StarWind Virtual Tape Library Reviews

We have been using the product for backups and long-term storage. 

We had been using physical tape backups for many years. It became harder to get those tapes to successfully complete and also get access to the data center to swap out the tapes. 

With the VTL, we have seen our success rate increase to 100%. We are now also able to direct the virtual tapes onto cheap storage and send them to multiple different sites. 

Finally, we can even replicate the backup tapes without the need to run the job again by using the built-in functions of the SAN.

Firstly, the solution made our backups way more reliable. Typically, we would have failures with the physical tape, and we would need to rerun the job. Our backup window is now smaller, and thus, we can process the same amount of data even faster.  

We have flexibility in terms of where the backups are stored, and as hardware changes, we are able to take advantage of new storage or even use our older storage to store the virtual tape backups. This decreases our costs, and we don't have to keep investing in new LTO technology.

With this solution, you can choose the LTO format. That means you can pick from LTO1 through LTO9 currently. All that really does is set up how big a tape folder will be. 

Inside that folder, you can set how large you want the file chunks to be.  This allows you to take the capacity of an LTO9 tape and break it down into smaller increments. This does a better job of taking advantage of the underlying storage that you are using. You can also create more than one virtual backup appliance.  Each appliance can have up to four virtual drives assigned to it.

I am not sure if this is a limitation of my physical hardware or if it is the software itself. However, I would like the throughput to be faster. Who would not like things to be faster? 

It would be nice if StarWind could come up with a best practice document for configuration. I had to do some playing around in my environment with test runs to get the configuration that really allowed for the maximum amount of throughput that I was going to get with the software. Once I had figured out what worked best, the solution was rather fast for backing up 30+ TB of data

We have been using this product for about eight months now.

The solution is very stable, and now our backups are always successful.

It can scale easily into PB - it just depends on the hardware you are storing the virtual tapes on.

It was great working with technical support. They took the time to address everything I needed to know.

Positive

We were using physical tape previously. It was taking too long to back up, and backups were failing. It was also hard to keep getting the tapes swapped out. Our tape hardware was aging out, so it was time to either spend the money on new physical hardware or go this route.

The initial setup was a bit complex with regard to understanding the terminology. However, using their support, we were guided through the process via a remote session. From there, I was able to tweak it as I needed without a problem.

We implemented the solution with the help of the vendor. Their expertise on the product was excellent.

Considering the ROI is hard as we were going to update our physical tape hardware. This solution is cheaper, even if you are considering buying new storage to store the backups on.

The pricing is surprisingly reasonable, and that includes the help to get it set up and running. They really want you to use their support get to get everything up and running.

In the VTL field, this was the only solution that I evaluated.

We use the solution for data backups and ransomware protection.

The solution is compatible with cloud storage platforms, such as Amazon S3. Also, it efficiently reduces the storage cost for archiving.

The solution's training process and online documentation could be more thorough.

We have been using the solution for four years.

It is a stable solution. I rate its stability a ten.

It is a very scalable solution. We can back up data from one terabyte to a hundred terabytes. I rate its scalability an eight out of ten.

The solution's technical support is good.

Positive

The solution's initial setup process is easy if you have technical expertise. It takes a couple of hours to complete and requires one executive for deployment and maintenance. Also, the operational expenses to maintain the product are minimal.

The solution is cost-effective. I rate its pricing as a three. We purchase its yearly license.

It is a perfect product if you are looking for a low-cost solution to archive your company's data backups. I rate it a ten out of ten.

We use StarWind Virtual Tape Library as a high-capacity storage system.

The most valuable feature of the StarWind Virtual Tape Library is the archiving to the AWS cloud.

I have been using StarWind Virtual Tape Library for approximately four years.

StarWind Virtual Tape Library has been stable.

The support that they provide is excellent. They have 24 hours a day seven days a week support, and all the engineers and the support staff know the solution very well.

The initial setup is straightforward. Additionally, it is easy to configure in a lab and to run tests, which is very important.

The pricing of the solution could be more flexible to meet the needs of smaller to mid-market size companies.

I rate StarWind Virtual Tape Library an eight out of ten.