impact on endpoints. It runs in the background and has some really cool features for the end-users to use on the computer, if they want to look at their backups, do restores, or to find their computer location. But it is very simple and basic for non-technical people to use.

I like the interface, how it works, and being able to get daily reports of any failures or anything that happens is very useful.

I would rate it a 10 out of 10. I haven't come across anything that's better.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Manager, Technical Services & Support at Linamar
Real User
Leaderboard
Significantly reduced the amount of manual work required to manage our backup operations
Pros and Cons
  • "It has significantly reduced the amount of manual work required to manage our backup operations. We're going from an on-prem to a non-on-prem, we're all doing nonsolutions. So we really can't compare it against anything else."
  • "The navigation of it needs improvement in terms of the UX. The product itself, it works as expected. It's all user experience and user interface improvements that could be made and it could be made a little more consumer-friendly."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use case is for Office 365 Backup. We started out as an Exchange Online only company. Then we were looking for some sort of backup solution to augment the existing Microsoft Office 365 archiving features for a price that was more compatible with our company versus what Microsoft was offering for their archiving solution. We also needed the ability to do time and date stamp retrievals. We ended up settling on Commvault at that time. We've been with them, and we've seen it more from being in the Commvault virtualized infrastructure to being the Metallic.io SaaS solution.

We protect mostly Exchange Online, but really we do the whole breadth of Office 365 with them. We were looking at some other solutions, but with them, we're doing our entire Office 365 Microsoft Online platform.

How has it helped my organization?

It has helped my organization because we don't have to have tapes. We're not paying for tapes, storage tapes, or storage ourselves. It's definitely a bonus. We're more efficient in all of our backups for Office 365 because it is in a single pane of glass. If we were to integrate Commvault on-premise, we'd be able to use the same pane of glass to manage both on-prem and cloud solutions. It's taken our backup from being a full-time job to being when you need it, set it up. Our users could be empowered to access their own data backups. Which means we can alleviate a lot of the administration from the backup administrator.

It has significantly reduced the amount of manual work required to manage our backup operations. We're going from an on-prem to a non-on-prem, we're all doing nonsolutions. So we really can't compare it against anything else.

The way we look at it is that before, we used to manage a separate backup solution for our on-prem environment. We had to make sure that our logs are flushed after the backup was complete. If the logs weren't flushed then it caused our on-prem Exchange to offline. There's a lot more management involved from that point of view. The other thing is that we would have to purchase the tapes. We have a tape rotation, we would have to ship tapes to an offsite location. If we need to restore, we had to go back to the offsite location, and get the restore. In some cases, exchanging restore on-premise could be a lot harder because it doesn't give you some of the brick level functionality.

What is most valuable?

My impressions of the backup and granular recovery of features are that they're constantly evolving and we've had such great contact with the engineering and development teams at Commvault while they were building out this product. We've seen the evolution of the product, and it has gone from being a platform as a service to a complete service option. The number of upgrades, updates, and ease-of-use features that they continue to build into it, has dramatically reduced the amount of time we spend looking for objects in the backup repositories.

In terms of the speed of both backup and recovery of Office 365 data, for backup, we have a very large Office 365 footprint. We have over almost 15,000 unique mailboxes, according to their metrics. The backup is at least thrice daily. I find it to be very fast compared to other options in the market right now. Especially that it can back up 15,000 users with no problem.

In terms of the ease of use, the original learning curve was a bit steep, but now I would say the overall ease of use, now that they've started with the latest releases of it is fairly intuitive. If I need to go look at my Exchange, so I go click on Exchange. If I need to look at my One Drive backups, I click on One Drive. It's fairly intuitive and it does a great job of guiding me when I'm not sure of where to go.

I haven't gone down the security road too much. However, I've never had a security concern with the product. The scalability and availability of it are outstanding. It's scaled with us. But as far as security goes, I've never had an issue or a concern, or if I did have a concern they were able to address it immediately.

We also haven't really gone too much into the flexibility in terms of where the data is stored but it's a great feature. We're only using a head-end and we're a complete SaaS offering, but we did explore the local active copies, et cetera. We decided that there was no need for us to keep the data on-premise if they're going to maintain it in Azure or AWS. So for us, it was a very easy decision to keep it in the cloud and not on-premise.

What needs improvement?

The navigation of it needs improvement in terms of the UX. The product itself, it works as expected. It's all user experience and user interface improvements that could be made and it could be made a little more consumer-friendly. Instead of having one person or a few people that know the system intimately, it gives us the ability for other people that don't have to know the system intimately be able to navigate it.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for two years. 

It's a SaaS offering. It's deployed in our infrastructure and we have a single VM in our infrastructure that we use for pulling any backups down to our infrastructure that we need.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's appropriate for an enterprise-level environment. It's scaled with us from 900 mailboxes to 12,000 mailboxes, plus our scale of the Office 365 platform.

Before the COVID pandemic, we had six users using this solution. They're system administrators, they manage infrastructure and systems.

It has a 100% adoption rate. The product is being used every day. The backups are automated four times a day and we restore them on a need basis. We use the product every day.

How are customer service and support?

Their support is awesome. On a scale from one to ten, I would rate them a fifteen. The entire Commvault team always goes above and beyond every time, for everything.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were on-prem before with an old version of Exchange, and we used old backup software to back it up.

How was the initial setup?

For us, the initial setup was complex because we were one of the first customers on this solution. However, we've reset it up a couple of times just as a demo for some of our subsidiaries, and the way the set works now is very straightforward, and very clean compared to what it was when we first got to it to 18 months to two years ago.

The configuration interface was fairly straightforward. Aside from the initial, "This is a product that we are building. You are a beta customer. You're one of our first few customers on the platform.", it was fairly straightforward. Now it's very point and click. It's very straightforward, very intuitive, and well automated.

The deployment took one week.

Our implementation strategy was to get it absorbing our email while we're still migrating users to Office 365 from our on-prem solutions. For us, it was a shotgun approach. I was adding more users to our office tenants than anybody had expected. When we were rolling out Commvault we were rolling out Office 365 at the same time, and it was overwhelming Microsoft at the same time. The implementation strategy was to try to run a slow controlled burn and cut people over as needed, but we managed to get Commvault set up. Then every day, myself and the team at Commvault, were checking to make sure that all the users we had just imported into Office 365 were imported into Commvault.

It wouldn't have been possible without the support team and the development team. The implementation that works now is very clean compared to what I went through. They made themselves so available to us when we were doing our implementation that the reason it took so long to implement was because they were waiting for me for the next step.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Metallic provides us with more predictable costs for our backup requirements. They charge us on a model that we understand. We understand the pricing model a little bit differently. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We investigated Backup Exec and Backupify. Backupify and Commvault were the top two. They were the two that we had narrowed in on, based on our needs analysis. We chose Commvault simply because of the scalability and expertise in enterprise.

Backupify was a SaaS solution and they had many similar features. But at the time they wanted us to add more service than we were expecting. They were fantastic competitor and they did everything we wanted them to do, just like Commvault. But we went with Commvault specifically because of their enterprise heritage.

We started with a free trial of Commvault. It might've been a POC then we just went from there.

What other advice do I have?

They do a fantastic job with their documentation, so you can follow their documentation and implement it.

I would rate it an eight out of ten. We can't compare it against another staff solution that we're using. So for now it works for us, we're not seeing any issues, and it's better than what we used on-prem. 

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
System Administrator at a transportation company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Leaderboard
Provides us with Office 365 backup in a SaaS model, significantly reducing backup admin
Pros and Cons
  • "This solution gives me the full insight without having to use other products, metrics, or reporting tools."
  • "I would like to see some of the code execute a little bit better when I add new licenses and assign licenses to users. I'd like to see that information update a little quicker."

What is our primary use case?

We really needed a product where we could extend the Microsoft Office 365 backups and archival process, as well as back up our Office 365 SharePoints and our users' OneDrives. That way we could have a seven-year retention plan and if we need to go back and grab someone's email that they accidentally deleted two years ago, we could. 

We also needed a solution that we didn't have to have onsite storage for, because we had a storage restriction onsite. This product gave me the ability to have everything stored, as a SaaS model. Everything is right there.

How has it helped my organization?

We recently had an issue where someone couldn't find an email that they had just recently written. When I went looking inside the backups, I was able to find and restore that email and they were able to continue working. It was very critical for a customer sale, but that email was recovered and it was perfect. Because it was just a single email, it was relatively quick. If I had had to do it another way, it probably would have taken me an hour-and-a-half to two hours longer with our old way of doing it. Before we went with Office 365, we were Exchange on-premises and it would have required me to have pulled out a SAN snapshot to recover the data that way, or go to the tape. Because this is all hosted in the cloud and works in the cloud, I was able to do it in five minutes.

Metallic has helped minimize the time spent on backup tasks, absolutely. It has reduced the time, daily, that I deal with whether the backup is up, and performing backups, by about 50 percent. I have more time to do other things.

I have been able to save on hardware costs at my site due to the low price of the application. I am looking at a reduction in infrastructure costs of at least 25 percent.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable part of the solution is that it is fire-and-forget. Everything we've programmed into this Metallic SaaS offering is what they claim it to be. It's been just a treat to use it. From starting the trial, to the 15 minutes it took to run my first backup, to the 30-minutes for my first restore of the users' email, it has just been fantastic. It works as advertised.

Since it's built off the regular Commvault product, and I use that Commvault product, the user interface has been very easy for me to get into. It's easy to use and navigate through. I've had no questions on how to find the relevant information, and their documentation has been on-point for helping me find all the hidden features inside their menus.

The Command Center, as far as providing a complete view of data goes, is 100 percent accurate. I found stuff that I didn't know about. I was able to find out that a couple of things are flowing in an odd way and I was able to get those remedied and treated in a way that ended up improving my boss' daily life.

It also provides me with a single platform to move, manage, and recover data across on-premises, hybrid, and cloud locations. It's a single window to see everything I needed to see regarding this level of backup. I really dislike like it when the company purchases multiple products that do similar things and I have to go to different windows to get full insight. This solution gives me the full insight without having to use other products, metrics, or reporting tools.

Since it plugs into my Office 365 tenant, it was literally three clicks. So it supports cloud well. And it's all documented well. They even provided training and onboarding help for that 15-minute process. It was just fantastic.

What needs improvement?

I would like to see some of the code execute a little bit better when I add new licenses and assign licenses to users. I'd like to see that information update a little quicker. It would also be helpful to be able to run a report on licensing so that I have better visibility into how much licensing I'm using.

I really have no other complaints beyond that. And they were able to get me that information relatively quickly when I submitted a ticket.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Metallic since day-one of its release in October, 2019.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would give the stability "five nines." I've not seen it down. I can't say it hasn't been down once, but it's been up the entire time I've used it. There have been no issues. It's snappy and responsive. I'm impressed with the stability of it.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scaling is amazingly easy. The way they recommend the setup, it is easy to drop a user into one of my security groups and, within 15 minutes, they are in the backup schedule rotation and are being backed up.

I have 75 users enrolled. We may have plans to expand in the future to start taking advantage of their endpoint product through Metallic. We would expand from 75 seats to 200 seats in the Office 365 backup, and would add on another set of 200 seats for their endpoint backup.

How are customer service and technical support?

Commvault's technical support for the solution is knowledgeable. I haven't been able to stump them. They've been able to answer every single question and help me with any issues I've had. They've just been, bar none, fantastic.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were using Backup Exec for a lot of stuff and ShadowProtect SPX, a StorageCraft solution. Now that we have this online, it's fantastic. Every product that we use from Commvault, in general, has been fantastic.

We switched to Metallic from our other solutions because they didn't provide the Office 365 backup component we wanted.

We needed a backup solution and I purchased their standard Commvault for our on-premises stuff. When I attended Commvault Go, their customer conference, they debuted Metallic and I said, "That's exactly the product I was looking for, for my 365 backup, and I'm buying it from Commvault." I already knew how their software works and Metallic is same. They're just doing it in a SaaS model for 365, endpoint, and even server backup if you want. I really needed that 365.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. It's 100 percent accurate on their website. From start to finish: 15 minutes and you're running your first backup.

My implementation strategy for this was for the 365, the OneDrive and the SharePoint components. When we brought it online, my goal was to target the 75 most used, customer-facing mailboxes. Within 15 minutes I was able to make sure the product was working and, by the end of that day, I had everyone applied. Compared to other products, that would have taken days.

If you have technical experience it will be straightforward. We walked through their installation script just to confirm I had everything done, because, given how new the product is, they wanted to test their help script. And it was spot-on. They had it perfect. I am fully confident that, even if a person doesn't have great technical knowledge, they would be able to help that person through it.

What about the implementation team?

When I purchased Commvault Metallic, they did have an onboarding process that helped me if I had any questions. It was literally a 15-minute process. I did everything before we even had that phone call, so I got to spend the call asking a few questions. It was really easy. 

What was our ROI?

I would say we have seen a return on investment, but it's a hard metric to come up with due to DR. We haven't had a DR scenario where it has paid for itself. But I view it like buying car insurance. It's better to have it and not need it, than something happening and needing it and not having it.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We are paying on a yearly basis and it comes out to about $3.80 a user per month.

There are no other costs for the specific features that I have. If I was to use server backups with them, there would be an additional cost per terabyte of storage, based on my storage targets, or an infrastructure cost if I was using it to target on-ground storage stuff. But because I'm using the platform that includes storage for the Office 365 backup exclusively, there is no additional cost.

The other products I was looking at wanted to charge me anywhere between $10 to $15 per person and I would have to do storage on top of that. That means I would be paying by the terabyte if I was putting the storage in the cloud or having to purchase hardware on-premises to do so. With the Office 365 offering from Metallic, at the price point we got it at, it was perfect. They knew exactly what the market needed and they hit their marks.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We really didn't evaluate other vendors because none of them gave me the options that I was looking for and that Metallic was offering: a low price per user, and storage included for the 365 backup. With other products I would have had to purchase cloud storage and pay for additional storage, or the cost per seat was just not something I was willing to pay.

What other advice do I have?

The biggest lesson I've learned is to remind people that they still need to back up Office 365 emails. Just because it's not on their premises, they should still back it up.

Commvault gives you a fantastic 45-day trial. It's worth trying it. They have a really good, long trial period. They will answer any questions you have during that process. I know a lot of people say, "Just try the product." With this one, try the product and you'll see the ease of use.

For deployment and maintenance of the solution, for our size of company, it's just one person, a system administrator who does overall operations support.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Metallic Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: May 2023
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Metallic Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.