I took a serious look at this product about a year ago ( v 2.1.4a).. 
Compared to Veritas:
Positives for syncsort
        - price
        - standard features which are add-ons with veritas (ndmp, san drive 
sharing)
        - very easy to install and get working
        - tech support over the phone was excellent
        - offsite tapes can be produced by 'twinning' the backup to two drives 
at backup
        time instead of duplicating later
        - catalog backup mechanisms can natively support spanning tapes.

Negatives against syncsort
        - I felt there was a fundamental model breakdown in Syncsort's 
implementation...
        It's multiplexing model is job centric. A job is a list of nodes/file 
systems 
        which are to be backed up. Streams within a job can be multiplexed 
concurrently
        to a tape. Streams can be created 1/client or 1/client file system 
(with upper 
        bounds). Multiple jobs will not stream to the same tape drive. Hence, 
maximum 
        performance will only be achieved by backing up multiple clients in 
large jobs. 
      However there are design issues that will force having many jobs - 
Exclusion 
        Filters, pre/post scripts, etc are all specified only at the job level.

        - The version I reviewed could not rebuild the catalog information from 
backup tapes. 
        If you lost/broke your catalog, you restore it from the catalog backups 
or you're
        out of luck

        - limited command line/scripting/customization ability when compared to 
NBU
        
        - The product starts a 'browser' which traverses a file system 
gathering meta 
        data information before the backup starts writing to tape. On a large 
(120G) 
        source code file system, this took 3-4 hours.   An option is available 
to 
        begin writing to tape immediately and do the meta data gathering 
concurrently. 
        However, when we tried this, the product spawned multiple browsers 
traversing 
        the file system, resulting in a severe performance problem.

        - File exclusion filters use a regex type syntax. This introduces 
platform 
        dependencies (eg '/' vs '\' in path names) which means that file 
exclusion 
        filters must be specified differently for each platform type. File 
exclusion 
        filters are specified at the job level (not for client nodes in the 
job). 
        
        - Tape management is job centric. The product stacks data on any 
available 
        'appendable' tape without regard to the retention period. 

        - When running a job that will create an 'offsite' tape, the tape is 
marked 
        'offsite' at the end of the job. Once marked offsite, the product will 
not use 
        that tape again, even to stack other offsite data on it. 

I would encourage all to take a second look at this product, as it would not 
surprise me
if SyncSort has resolved many of my issues since then.

As always, these views are my own, and do not necessarily reflect those of my 
employer.

Terry Green
Sr System Admin
Mitra Imaging
Waterloo Ontario Canada
tgreen AT mitra DOT com
        

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Marelas, Peter [mailto:MarelP AT AUSTRALIA.Stortek DOT com]
> Sent: Sunday, May 19, 2002 8:08 PM
> To: 'Lee Anne Pedersen'; veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
> Subject: RE: [Veritas-bu] alternative products
> 
> 
> Syncsort backup express is an alternative.
> 
> www.syncsort.com
> 
> Good competition keeps them honest.
> 
> Regards
> Peter Marelas
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lee Anne Pedersen [mailto:LeeAnne.Pedersen AT gov.ab DOT ca]
> Sent: Saturday, 18 May 2002 3:13 AM
> To: veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
> Subject: [Veritas-bu] alternative products
> 
> 
> Due to the ongoing headaches and poor customer service 
> experienced with 
> Veritas and NetBackup, administration is seriously 
> considering moving to a 
> different product. One being considered is Bakbone Software's 
> NetVault. 
> Does anyone here have any positive or negative experience 
> with it that they 
> could share with me?
> 
> Thanks,
> Lee Anne
> 
> 
> Lee Anne Pedersen
> LAN/Server Analyst
> 
> Alberta Corporate Service Centre (ACSC)
> DCS Delivery Team E
> Ph: 780-427-2504
> LeeAnne.Pedersen AT gov.ab DOT ca
> 
> This communication is intended for the use of the recipient 
> to which it is
> addressed, and may contain confidential, personal and or privileged
> information. Please contact us immediately if you are not the intended
> recipient of this communication, and do not copy, distribute, 
> or take action
> relying on it. Any communication received in error, or 
> subsequent reply,
> should be deleted or destroyed.
> 
> 
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