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Dell Avamar vs Dell Data Protection Advisor 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

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)
Dell Data Protection Advisor
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
26th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Dell Avamar is 3.5%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell Data Protection Advisor is 0.5%, down from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Mario Castillo - PeerSpot reviewer
Backup solution that improved our RTO and RPO
I would rate this solution 8 out of 10. It would be a 10 for me if there were more features for disaster recovery. For someone who wants to implement this solution, my advice is that they need advanced knowledge about the solution. It can't be implemented without technical experience.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"All the features in the system are highly valuable."
"Dell Avamar has a push upgrade feature that lets you simultaneously push updates to thousands of clients. I also found the self-service part of Dell Avamar helpful."
"The most valuable feature for me is the backup functionality."
"The most valuable feature for me is the backup functionality."
"The initial setup is easy."
"The solution's ease of use simplifies the disaster recovery processes in our company"
"Dell EMC Avamar has many valuable features. It's very stable and it's easy to manage."
"The product is good for backups."
"The initial setup is very straightforward. Deployment typically takes about one hour. You just need one person to handle the deployment process."
"I can increase the tool's licensing as per my requirement with no conditions applied."
"The reporting feature and the Dell's continuous improvement of the solution are the most valuable features. The solution not only supports Dell Power Products but also other products."
"This is a stable solution."
"The solution is easy to use, flexible and has a lot of out-of-the-box functionality. You can configure the dashboards or you can use a script. However, to fully utilize its capabilities you will want to use a lot of scripts which you will need advanced training. The reports can be customized for many things, such as chargeback billing."
"The product's ability to give predictions and advice on how to protect data is incredible."
"It generates very detailed reports, which makes things easier when it comes to IT auditing."
"It has a lot of stock reports. I believe over 300 canned reports, which for the most part meet a lot of generic needs."
 

Cons

"Performance can sometimes be affected when tools are utilized for tasks like backup or deep archiving."
"It is very scalable, and that's its claim to fame, but that also makes it hard to make changes. Anytime there is a large piece of software, changing that piece of software is harder. You've got a larger install base, so you can't just rapidly change. We also use another product called Veeam, and it has this new feature called Continuous Data Protection, which basically lets you get very close to the way the system was in time. We have a system or two up there on which we have set 10 minutes Continuous Data Protection. So, we can roll it back to whatever it was 10 minutes ago, 20 minutes ago, or 30 minutes ago. This feature doesn't exist in Avamar Data Domain. That's the one feature I'd like to see first."
"If there is a need to move the data from one backup solution to another, it might be difficult since there is no option for a straightforward migration."
"Some integrations are not in place, such as the email alerts, which are not compatible with Office 365 SMTP gateway."
"It would be better if we could integrate easily with other platforms."
"It's not the best solution for big databases."
"The management of this solution is a little bit difficult for IT administrators. They have to be trained before going through the system."
"Some customers need to back up to tape, but Avamar lacks support, so it costs a lot."
"There is a steep learning curve to use the interface and to create new reports, this could be made easier. If the solution could provide more drag and drop functionality to build more advanced reports that would be very helpful."
"Some minor adjustments could be made regarding the graphical interface and customization options."
"They should empower their customers with the ability to upgrade this solution as long as it's in the same major release."
"Customization of reports or creating new reports can be difficult. Users need to have a deep knowledge of SQL. 70-80% of customers can't seem to understand how to do it. They don't know how to address reporting. If Dell EMC could simplify it, it would benefit the end-user."
"Dell Data Protection Advisor's feature for data domain protection needs enhancement."
"The solution requires more integration with our other solutions. I know that they have full integration with VMware because it is also from EMC. However, we have to have better integration with Microsoft and Nutanix as well."
"It's a bit difficult for first-time users."
"The stability of the solution needs improvement for stand alone users."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Dell's pricing structure is not overly expensive."
"The cost is high."
"Avamar's pricing is quite competitive compared to other vendors."
"Dell Avamar is expensive."
"The solution is expensive."
"Its licensing is weird. It is not just the licenses; we also purchase hardware. With most software products, such as Veeam, Commvault, and Data Protector, there is no hardware purchase at the same time. Because Avamar and Data Domain are tied together, they have an integrated pipe. You can separate them, but basically, they're designed to work as a couple. Because the Data Domain backend is designed to do dedupe and compression, we get 60:1. When you count it, you count it as a straight compression, but of course, that's with dedupe and some other stuff. You have to buy the hardware, the licensing, and the software at the same time. So, it's not just software."
"It is easy to use."
"When it comes to competition the price is not what is important, it's not the problem."
"You have to procure the license when you are ordering or quoting for Dell Data Protection Suite (DPS). DPS is bundled with the suite and comes with a license. However, if you purchase NetWorker separately then you will have to procure the license for DPS separately."
"The product pricing has been satisfactory, particularly with the economy of scale in our agreement."
"If the customer has huge lineup of Dell Products then they receive discount on the pricing."
"The product is affordable."
"You need to make an upfront payment for three, five, or seven years and renew the licenses for support. We can do an annual maintenance contract with Dell. I would rate the product's pricing a six out of ten."
"For pricing, I would rate Dell 2 out of 5. It's affordable."
"It's not very expensive — I think the price is fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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.
What do you like most about Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The platform's most valuable features are data protection and retention.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The product pricing has been satisfactory, particularly with the economy of scale in our agreement.
What needs improvement with Dell Data Protection Advisor?
The product could be improved by addressing intermittent collector failures affecting status reports' accuracy. Additionally, enhancing bulk update capabilities for items like cost centers would be...
 

Also Known As

Avamar
DPA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Dodge County, St Laurence's College, FieldCore (a GE Company), Comanche County Memorial Hospital, Getronics, Lewisville Independent School District, EnvisionRxOptions, Cincinnati Bell Technology Solutions
Nielsen, Trek Bicycle, Cal-Israel Credit Cards
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell Avamar vs. Dell Data Protection Advisor and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.