Dell Avamar Reviews

We use this product for Windows and Linux servers, and we have both file and database backups stored on them. We use them at smaller sites, which are small offices that are located around the world.

The most valuable features are image backups and file backups.
Image backups are very good to use, since they don´t require a backup agent.

Technical support should be more knowledgeable.

I have been using Dell EMC Avamar for more than 10 years.

The newest version is not very stable, which is something that should be improved.

We have perhaps 70 clients/server and have not tried to scale beyond that. We have about 40 users in total and do not plan to increase our usage at this time.

The quality of technical support varies. Sometimes they are very good, and sometimes they are not. They should be faster and more knowledgeable.

We also use Dell EMC NetWorker.

I was not involved in the initial setup but from what I understand, it's pretty simple.

There are five of us in the technical team who deploy and maintain our solutions.

The price of this product should be cheaper.

This is a product that I can recommend for small sites without anything special.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

We are system integrators who are selling backup solutions, and Dell EMC Avamar is one of the products that we implement for our clients.

I had come across it for backing up laptops and VMware but previously, I have had clients using it to backup system machines like AIX, Solaris, and others. Slowly, people are moving away from those.

Using Avamar for VM backup is pretty good, but we've used it for other purposes as well.

It works quickly and is very stable.

The screen design is a bit back-dated.

The reports are not very presentable.

The price of this product should be lower.

We have been working with Dell EMC Avamar for a few years.

This is a very stable product.

Avamar is quite scalable.

With respect to technical support, sometimes you get a good technician or a good engineer, and you can get the problem resolved pretty fast. If on the other hand, you get someone with a very heavy accent then you can speak for three hours and not understand what the other is trying to say.

We work with quite a number of backup products including Veritas NetBackup, Veritas Backup Exec, Dell EMC Networker, Dell EMC Avamar, and Rubrick.

The choice of product that I recommend depends on the situation and what the customer is saying. If they are not happy with one then I can suggest others that are good, too.

If my customer is already using an existing product then I will not recommend that they switch unless there are serious problems. If there is some heavy restructuring, for instance, because a previous person knew the environment very well, it will be difficult to take over. It is best if they have something very simple to manage.

In general, it is not easy to switch from one backup platform to another because of incompatibility.

My advice for anybody who is implementing Dell EMC Avamar is that it's always good to have a plan first. You want to know exactly what you have on-hand that you need to back up.

Overall, this is a good product. The stability and backup speed are very good but the GUI and reports are not something that a new user can get used to.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

In our company, we handle five different types of data from VME, Windows, SQL and other sources. The complete backup of forty lead machines is implemented daily using Dell Avamar in our organization. 

A huge storage space needs to be bought with Dell Avamar, even when it's unnecessary for an organization. The upgrades of the solution are highly time-consuming; it takes 10 to 12 hours to upgrade Dell Avamar or Dell IDPA. The aforementioned upgrade arrives once a year, but it takes an entire day in our company.

I have been using Dell Avamar for ten years. 

The product offers satisfying stability. The disc failures with the solution are usually replaced within the next way with Archwap discs, and it doesn't affect the stored data. 

The solution can be easily scaled. When your solution is running out of space, you need to apply for a new license and it can be obtained in multiples of 12 TB options. Only one professional in our company uses the solution to manage the IDPA backups. 

Our company has availed tech support, they are quite helpful and efficient. The maximum turnaround time I have witnessed, depending on the issue, is two days; otherwise, the support team sorts my issues in minimal time. I would rate the tech support an eight out of ten. 

Positive

The solution isn't easy to deploy. Dell IDPA comes with numerous tools demanding several configuration requirements. Storage and index manager are inputted in separate VMs. There are multiple components during the initial deployment of Dell Avamar, but client migration and workflow onboarding can be implemented in a straightforward process. Agents need to be stored and new connections have to be found as part of Dell Avamar's deployment. 

The initial setup of Dell Avamar took about three months in our organization. The aforementioned long duration was due to the need to deploy the solution separately for backups and DR purposes and also for arranging network logistics. I deployed the solution with assistance from a Dell partner. 

It's an expensive tool. 

In my experience, Dell solutions are more user-friendly than Commvault. The deployment and management of Dell products are a lot easier than Commvault. There are a lot of complexities in Commvault, but the solution has multiple great features, including troubleshooting. 

The solution's ease of use simplifies the disaster recovery processes in our company. Once implemented, Dell Avamar performs as a complete solution. The advanced DR backup from varying locations is easy to recall using Dell Avamar.  

The backups are performed by the solution with superior stability. The product is easy to manage as frequent troubleshooting is not required and reliable backups are procured. 

The interface of the tool was quite bland previously; it was a Java console, but recently, it got upgraded to a WIP console. The WIP console is easy to comprehend and navigate in Dell Avamar. The product is more expensive when purchased as a stand-alone solution, but with Dell IDPA, the cost is reduced significantly as a suite of tools. With the IDPA bundle, a user pays for only the features used. Dell Avamar requires pre-purchase of the entire storage.

For example, with Dell Avamar, you might need to purchase 36 TB storage when you only require 16 TB. Dell IDPA offers a huge storage device, and payment needs to be made as per the license procured. I have a 96 TB storage solution with Dell IDPA, but I am licensed to use only as much as required; if I am using 12 TB, the cost for only 12 TB needs to be paid. I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. 

Potential customers should be aware that the solution is initially provided with 96 TB storage and can possibly be scaled further. I haven't faced any downsides or setbacks with the solution; it's quite easy to use.  

As solution providers, we provide solutions to meet the objectives and goals of customers. We provide a general global architecture and the right solution that will solve a customer's problem and meet the goal at the fixed cost. If the customer doesn't mention a specific provider, then to meet the goal, we use the provider that we have to.

It's a good solution.

The management of this solution is a little bit difficult for IT administrators. They have to be trained before going through the system. 

We have been using Dell EMC Avamar for two to three years. 

We haven't worked on the extension or scalability of Dell EMC Avamar. We didn't find it fairly straight forward. When we have to upgrade or scale it, a lot of things don’t fit.

Dell EMC Avamar is hard to manage because of the support. It’s very difficult to get support. Our solution is complex which makes it more difficult to get an answer from them. We have multiple vendors in our environment. Support only looks at their own solution and not the solution as a whole. It would be easier if our whole infrastructure was Dell EMC. It’s very difficult to get help with troubleshooting. When you have an architecturally multiple-vendor solution, like we do, it’s hard to find a solution to the problem. It’s normal that they only focus on the part that corresponds to their company, but I would like for them to look at the environment as a whole.

I did not find the setup to be fairly straightforward. There are a lot of things that don’t fit when we try to upgrade or scale it. We have to break every chain and reduce it from scratch.

It's difficult to manage the Dell EMC Avamar template, so we try to avoid that program. The return process, when there was no space and we had to create some space, was very time-consuming. There are solutions that are simpler than Dell EMC Avamar.

I would rate Dell EMC Avamar a six out of ten. 

From my IT experience, there are much simpler solutions than Dell EMC Avamar for management and recovery. Dell EMC Avamar would not be my first choice.

We recently stopped using this solution but it was being used to back up our servers and client machines.

We were using an on-premises deployment.

It was very simple to deploy the solution to the client that wanted to backup.

It was challenging to back up our Exchange database, which is one of the reasons we did not continue using this solution. It was very tough, and a case of having to contact the Microsoft Partner Network.

Technical support needs to be improved.

We could not integrate this solution with our tape backup.

This is a stable product.

We had about one hundred users on the platform.

I would not rate technical support high for this solution. We had a problem and nobody could be specific about the issue, or what it is that we needed to do in order to resolve it.

Technical support could not resolve the issue that we had in terms of integrating with tape.

We were not able to back up the Exchange database with this solution. In the end, we had to discontinue using it. We switched to EMC Data Domain, and the cost was one of the factors that influenced our decision.

Our in-house team implemented this solution, although I was not part of the process so I do not know the details.

This is a solution that I recommend. It is a good product. It's stable, it is easy to deploy, and the visibility of the backup and restore is good.

If I had my way then we would be using this solution for other applications and we would be running them side-by-side as a comparison. 

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

Our primary use case for Dell Avamar is backup and verification.

Dell Avamar has helped our organization by allowing us to do backups. We can tell machines to do backups in the application.

The most valuable feature for me is direct activity.

This solution could improve by introducing daily verifications and another repository.

I have been using this solution for about two years.

I would rate the stability of this solution a seven, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

I would rate the scalability of this solution a five, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

My impression is that their technical support is quite good.

I would rate the initial setup process a five, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

My impression – and that of some other people – is that this solution is expensive.

I would recommend this solution to other people. 

I would rate this solution as a whole an eight, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

Dell EMC Avamar is used for backups and data recovery.

Setup and deployment of Dell EMC Avamar is complex. It requires expert engineers. Making its setup easier is something that could be improved.

Dell EMC Avamar is stable, especially because it's been around for a very long period of time.

We are preparing ourselves for a big project for the Ukrainian Railways, and I found that a lot of railways worldwide, e.g. in the US, England, and other countries in Europe, use Dell EMC Avamar as their backup solution. It is stable.

Dell EMC Avamar is a scalable product.

Technical support for this product is good.

Installing this solution was not easy. It requires engineers with expertise for a successful setup.

Deployment of Dell EMC Avamar is not easy.

We sell Dell EMC Avamar, but we have not sold that many, just several. We've been partners of Dell for a long period of time, so we have the partnership for Dell EMC Avamar, and we can sell it at anytime, but we don't have much expertise on the product. We sell it worldwide and it was not so difficult to sell because it met corporate standards, e.g. for companies in the same level as Ernst & Young, Xerox, Proctor & Gamble, Philips, etc.

We have not been certified to deploy this solution on the Cloud, but we're looking into this.

In general, when you look at the spec sheet for Dell EMC Avamar, it's a very good product.

We're looking forward to trying this product's isolated backup feature.

For the deployment and maintenance of this product, at least two engineers are required. We only have several clients using it, and they received the product from us, but it didn't require installation because the installation was provided remotely by the headquarters.

We sell backup software from Symantec, Dell, and Commvault. Our company doesn't have engineers certified in Dell EMC Avamar, however, because it is a difficult product. There's a lack of customers as well, so we didn't train and we didn't have our engineers certified for it.

Dell EMC Avamar is a product I can recommend to others.

I don't remember exactly the licensing policy for this product. You have to pay for it for three years, then you also have to pay for support after a certain period of time, but I'm unsure.

I'm giving Dell EMC Avamar an eight out of ten, because it's very good, but it's not easy to deploy.

The solution offers good storage.

The product is very stable.

I have found the product to be scalable. 

The pricing of the solution is pretty good and not too expensive. 

The interface is great.

The documentation on offer is very helpful and thorough. 

Overall, the solution is good right now. I can't think of where I have seen any missing features. 

The solution, in the future, should offer support for mobile. 

I've been using the solution for more than 10 years.

The stability, in general, has been great. There are no bugs or glitches. It does not crash or freeze. It's reliable and the performance is good. 

The scalability of the product is good. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so. 

I don't directly use the support services on offer. If I have questions, I tend to direct that to the developers, and not Dell.

I'm also familiar with Dell DataDomian, which I also work with. 

As long as you follow the implementation directions, it's not too bad. 

While I didn't directly purchase it myself and was not involved in the licensing process, it's my understanding that the cost is reasonable and the pricing is good.

I'm a freelancer and an EMC instructor.

I'm not an expert in the solution, however, for me, it's been a very positive experience. 

I'd advise potential new users to pay attention to the details and to follow the implementation instructions. If you do that, you'll be fine.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten.