Branko Cirovic - PeerSpot reviewer
Storage Engineer at Comtrade Group
Reseller
Top 5Leaderboard
Robust reliability tool ensuring high availability and disaster recovery for virtualized environments
Pros and Cons
  • "It eliminates the need for complex compliance requirements, making it a highly effective solution."
  • "The primary site lacks adequate equipment, such as power backup and cooling, which can lead to downtime during issues like power outages or overheating."

What is our primary use case?

Our initial deployment of VMware's Site Recovery Manager in conjunction with PostgreSQL for automotive sales, and also involved integrating SRM with HP's triple storage systems. It leverages background storage replication to ensure stable and reliable business continuity.

What is most valuable?

Stability and ease of installation, along with straightforward maintenance through the graphical user interface, make this solution a practical choice. It eliminates the need for complex compliance requirements, making it a highly effective solution.

What needs improvement?

The primary site lacks adequate equipment, such as power backup and cooling, which can lead to downtime during issues like power outages or overheating.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been working with it for six years now.

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What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is a highly reliable solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's important to note that the scalability of the solution should align with the customer's needs. If they anticipate increased workloads and data, they can easily scale up their storage systems. Site Recovery Manager simplifies this process, as it doesn't necessitate extensive reconfiguration, instead, it involves adding or extending data links in the replication groups, making it a straightforward and manageable process. It is well-suited for mid-sized and small companies that don't have extensive data replication needs. It's a practical choice for businesses in need of a reliable and scalable disaster recovery solution that matches their specific requirements.

How are customer service and support?

VMware offers excellent support for its products, and we haven't encountered any noteworthy issues or negative experiences in our interactions with their support team.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

In addition to our existing setup, we use backup software, Veeam, for replication on the disaster recovery side. With Veeam, we replicate virtual machines from the primary site to the secondary site. It is particularly advantageous because it doesn't require the same storage type on both the primary and secondary sides, which gives us flexibility and allows us to mix and match storage types if needed. One of the key benefits of Veeam is its ease of management, making it a valuable resource for replication. I believe it has a promising future, especially for handling data replication in various sectors. We also employ Veeam in the banking system to replicate data from different strategies across multiple departments. Its performance in replicating virtual machines is superior to SRM. The choice between SRM and Veeam largely depends on your storage environment and replication needs.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was easy and straightforward.

What about the implementation team?

The implementation process typically involves setting up VMware, configuring virtual machines, creating storage blocks, and installing the necessary components. For VMware to work seamlessly with the storage, a connector from the storage vendor is installed within the VMware environment, and once this is in place, replication can begin. In cases where there's a substantial amount of data to replicate, and the customer lacks a robust network link between sites, a physical transfer of data is undertaken. This involves physically moving storage devices from the primary site to the DR site, initiating the replication process, and then returning the storage to its original location once replication is completed. The replication process usually takes around two weeks, which is considered suitable for customers with relatively uncomplicated needs. For smaller customers with ten machines or so, replication is organized into groups based on different data sources on the storage system. Implementation requires the involvement of one or two technical experts who are well-versed in the equipment and storage systems. Monitoring the system is primarily the responsibility of the customer, with one or two IT personnel overseeing the process. Email notifications are often set up to keep track of system performance and any issues that may arise.

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

It is reasonably priced, and its cost hasn't been a significant factor in our implementation. We utilize various licensing options, but we typically purchase licenses upfront, avoiding monthly or yearly payment structures. We often opt for multi-year agreements, and if technical support isn't required, it allows us to maintain the same number of virtual machines and central traffic capacity.

What other advice do I have?

If you're dealing with a more stable and homogeneous storage environment and have technical reasons to favor SAN, then SRM, which is tightly integrated with the storage vendor, may have some advantages. Veeam is a better solution when you have a mix of heterogeneous storage types, multiple sites, and diverse data replication requirements, as it operates independently of the storage application. For larger customers, such as those in the banking sector with diverse storage systems and extensive data replication needs, Veeam might be preferred. While it might have a slightly higher price point compared to SRM, it offers more flexibility and scalability. SRM, on the other hand, is well-suited for smaller customers with simpler storage environments and a smaller number of servers. It's more straightforward to configure and manage in such scenarios. Overall, I would rate VMware SRM ten out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
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Naunton Cheesman - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant at Cloudstratex
Real User
Top 5
Stable, useful, and offers great technical support
Pros and Cons
  • "The thing I like the most about SMR is the reduced cost of management."
  • "VMware SRM lacks certain functions that other platforms have, such as better prioritization of allocation of resources and Boot profiles."

What is our primary use case?

We use SRM to invoke DR and to move workloads across the DR side.

What is most valuable?

The thing I like the most about SMR is the reduced cost of management.

What needs improvement?

VMware SRM lacks certain functions that other platforms have, such as better prioritization of allocation of resources and Boot profiles.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using VMware SRM for a long time, almost ten years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's a good and stable product. They do a lot of testing.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I think it's scalable. When you work for big organizations, I don't think that's much of a problem. There are multiple and fairly large clusters. That's one of the ways that we reduce cost because we are building things like sequel clusters. Approximately 5,000 people use SRM at our company.

How are customer service and support?

The technical support is great. VMware staff help with deploying and testing. In terms of building storage clusters, metro clusters, stretch clusters across sites so that, you get all of the benefits of a local cluster, but they're deployed between the lines and the DR side. It's a fantastic technology and VMware provides you with their best people.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

Before VMware SRM, we were using Veritas Volume Manager and Veritas Replication Manager for stand-alone. When we went to virtualize, we moved to SRM. I did a lot of work with IBM PowerVM and it had some nice features. It had things such as better prioritization of allocation of resources and Boot profiles where you could put one VM across another so that it grabbed the resources. You could do things such as have thin DR VMs without much allocation of CPU or memory, and then as you boot them, they start to grab all of that automatically from all of the non-prod. Functions like that were quite good in Power VM, which aren't quite as present in the VMware world. PowerVM is extremely expensive to use and that's why everyone is shifting towards commodity computers.

How was the initial setup?

I'm an architect so I did not install SRM myself, but I think there were no issues with installing it since it's a pretty standard tool nowadays. It does not require much maintenance. We are still running some old versions of VMware as there was a challenge around Oracle licensing. We are moving the Oracle workloads off of it now and addressing the architecture to get rid of the copies of the legacy versions of VMware. 

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

SRM is quite pricey and the license is renewed annually. I think that they do a lot of ULAs, the universal license agreements, where you pay a set amount and get unlimited usage. That's how it usually goes with big companies. Occasionally, they do true-ups to work out how much you've got and whether ULA pricing is appropriate. It might be too expensive for smaller organizations.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?


What other advice do I have?

I would advise new users to start off with manual processes and document exactly what they want to come up with in the right order. Get your IT continuity plan defined very closely and with a great amount of detail. Then start to automate with your SRM tooling to make sure that things are brought up in the right order and ensure that if one service fails and you need to bring another one across for latency purposes, you really understand all of those requirements before you start to just implement SRM and marching on without really understanding how the services tie together and the dependencies between them.

Overall, I would rate SRM an eight out of ten.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Technical Services Manager at eBiZolution
Real User
Top 5
The solution is easy to deploy, has automatic recovery capability, and is stable
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature of the solution is the automatic recovery of the virtual machine if it goes down."
  • "The solution currently has a five-minute RPO, meaning if the VM goes down we can lose up to five minutes of data which is a big deal when it relates to database replication."

What is our primary use case?

The primary use case is for disaster recovery. We use the solution for two different sites, as well as our virtual machine backup. In a situation where one of our data centers goes down, our servers can go up on the other site.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of the solution is the automatic recovery of the virtual machine if it goes down. In the event the VM goes down, we can either power it up automatically or manually depending on how we have the solution configured. When configured to power up automatically, the copy in the VM will power up.

What needs improvement?

The solution currently has a five-minute RPO, meaning if the VM goes down we can lose up to five minutes of data which is a big deal when it relates to database replication. The solution can be improved by reducing the RPO time to zero.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is scalable. We only need to add a host whenever we want to expand our cluster.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward and user-friendly. Depending if everything in the network layer is okay, we can configure VMware SRM for both sites in less than an hour or less. The replication process will depend on the size of the VM, so if the VM is large enough, the replication process will take some time. However, the configuration of SRM is straightforward.

What about the implementation team?

The implementation was completed in-house.

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

We have a standard enterprise license for the solution.

The cost may be based on the number of simultaneous replication which is the limitation of the standard.

What other advice do I have?

I give the solution a nine out of ten.

The deployment and maintenance can be done by one engineer.

I am the consultant solution architect, and sometimes I am the deployment engineer.

I seldom ask for support from VMware because most of the problems are caused by bugs, which we can usually fix ourselves by consulting the knowledge base on the VMware website. However, there are times when the problem is at the hardware level and VMware is not at fault - for example when there is a bug in the VMware version used by the hardware vendor. In these cases, we need to ask for support from the hardware vendor.

VMware SRM is a great solution. I always recommend the solution because it is a native replication solution for VMware. Although there are other solutions such as Zerto, they may deliver a lower RPO in certain cases. I believe Zerto is a better solution than VMware SRM, but when it comes to functionality, and for regular customers, VMware SRM is enough.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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Yosevan Sinaga Sinaga - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Infrastructure Manager at TMLI
Real User
Top 5
A stable solution to run application and server functions, but lacking in threat-protection functionality
Pros and Cons
  • "We find the back up feature of this solution to be particularly valuable."
  • "We would like the patching management function of this product to be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We use this solution to run our applications and our server functions.

What is most valuable?

We find the back up feature of this solution to be particularly valuable.

What needs improvement?

We would like the patching management function of this product to be improved.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using this solution for around 10 years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have found this solution to be very stable so far.

How are customer service and support?

We have found that the technical support team are not always competent enough to help with our issues, and often have to escalate them.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

How was the initial setup?

We found that the initial setup for this product was quite easy.

What about the implementation team?

We implemented this solution using a third-party team.

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

The level of licensing required for this solution is dependent on the server instances in use.

What other advice do I have?

I would advise organizations who wish to use this solution, to ensure that their threat protection software is in place and up to date, as there isn't any threat protection embedded in this product.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Manager IT Security & Infrastructure at Currimjee Jeewanjee & Co. Ltd.
Real User
Top 10
Easy to set up with knowledgable support and good reliability
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution is scalable."
  • "Technical support can take some time to respond."

What is our primary use case?

It was working very well with VMware since it's a VMware product. We didn't have any issues. It was quite smooth when doing drills, when we were trying to recover VMs from other sites.

What is most valuable?

There's an option where you can test VM, when you can test the drill. That option was very valuable.

It's easy to set up. 

The solution is scalable. 

It is stable. 

What needs improvement?

Technical support can take some time to respond. We'd like a faster response. 

For how long have I used the solution?

In the previous year, we were using SRM, and then we shifted to another software called CR2. We're replacing SRM. However, we used SRM for a few years. It's been about four years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable. Its performance is reliable. There are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product can scale well. It's not an issue. 

We have three or four people on the solution right now.  They are mostly infrastructure engineers. 

We don't have plans to increase usage. 

How are customer service and support?

Support is good, although we would like them to be faster. 

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

We had a simple vertical setup. We have VMware engineers at our disposal, and their expertise made it easy.

The deployment took one to two days. It was not complicated. We only needed one or two people to handle the deployment and maintenance tasks. They are engineers and junior staff. 

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

We pay a yearly licensing fee. 

What other advice do I have?

We have some nodes which are still running VMware. We currently do have some nodes still running VMware like ESXi 7.0, however, not for production. It's right for testing purposes.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten. 

I'd recommend the solution as it is very stable and does the job. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Daniele Curzi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Engineer at Systematika Distribution
Real User
Top 10
An easy-to-setup tool for disaster recovery
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution can be deployed in a couple of hours."
  • "The product's dashboard is an area of concern where improvements are required."

What is our primary use case?

I use the tool in my company for business planning, not disaster recovery.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is a tool or software for disaster recovery.

What needs improvement?

It is important to understand that Broadcom's acquisition of VMware is one of the major problems attached to the solution right now to understand what needs improvement in the product.

The product's dashboard is an area of concern where improvements are required.

The solution's technical support needs to improve since the support team takes too much time to respond when my company contacts them.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using VMware SRM for three to four years. I use the solution's previous version.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

Three engineers in my company use the product.

How are customer service and support?

I have communicated with the solution's technical support. I rate the technical support a five out of ten.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

I have previously worked with products from other vendors like Nutanix. I still use Nutanix Acropolis in my company.

How was the initial setup?

The product's initial setup phase was not difficult.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model.

The solution can be deployed in a couple of hours.

What about the implementation team?

Many different people managed the product's deployment phase.

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

I rate the product price a five to six on a scale of one to ten, where one is a very high price, and ten is a very low price.

What other advice do I have?

I can't share my experience with the orchestration capability of VMware SRM since I am currently using the tool to test it in my environment. I haven't dealt with any real disaster scenarios in my company.

There is no requirement for any maintenance of the product at the moment.

I rate the overall tool an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Joshua Kurian - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Technical Architect at StarOne IT Solutions
MSP
Top 5Leaderboard
A stable solution that can be used for disaster recovery and replicating VMs from one site to another
Pros and Cons
  • "VMware SRM replicates the VM from one site to another, and it helps us orchestrate the powering of VMs and DR when the DC goes down."
  • "Currently, there is a limitation of consolidating only 15 sites per SRM."

What is our primary use case?

We use VMware SRM for disaster recovery.

What is most valuable?

VMware SRM replicates the VM from one site to another, and it helps us orchestrate the powering of VMs and DR when the DC goes down.

What needs improvement?

Currently, there is a limitation of consolidating only 15 sites per SRM.

Ransomware recovery or early detection could be incorporated into VMware SRM.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using VMware SRM for three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

VMware SRM is a stable solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

VMware SRM is a scalable solution. I work with mostly small and medium businesses.

How are customer service and support?

VMware SRM’s technical support is good.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

We previously used Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator, which is more suited for small businesses. It doesn't offer as much flexibility as VMware SRM. For namesake, it's a DR solution, but it cannot compete with VMware SRM.

How was the initial setup?

VMware SRM's initial setup is easy.

What about the implementation team?

Two people can install VMware SRM in two to three hours.

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

We pay a yearly licensing fee for VMware SRM, which is not very expensive.

The fee is for the solution's license plus support. There are two options. One is subscription-based, which would be for a one or two years term base, and the other one is perpetual with support.

What other advice do I have?

Just one person is enough to maintain the solution.

I highly recommend VMware SRM to other users.

Overall, I rate VMware SRM a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
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ChukwuemekaOnyemelukwe - PeerSpot reviewer
Infrastructure Administrator - Server, Storage & Virtualization at MicroAccess Ltd
Real User
Top 10
Has the ability to schedule, write and configure the recovery and scheduled steps
Pros and Cons
  • "Its capability to schedule, write and configure the recovery and scheduled steps, such that you don't have to come in and start manually trying to recover the entire machine. You just push a button to recover the VMware and everything is done."
  • "What I think can be improved is the data replication aspect."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use is for our client. It's a system integrator frame. I have clients for whom we manage their data centers. Or, we do their integration and implementation. Basically, we use it to replicate their virtual machines, their user site, and their company site, and maybe to configure it and schedule their recovery. We use it for doing recovery tests from time to time, quarterly or yearly, for some of our clients. To test for a situation whereby a danger or a disaster could be affecting their data that is being replicated. This is good to do. Periodically, we run those tests and recover those virtual machines, and they try to work from their recovery sites to ascertain that everything is okay.

What is most valuable?

What I like about VMware is its capability to schedule, write and configure the recovery and scheduled steps, such that you don't have to come in and start manually trying to recover the entire machine. You just push a button to recover the VMware and everything is done.

What needs improvement?

What I think can be improved is the data replication aspect. For example, I know of another repetition solution called RP for VM. I don't really know how to use it since I've never used it before, but I've read about it. I know its features and I've spoken to some IT practitioners who have experience with RP for VM, who work with Dell EMC, and they gave me the feeling that RP for VM is better than VMware replication technology. The argument is that RP for VM has the ability to get your application going even when there is a loss of connectivity. Whereas in VMware you have to have something like 50% connectivity for the configuration. So in that respect, RP for VM has that feature which makes it better than VMware solutions. I guess VMware should make sure they are on top of their virtualization and data replication solution, more than every other company.

Overall, I can't point to any other thing, apart from whatever feature makes some people think artificial DNE is better than the replication application and SRM. If they can just take care of that then I don't think there's anything else.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using VMware SRM for close to 6 years now.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would say that it's stable. I think everything depends on how you design and manage your environment. For example, when it comes to data replication on the disaster recovery side, part of the challenge that most of our clients have is the link between the production site and the APR site. Sometimes the link will be having challenges and data replication won't work for a few minutes, or something like that. But I don't really think it's an issue with the VMware solution. So, I don't really have challenges with it. If you properly take care of your environment the virtual machines will not have issues. In your scenario, maybe you didn't configure your cluster very well, or your GRS is not working properly, or some virtual machines are not giving results - then most likely you are going to have challenges.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I have not scaled it before so I am not able to give feedback on that.

The environments we have deployed it on are enterprise environments, like the fashion wear industry, dotcom companies, and some other companies also.

How are customer service and technical support?

The only time we've contacted VMware support was in a case where we had some virtual machines mistakenly deleted and they needed someone who was very experienced in VMware virtualization, someone who understood working from the command line in the process. They needed to do some troubleshooting from the command line. I was very new to VMware virtualization solutions at that point, so I had to contact support. But anyway, that was a long time ago, about 4 -5 years back, and I have not been in contact with them at support.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is not that difficult. I would not say it's difficult because you just experience it when deploying some VMware solutions, especially a replication plan. The first time it's not always easy. But once you get the hang of it and get it right the first time, then you don't really have issues. Such as, do you need to go there and provide a key? I wouldn't say it's that difficult - it's not so straightforward but it's not that difficult. It's not complex for me.

I've done the deployment for different clients. So I would say the first time was not easy. But, for me to do it right now wouldn't take time.

What other advice do I have?

My advice to people considering this solution is that they should just go ahead and get it. I think that is the best virtualization solution out there. Some people say Nutanix is better. I think VMware is the best. 

I would also advise making sure your virtual environment is well taken care of. I don't think there are any other challenges that you're going to have. It's necessary that when you see it side by side, to have an operations manager help you find problematic areas and possible issues you are going to encounter in the future.

On a scale of 1 - 10, I give it a 9.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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Download our free VMware SRM Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: February 2024
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Download our free VMware SRM Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.