Having used Commvault to perform a disaster recovery exercise, I can
offer my own personal experiences as advice you might consider when
looking at leaving NetBackup.

Examine the user interface. On the CV versions I have used (5.9 and
6.1), everything opens in a new window, and for whatever reason, it does
not remember your column settings. It has been accurately described to
me as "death by 1000 windows", and that's pretty annoying if you are
familiar with the NB interface on Unix, or you appreciate a healthy
array of powerful command line utilities. There is a fat client, and a
web interface which

Look closely at the DR model. If you follow their recommended models for
implementing DR and doing it properly, you will see how it compares to
the NB product, and if you deviate from their documented models, expect
a world of pain and suffering. The Achilles heel of commvault is the
MS-SQL database which is dumped to a flat file frequently and protected
to disk or tape depending on your needs. The main controller is called
the Commcell, and it is licensed by IP address, so you cannot bring up a
copy of the commcell on the same network at the same time.

As far as I know, you cannot recover all data types from your tapes
without first reconstructing the Commcell. The metadata cannot be
rebuilt from a pile of tapes like you can do with NB, so to protect your
environment you need to protect the active database and its dump files
with the highest priority.

Commvault has the features and function you expect from enterprise
backup sofware, and is currently in the same Gartner magic quadrant
square as NB, but should be evaluated before making a decision.

I personally like the NetBackup product better, for the UI and the DR model.

-Jon


> Well, I have a dilemma and need my fella NBU guys to provide me some
> ammo. My management is looking into alternative backup solutions. I am
> ok with looking at other vendors that specialize in one or two
> products…we are looking into CommVault and dare I say it…Microsoft’s
> Data Protection Manager. I saw a demo of DPM quite some time ago and
> almost instantly was not a fan. It is a total Microsoft support
> platform so it will work well with other MS applications. At the
> moment I cannot remember all of the down falls I thought it had but
> the few I can remember are:
>
> Won’t backup Oracle
>
> Won’t backup SAP
>
> Won’t backup ESX hosts
>
> And while I was in this demo, I drifted off since I really did not
> realize that management was seriously considering it. And as most
> Executive managers, they see the bottom line. Their main driving focus
> is the fact that since we pay so much for MOM and SMS, we would be
> getting DPM for free. GREAT! But my philosophy is you get what you
> paid for.
>
> So I reach out to all of you to help a guy out and start throwing me
> items that I can punch holes into DPM. I really, really do not want to
> support another Microsoft product. I beg all of you, please help me out.
>
> My environment is mostly MS servers, Oracle, SQL, VMware, SAP,
> Exchange, some UNIX.
>
> Thanks
>
> *Dan Cruice*
>
> Deloitte Technology Service
>
> Deloitte & Touche Tohmatsu
>
> Direct: +1 610-479-5179
>
> Fax: +1 610-479-6179
>
> E-mail: dcruice AT deloitte DOT com <mailto:dcruice AT deloitte DOT com>
>
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