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Azure Backup vs IBM Spectrum Protect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Azure Backup
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
7th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM Spectrum Protect
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
16th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
149
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Azure Backup is 3.6%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Protect is 2.2%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Terry Tull - PeerSpot reviewer
Straightforward to set up and manage and allows us to monitor all backups in one place
I would rate the easiness of the initial setup as an eight out of ten. Setting up Azure Backup was pretty straightforward, especially if you follow the steps in the right order. It might seem a bit complex at first, but with experience, subsequent setups become easier. Planning is key to optimizing its effectiveness. Deploying Azure Backup typically takes around half an hour to an hour to set up one VM, involving creating a recovery services vault, defining a backup policy, and configuring storage options. For a more comprehensive setup including proper recovery planning, it might take a few hours. The key steps involve creating a resource group, and a recovery services vault, selecting a storage type, and defining backup policies. I deployed the solution myself.
Syed Habib - PeerSpot reviewer
Manageable and comprehensive and integrates robust backup features for core banking
It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dashboard from Browser Spectrum. This is why I am searching for another solution. The product also lacks any centralized graphical user interface (GUI), such as Jarek Pod, and I am limited to using a console-based text user interface, which my local partner handles completely.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Automation provides us more time to work on other tasks, avoiding repetitive tasks and saving hours that we can allocate elsewhere. This gives more free time for involvement in other activities instead of repetitive data pulling."
"With Azure Backup, you can readily make your environment if your setup somehow fails on the cloud or on-premises."
"It's very simple to configure which is very useful. It's not complex to configure it."
"The best aspect of the solution is its backup functionality."
"It's useful, it works, and it's fairly reliable."
"I have no issues with the stability at all. So I don't necessarily care about the stability of the product. I look more at whether or not can I recover. And I haven't had a failed recovery yet. I've got no failed recoveries of all my years."
"Azure Backup is very simple to use and user-friendly."
"I like that it's a stable solution and their support is good. I think Microsoft's commercial force is superior."
"Scalability: Our customers are able to grow the product without having to buy additional hardware, so it is very scalable."
"It has a lot more capabilities and functions than a lot of other products. Even though it is more complex, the reason is because it gives you a lot more features. This is what I prefer, especially for a long retention."
"Incremental backup is highly valuable as it allows for significant time and cost savings."
"The most valuable feature for data recovery in IBM Spectrum Protect is its database protection capabilities."
"All other products contain the same features, but when I'm backing up an IBM Power server I feel more comfortable with IBM Spectrum Protect because it's the same vendor."
"It is scalable beyond anything my customers ever aspire to."
"It scales well. We have grown here in the last year or two, and it has been relatively easy."
"Performance and recoveries are better. Our clients and customers are happier with the performance of it."
 

Cons

"I believe more options could be available to understand better what's happening in the system. Additionally, automating the client updates and connector updates would be beneficial. Updating the connector from time to time can be challenging, and it could be made more transparent and straightforward for users. Moreover, another drawback lies in the time it takes to test full data backup recovery. Deploying a full recovery takes longer. We need to allocate a longer period for complete data recovery to establish the environment again."
"The only thing I would say that could be improved is the reporting."
"Microsoft's technical support for Azure products could be improved."
"The solution should involve more redundancy types in the backup storage and support open-source OS."
"They need to improve the frequency of the backup. You can only backup one to three times a day. It would be better to back up continuously throughout the day."
"I would like to see more automation, integration, and security. The price could be better."
"To make it a ten, it should have the ability to extend the retention and to perform a copy of the data outside of the subscription - with no additional costs."
"Azure sometimes provides reliable recovery that can be slow for large-scale scenarios."
"We are still using TSM Manager for many of our projects to administer our platform because the gap was not resolved with the new Operations Center."
"For Spectrum Protect Plus, I would like to see more enhanced reporting features and integration with Spectrum Protect."
"We would like to see cloud integration."
"Restoring massive files is a very time-consuming process."
"I would like to see more technical training online. Sometimes, it is a little bit difficult to find, or that I do not really know what I am looking for as somebody who is starting off finding their learning curve."
"The solution could be more user-friendly and provide better monitoring. The monitoring should be improved first since it is a higher priority."
"Our new leadership has pushed us to go more toward the cloud, so we are definitely going to leverage anything we can in that direction."
"I think Spectrum Protect's interface is not so user-friendly, but the interface is not so friendly. Some of the functions are too complicated. I prefer a simpler solution."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of this solution is good, and it is one of the easiest things that you can sell Azure with."
"Customers prefer Azure Backup because it has a pay-as-you-go model, and they won't have to pay an upfront amount at the initial level."
"Azure Backup is a product that is priced at a cheap rate, and it is a great tool."
"The pricing of this solution is ok, but I'm expecting that the price will decrease in the future."
"It's around $10 to $15 per month per virtual machine, along with something extra based on the size of the data."
"We are paying about $100,000 USD per year, just for a couple of servers."
"Considering the fact that our company's enterprise-sized customers use the solution, the product's price is fine and is not on the higher side of the spectrum."
"Price-wise, it's similar to AWS."
"I don't have an idea about the pricing. They send that over to someone else, but I know that one of the issues they had was the licensing costs. I don't think they were happy with how they were charged."
"The solution's pricing is fair. Price-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten."
"The solution has a capacity based licensing, front and back-end license."
"That's a hard estimate. It depends on the licensing, the hardware, and other stuff, but it is fairly expensive. It is generally more expensive than other solutions."
"Going to IBM Tech University Conference saved me from making a major purchase of the wrong thing, which was very helpful."
"IBM provides an open license policy, which is more like a gentlemen's agreement."
"There may be an advantage to going with IBM in terms of pricing. They have a pay-as-you-grow policy, so there is no need to take one license for the entire datacenter. You can start with small licenses and then grow, and pay, as you use more."
"Regarding retro-compatibility of the product between versions, your data is always available and the ROI is unquestionable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Azure Backup differ from Veeam Backup & Replication?
Veeam has a version for Azure but there are organizations, like ours, that are considering moving to an Azure environment and wonder if Azure Backup is better than Veeam Backup and Replication (Vee...
What do you like most about Azure Backup?
Azure Backup is easy to configure and restore.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Backup?
Azure Backup is expensive relative to the value we get from it. I do not have specific details about the licensing cost as it falls under another department.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Protect?
For my company, the tool is affordable and reasonable, but most people don't know that. People only see one major price for the tool, which runs into millions, so they would always say that it is a...
What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Protect?
The technical team's service depends on where the support service is located. Some products are not included in IBM itself, but external companies are developing some solutions for IBM. I think the...
 

Also Known As

No data available
IBM TSM, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Russell Reynolds Associates, Somerset County Council, Kardem, PCL Construction
CERN, Einstein Healthcare, Nyherji, Allianz Australia, TZM, ABT Online, NCT, Kindred Healthcare Inc., Cobalt Iron, TransGrid, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Cash America, Piedmont Healthcare, RWGV, Arkansas Tech University, British Columbia Institute of Technology
Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Backup vs. IBM Spectrum Protect and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.