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Cohesity DataProtect vs Microsoft DPM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

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

Cohesity DataProtect
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
8th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Backup (6th)
Microsoft DPM
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
27th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Cohesity DataProtect is 3.5%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft DPM is 1.2%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Giovanni Golinelli. - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use, offers good scalability and responsive support
The deployment depends on the environment. Deploying on VMs is relatively simple. But for most of our customers, we implement physical clusters with at least three configured hosts using the existing model. So, it depends on the setup. Implementing DataProtect itself wasn't particularly challenging. One key requirement for successful DataProtect deployment is proper network configuration. If the network setup isn't right, you won't achieve optimal performance. We have developed a service for some of our customers where they implement an appliance or physical cluster of Cohesity at the customer site. Then, we use cloud clustering to replicate, and even in production, a second copy of the protected data. And in some cases, we have developed some disaster recovery procedures using Cohesity.
RifkanHasan - PeerSpot reviewer
Backup and recovery that is stable but support is no longer in existence
The DPM is pretty good, but when it comes to external devices, you can't back up to the external device. It's a huge drawback because once everything goes down, it goes down fully. We can't take a snapshot and take it outside, which is a problem. Also, when it comes to recovery, the recovery process doesn't work properly. It doesn't recover. One of our drives failed and when we wanted to recover it from the other drive, it never worked. So, we couldn't recover the data. Recovery of data if the server goes down, is not very good. The DPM is good apart from the support services. We were told that the support was no longer in existence, which is why we are looking for another provider. In the next release, I would like to see backup to external devices, so it can always restore the backup and we can take it externally and store it somewhere that it is off-site and archived. Currently, it does not allow us to do that because it is required to be in one location.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Within the system, we have rule-based access control, single sign-on, multifactor authentication, and basic identity and access management features."
"The initial setup is easy."
"The product is easy to put in place. All backups are done very quickly. It's easy to perform restores. What I prefer in the product is its simplicity. There are no useless settings to define, and everything is ready after the initial setup."
"By using their Helios Cloud service, you have all your clusters, no matter where they are located, in one web portal."
"We can run test scripts on production data."
"The most valuable feature is ease of use."
"Cohesity is a cost-effective storage designed for secondary or archival data. It also integrates well with a number of other systems, like VMware, Pure Storage, or AWS with its large array of APIs available to the user."
"The most valuable features of Cohesity DataProtect are SpanFS and the handling of hybrid workloads."
"The most valuable feature is the recovery."
"The most important feature is that it's easy to use."
"Its capability to give a BMR for all the workstations that I want to connect to."
"The automated procedure is quite good for us, as it is able to capture all of the information that we require."
"One of the most effective features of Microsoft DPM is its integration with the entire Microsoft ecosystem."
"The most valuable feature is that DPM has an index so individual files can be searched."
"The user interface is very good. The reporting and monitoring features are also good."
"I could back up all the stuff we had, even the VMs we have for Hyper V."
 

Cons

"The support is pretty bad."
"I would like to see Cohesity have the ability to do a file level restore from a Windows server, which is storing data on dynamic disk."
"The rack mounting instructions did not appear to be correct, but we were able to overcome it."
"The solution's dashboard or UI can be enhanced and made more user-friendly than its competitors."
"It would be great to add SQL ​Object Level restore, so user objects, tables, etc. can be restored without having to restore the entire DB."
"I would like to see the management of multiple nodes inside a tenant. If you want to manage a Cohesity environment, you either go on a per-node base, and you can hop from one node to the other, or you need to implement their SaaS capability but it always needs an internet connection. We would really like to have some kind of local management entity so that we can see all the Cohesity nodes in a customer environment and manage those nodes centrally. That's something that we would really like, and they are really working on it."
"The product is still young and is continually improving. There have been a couple of buggy releases in the software that have caused us minor issues, so possibly some better QA before releasing would prove to be useful. We have also been inquiring about new app and functionality via the Marketplace that was teased months back but has yet to come to fruition."
"We have Oracle databases running on Linux servers in our environment and we have found the Oracle backups were quite complex to setup."
"It needs portability for other vendors. It is good for backing up Microsoft servers, but it doesn't support third-party solutions such as Oracle Database. It depends on Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy, especially for Hyper-V, which has a lot of problems. They should enhance the Volume Shadow Copy functionality. Its reporting should also be better. Reporting is too weak in DPM."
"The data tagging feature needs improvement. The solution could be a bit more intuitive in certain aspects."
"You have only a few settings and if you change them for some special configurations, it's very difficult."
"Compatibility and integration with other products needs improvement."
"The user friendliness could be improved."
"Management reporting could be improved."
"The user interface can be improved quite a bit."
"It would be better if it integrated seamlessly with open source and competitor products. In the next release, I would like to see some data governance frameworks. It should have support features for data integration and data replication like Veeam. Right now, we are also using Veeam for certain scenarios."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing model is impressive and very effective."
"Licensing is per node and per protected terabyte. You will also pay 10-15% annually for support."
"The solution's pricing is in the mid-range, where it's neither costly nor cheap."
"The tool's licensing costs are yearly. It is cheaper than other backup solutions."
"We purchased support from Cohesity to ensure that should we face an issue, we don't have to deal with different service providers."
"The tool's pricing is average."
"Ensure that you understand the per TB licensing model. Also, Exchange backups are not native to Cohesity and require Kroll."
"It has reasonable pricing, and we know they can give discounts. If you look at the primary pricing or the list pricing, it conforms to the market pricing, but you have to have a discount on it. Otherwise, it is way too expensive."
"I think Microsoft DPM pricing is reasonable. The additional costs are related to storage and technical support."
"Microsoft DPM is a free solution. However, we pay approximately $3,000 annually for support."
"Microsoft DPM can be considered as an expensive solution for smaller or medium enterprises, but we have been satisfied with the price structure as it is fixed and it offers a variety of useful features"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
41%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cohesity DataProtect?
Several features enable us to perform fast recovery, such as instant fast recovery. All our virtual machines protected with the product can be quickly restored to another healthy environment with m...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cohesity DataProtect?
Typically on-premises nodes/clusters are deployed for primary backup (to enable instant mass restore) so price will be dependent on chosen OEM and capacity required. MSPs like us utilise PPU licens...
What needs improvement with Cohesity DataProtect?
While there are improvements to be made, such as providing support for older systems like IBM iSeries and tandem systems from HP, the solution overall shifts from older methods to modern practices....
What do you like most about Microsoft DPM?
This solution helps us to manage all of the operations across servers and different workstations.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft DPM?
Microsoft licensing is complex, especially for enterprise or data center solutions. However, it's not more complicated compared to other competitors and the market is well balanced.
What needs improvement with Microsoft DPM?
I am not sure if I am competent enough to address areas for improvement in Microsoft DPM.
 

Also Known As

Cohesity
DPM, Data Protection Manager, MS DPM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Tribune Media
Medical Park, Centropol Energy, a.s., NCFE, D & H Distributing, Metalor, Colosseum, a.s., Sanitas S.A., Icebreaker
Find out what your peers are saying about Cohesity DataProtect vs. Microsoft DPM and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,190 professionals have used our research since 2012.