Veeam Backup Vs PHD esXpress

[ufo8mydog]

Hi all

I've been looking at VM backup options recently for vSphere. After messing around with our current solution (Commvault) it turns out that they are still using the old VCB framework according to this article:

http://www.backupcentral.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=259&Itemid=47

Things like mounting the restore to the proxy server first before restoring back to the SAN volume and no Linux file level restore are dealbreakers, so Commvault can't be considered a serious contender in this market segment at this stage.

It looks like the choice is therefore between Veaam Backup and PHD esXpress. Could current customers/vendors comment on the two solutions? The environment comprises of 12 sockets and growing towards 200 VMs (ranging from 10GB - 150GB). For example, if you could comment on:

1) Value for money. Which tends to be more cost efficient?

2) Backup and restore efficiency

3) Functionality/reporting/management tools

4) Consistency of restores

5) Any single points of failures or caveats/gotchas that should be taken into consideration?

6) Does the solution feel that it is of 'enterprise' or 'production' quality?

Basically some real life experience using the tool in a production environment would be great. The target is a hardware dedupe datadomain appliance so the dedupe function would be done in hardware.

[AntonVZhbankov]

Did not try esXpres myself, but as far as I read about it, price is very similar. Veeam Backup is about 500$ / socket, and esXpress 1k$ / host. With 2-socket hosts price is the same.

Both solutions are enterprise class.

Veeam Backup fully supports ESXi servers.

---

VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[TomHowarth]

That said on the quad quad cores I tend to utilize as host servers the cost of esXpress is 50% of the real costs of Veeam.

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author for the upcoming book "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780136083214]”. Currently available on roughcuts

[AntonVZhbankov]

>That said on the quad quad cores I tend to utilize as host servers the cost of esXpress is 50% of the real costs of Veeam.

Price for backup is 1k vs 2k.

AFAIK esXpress does not support ESXi, so you have to buy hard disks for full ESX. And 2 low-speed SATA disks for mirror will cost you 500$ (HP Configurator for BL685c G6), while Veeam can work with ESXi on USB flash.

So, in this case price is 1.5k vs 2k per host.

---

VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[Gostev]

There's another thread with the same discussion here

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1372948#1372948

[christianZ]

That said on the quad quad cores I tend to utilize as host servers the cost of esXpress is 50% of the real costs of Veeam

That's true, first time not reading the statement exactly.

[petedr]

Our point of view is to test as many solutions as possible to make sure you have the correct solution for your infrastructure.

If anyone has any questions about esXpress you can always email me or private message me.

Pete@esXpress

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[TomHowarth]

That is very diplomatic of you Peter. you been taking lessons of Mr Mittell LOL

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author for the upcoming book "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780136083214]”. Currently available on roughcuts

[petedr]

Thanks Tom, of course always following Alex's lead.

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[FlEric]

Before you made a decision, test the backup and restore speed. The backup speed of esXpress is in the traditional backup very fast but the restore is slow. A fast backup is nice but if you a in a emergency situation and you have to restore a e-mail server with a 500 GB disk and this needs a full day you wish you are somewhere else.

After some expierence with esXpress i like to say it is nice for a small enviroment but it is never a enterprise solution.

Regards

Frank

[qvantas77]

Not an enterprise solution??? Based on what?

Dont trash-talk a very good product when u cant explain whats bad.

//Johan

Not a PHD customer, a VEEAM customer

[AntonVZhbankov]

>Not an enterprise solution??? Based on what?

If it does not support all the enterprise products from VMware - it's not enterprise product. AFAIK esXpress does not support ESXi - I actually have some diskless ESXi's with Enterprise license.

So to use esXpress I have to buy some disks for each server and install ESX instead ESXi Embedded.

As for me this issue makes esXpress not enterprise solution till it start to support ESXi.

P.S. I'm not Veeam employee and even not Veeam customer. I still backup my VMs with VCB.

---

MCSA, MCTS, VCP, VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[petedr]

Frank and Johan,

If you have any questions or issues you want to talk about concerning esXpress you can always email me or private message me.

With restores we recently have added restores through the VBA for DeDup backups which removes esXpress restores from the service console limitations which definitely can effect performance.

Pete@esXpress

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[AntonVZhbankov]

Pete, could you please answer in public?

Do you support ESXi?

---

MCSA, MCTS, VCP, VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[petedr]

Anton,

There is nothing being hidden there our part, esXpress does not currently support 3i.

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[paulan]

Pete - so what about your earlier promises to deliver ESXi support by VMWORLD 2008? It is almost 2010 already, do you at least have beta of some kind by now?

[petedr]

Business plans change. If you want to talk about this further you can always email me or private message me.

www.phdvirtual.com, makers of esXpress

[FlEric]

@pete

You are right the restore is now in a VBA but this is only for the Dedup restore. A very nice feature of esXpress is still the traditional backup with delta files. You have a usable zipped file on the backup location and this was very simple and very usable in case of problems. But there is a big issue due to the restore speed of your system and in the past you announced, that esxpress will move the restore to a VBA instead of the console to improve the speed. But currently it is only for the DeDup Backup. If i like to have DeDup Backups i can also use VDR which comes from VMWare and working in the same way.

Regards

Frank

[AlbertWT]

Yes, it would be great if it can support ESXi 4

Kind Regards,

AWT

[pauliew1978]

I second that. Esxpress is a fantastic product but slow on restore in the console when not doing a dedup. I am caught because I need my vm's on tape so using fulls with compression is the only way I can go. Not only that but I dont want to have to install esxpress at the dr site before restoring. If there was someway of just downloading a special vm appliance that you could point to your phd files that sit on the vmnfs (once copied over from tape using veeam fastscp) and get past the restore speed barrier it would make the product truly awesome. DOnt get me wrong it IS an awesome product. But sitting in front of the virtual infrastrcuture watching an 800gb extraction take place from the compressed file at 15 mbps is annoying!. Especially when you have like 20 vm's totalling 3.5 tb to restore.

Actually I am doing my first full DR test at the company I work for in 2 weeks time so it will be interesting to see how long it all takes. I estimate I can do the extraction routines in about 33 hours. However my cunningplan is to run the extract routines in parallel on the three esx hosts which therefore should get me enough time.

If only there was some way of getting around that flipping throttling on the console arrrrgggg!!! it is literally the bane of my life right now and causing me a lot of undue stress. COme on vmware!! let me know how I can stop the console throttling! I only need to set it during a DR situation and then turn it off back to normal after recovery!