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Bacula Enterprise vs Dell Avamar 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

Bacula Enterprise
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
28th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Backup (18th)
Dell Avamar
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
88
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Bacula Enterprise is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Avamar is 3.5%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Roni Alvarenga Ferraresso - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use with many useful plugins and extremely helpful technical support
A more user-friendly interface (GUI) can be developed. I would also like a mobile application to manage the Bacula Enterprise environment where I could perform backups and restores directly from my cell phone or tablet. Relying solely on a desktop is a bit frustrating as its GUI isn't exactly responsive. They need a clearer and faster restore screen to get the information about the data we want to restore; it's a little uncomfortable to find the files to restore on the current screens.
Rahul Sarangdhar - PeerSpot reviewer
Works excellently for on-prem backup but not the best for Azure backups
Avamar is not the best tool when it comes to taking Azure backups. Like Commvault, if Avamar can support VM-level backups for the cloud, that would make it a bit better. There is another Dell EMC tool called NetWorker, which is a bit centralized tool. If you deploy a storage node locally, you can use the same UI tool for central management, but in the case of Avamar, it needs to be deployed individually on a site, irrespective of whether it's small or big. So, if I have 10 sites, I have to manage 10 Avamar. That's a bit of a headache. The Dell EMC solution professionals who connect with the clients should suggest NetWorker to clients with multiple sites rather than Avamar. That's because NetWorker gives more centralized control, but they keep recommending Avamar, which isn't the best practice. There are no free or cheaper training plans. Unless your company is a partner with Dell, you don't get the student guide training, etc. Their administrator guide does not have all the information required for a new person. It doesn't cover the basics. The student guide is good, but it's not free. If you are a partner, only then it's free. Otherwise, there is a cost of $2,000 to $3,000. For people who are new to Avamar, there should be some resources to enable them to study on their own at least 50% of the basics. If I want to study Commvault, I get so many documents and resources to study, but in the case of Dell EMC products, there aren't any free resources. Only if you're a partner, the resources are available for you to learn. The user manuals and administrator guides are just for deployment. They aren't good for learning the basics for a fresher.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has extensive documentation and a very active community."
"Bacula is very solid, very stable, and very scalable."
"The most valuable features are the special plugins such as SAP HANA databases, Microsoft SQL, and various types of virtualization."
"It brought many advantages - such as the learning curve being very light."
"It can be used in virtually any environment we have onsite."
"Bacula is pretty stable."
"It is easy to scale Bacula Enterprise even if your system is growing tremendously in data and servers."
"It works great and it provides you with several standard tools to restore your backup, even after a big failure."
"It is a very complete product."
"The source site replication feature is valuable."
"We love the instant recovery functionality. It's very useful."
"Dell Avamar has helped our organization by allowing us to do backups."
"It is a cost-effective solution."
"The setup is very easy."
"The initial setup is easy."
"Avamar has long been the best in its class, but that's changing as new solutions emerge. However, Dell has traditionally been a leader in deduplication and compression. Avamar enabled us to shift data from on-premise local appliances to data centers and multi-tenant infrastructure. That's a powerful feature. because customers can back up to the cloud without upgrading o high-capacity links or congesting their backups."
 

Cons

"Easier setup and configuration, perhaps including a GUI, would be an improvement."
"Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability."
"The initial setup could be a bit easier."
"We would like to see an improvement in the functionality of the GUI."
"Bacula needs a graphical user interface because, for administrators, the command-line interface is okay, but for the average user it is not very easy."
"We are looking for a unique interface that can rule both enterprise and open source editions. Such a thing does not yet exist."
"A more user-friendly interface (GUI) can be developed."
"It could improve its interface or offer a specific screen for the manager of the company."
"There are limitations when trying to use this solution with Hyper-V."
"The reporting should be improved, as we currently have to use another tool for that purpose."
"We'd like to see something that could also work with Unix servers and physical servers to have a unified solution that works with everything."
"Avamar is not the best tool when it comes to taking Azure backups. Like Commvault, if Avamar can support VM-level backups for the cloud, that would make it a bit better."
"The configuration and expansion aspects of the solution need improvement. They're complicated and don't really integrate well."
"The UI is not easy to use. There are other products such as Veeam that are easy to use for the end-user which is why they are moving away from Avamar or Networker."
"It's an expensive solution."
"The tool's interface is very much in a spreadsheet format...reporting is an area with shortcomings requiring improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is an open-source solution."
"We have a perpetual license."
"The solution is costly."
"It is easy to use."
"The cost of the solution is very expensive."
"It's an expensive tool"
"Dell Avamar is expensive."
"The solution is expensive."
"Dell's pricing structure is not overly expensive."
"The price of this product should be lower."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
University
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Bacula Enterprise?
Bacula is more expensive than various other solutions. It’s almost completely commercial now. Products like Veeam software are much more expensive.
What needs improvement with Bacula Enterprise?
Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability.
What is your primary use case for Bacula Enterprise?
The last scenario in which I used Bacula was for a customer who needed some open-source tool which could support encryption at that time. We managed to convince the customer to use Bacula to deploy...
What's the difference between Dell EMC Avamar and Dell EMC NetWorker?
From the very beginning, Dell EMC NetWorker considers users and those who might potentially become users. In terms of both pricing and setup, this product offers an experience that is significantly...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell EMC Avamar?
I don't currently have detailed knowledge about the pricing, however, it is geared towards enterprise businesses and might be on the higher side.
What do you like most about Dell Avamar?
Easy to configure and highly reliable for backup.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Avamar
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA, SwissCom, Navisite, Turner Studios, Bank Austria, Caixa Bank, SdV Plurimedia, Leibniz University Hannover, Zeta Global, Tricore, NetLog, Siemens, LocaWeb, wbsGo, itesys, Queens School of Computing, Escrypt.
Dodge County, St Laurence's College, FieldCore (a GE Company), Comanche County Memorial Hospital, Getronics, Lewisville Independent School District, EnvisionRxOptions, Cincinnati Bell Technology Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about Bacula Enterprise vs. Dell Avamar and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,640 professionals have used our research since 2012.