David,

Thanks for the insight.

I too believe that *SM is the best "enterprise class" backup product currently
available. The biggest issue we're having is with the Novell client, the 3.7
version memory leak caused the Novell servers to crash, did not restore with the
proper rights,
the 4.1 version scheduler doesn't work. Unfortunately, Novell is where we do
most of our restores so the problem is magnified.

My management has requested information on the advantages/disadvantages of the
available backup solutions and I appreciate the non-sales centric feedback.

Regards, Tim




                    "David M.
                    Hendrix"             To:     ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
                    <dmhendri@FED        cc:
                    EX.COM>              Subject:     Re: Comparison of Backup 
Products
                    Sent by:
                    "ADSM: Dist
                    Stor Manager"
                    <ADSM-L AT VM DOT MA
                    RIST.EDU>


                    03/28/2001
                    10:19 AM
                    Please
                    respond to
                    "ADSM: Dist
                    Stor Manager"






Tim,

We've been through a few iterations of evaluations of these products.  We
recently added Netbackup along with TSM as our supported software
platforms.  We run on HP, Sun, Win2K and IBM platforms, use EMC and HDS
disk arrays, EMC switches (okay - McData) and use 3590B/E, 9480 and LTO
devices (and hopefully a Gator 64K soon).

Here is my take: they are both good products and we have a guidline design
document for deployment and implementation for each product paired with
whatever software.  However, we have discovered that from an enterprise
class deployment, TSM is clearly the winner.  Implementing failover
servers, messaging (integration into our ops VPO screens), and support are
the key issues we have run up against.  We have also implemented the
Veritas HSM product for our imaging process.  We were very disappointed
that the product is not well integrated with Netbackup (it uses media
manager but things like the vault product and failover do not work with the
HSM product - TSM HSM would have been a much better choice but I was
overridden).

Veritas is a solid product and we are having teething pains.  The cure
always seems to be "Veritas Consulting Services".  These aren't cheap.
There are third party companies that can help you as well and can sometimes
provide more functionality than what Veritas would implement (I know one
company that does Vault - their own - plus production SOP work ups).

Quality of code is probably not an issue you'd like to switch to Veritas
on.  We have 21 TSM servers in production and all of our clients are tier 2
or 3 servers.  Considering the amount of data we push each day it's pretty
reliable.  Our tape drives have 50 times the # of problems as any code we
run.  And so, the grass is not greener on the Veritas side - it's the same
shade of brown.

David Hendrix
dmhendri AT fedex DOT com




Tim Melly <tim.melly.b AT BAYER DOT COM>@VM.MARIST.EDU> on 03/28/2001 07:13:45 
AM

Please respond to "ADSM: Dist Stor Manager" <ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU>

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Subject:  Comparison of Backup Products


To All,

Due to the poor quality *SM code Tivoli has been releasing, and the
resultant
fallout at my site, I've been asked to investigate other backups solutions.
I'm
familiar with Veritas NetBackup but have not worked with any other backup
products. Does anyone have any experiences / information on non-*SM
products
that they can share.

Thx, Tim Melly
          Bayer Corp.