IBM Spectrum Protect Reviews

We are currently looking at doing a refresh for the PowerNAS for Spectrum Protect and getting Spectrum Protect Plus in-house for our VE as well as backing up our databases, such as Oracle, DB2, or SQL.

We use all-flash for all the storage that we use for Spectrum Protect.

We do not have anything going to the cloud now. The goal is to have anything which requires a long-term retention backed up to either Amazon or Azure.

We currently use Tivoli Data Protection to back up our databases. Spectrum Protect is actually the application which backs up the file system data, then anytime you want to back up the databases you use an agent with Tivoli Data Protection (TDP) to be able to back up your Oracle databases or your SQL databases. 

Right now, we are getting  good results when we back up Oracle with TDP, but we back it up directly to the VTO. So, the goal is to get rid of the VTO and utilize the native features within Spectrum Protect to be able to do deduplication and no replication as we would do it on the VTO, because all that functionality is on the VTO. However, Spectrum Protect does not know about the VTO. So, it would be nice to be able to move that within the functionality Spectrum Protect. However, in order to do, we have to make sure we are sizing the servers correctly. This is why we are also considering using the PowerNAS, and maybe putting Spectrum Scale ESS behind it as well. 

We currently are working with our sales rep and some of the IBM techs to see how this solution would play out if we wanted to bring it in-house.

From a tech perspective:

• Utilizing deduplication
• No replication
• Getting the virtual environment backed up using Spectrum Protect Plus on all of the databases.

I would love to see something which allows us to do an auto restart of backup jobs. Right now, we have it where we have health checks, and if anything that missed or failed, we monitor those. However, we have to manually go onto the servers to execute a manual backup. It would be nice if there was something that ran behind the scenes on the Spectrum Protect server saying, "If our file spaces have not been backed up in eight hours or 12 hours (depending on the attribute status set by the customer), then an auto backup restart occurs automatically." This would be instead of having to do it manually. 

This would help us out, and also the operational teams as it would allow them to focus more on maintaining the Spectrum Protect server versus restarting backup jobs.

Performance has not been an issue. If we do move all of our Oracle and SQL databases off of the VTO on to Spectrum Protect, performance will be a huge factor because we will now a LAN-free backup to a LAN backup. This means we will be going over the network. Therefore, we need to be able to know that Spectrum Protect and our internal network will be able to handle the workload.

We do have a test environment. Currently we just upgraded our test environment to 8.1.5. We are currently testing some of the issues that we have had related to the GS Kits that were resolved in 8.1.5, as well as some issues where the nodes were not communicating back to the Spectrum Protect server providing you information on the last time it established communication with Spectrum Protect.

These issues were resolved by reading. We did a lot of googling and found some information which was on the IBM website. It gave us information in regards to the issues that we found. However, when we upgraded our production servers to 8.1.3, we actually ran into the GS Kit issues, and we had a lot of clients who still run 7.x. Therefore, we had a lot of issues from the first time it started to authenticate to the Spectrum Protect servers and the servers stopped backing up. 

One of the things we did was open up a ticket with IBM and say, 'This is what is going on." The IBM technician helped us out and ensured that we had everything in place. He made sure that we did not have that issue again when we were using it. When the Clients started communicating back with the Spectrum Protect servers, it was back on level. So the issue was resolved.

We have been impressed with the scalability.

Our environment is huge. We have a large AIX Windows environment, and it is growing every day.

If we build our servers correctly when we refresh our environment using a PowerNAS, Spectrum Protect will definitely be able to handle our growth.

We came from version 7.1.3. Based on some of the features which were offered in version 8, this was the focal point for us to say, "We need to upgrade if we want to take advantage of using container pools, start using deduplication, and no replication." 

We wanted to go ahead and start upgrading the Spectrum Protect servers to the latest code, as well as the Client, so we could take advantage of these new features.

I was involved in the initial setup. It was not complex; it was pretty much straightforward. Besides the security issues, we experiences no other issues.

We started with the blueprints, which were great. The blueprints allowed us to be able to decide if we needed to use small, medium,k or large. Because we are a large environment, we used a large blueprint. Once we followed everything in the blueprint, it was a smooth transition from there.

We looked at Veeam and Rubrik, but right now, we have the two best products. We have Commvault and Spectrum Protect. Each one of them are the best at different things and each have their weaknesses. During the last two years, IBM has put out a lot of different features which have impressed us. We may be able to reevaluate some product comparisons now. As long as IBM continues to roll out new features and adjusts a lot of other customer issues out there in the industry, they will continue to stay one of the top products.

Look at all the products in the industry, then base your decision on the size of your environment. A lot of times products say that have cool things, but at the end of the day, scalability and performance are what you should be looking at. Spectrum Protect has been able to meet these particular needs for us. 

Do not let companies use you as their guinea pig.

We use it to back up all of our midrange enterprise systems. It performs exactly the way we need it. We don't need anything more, don't need anything less. It has always done the job.

Our infrastructure is on-premise. We have a bunch of Microsoft servers and VMs, but mostly what Spectrum Protect covers is our Power systems. We have roughly 30 servers that we protect at this point. We do backup a few Linux servers as well, because our group actually covers that area.

It provides upper management peace of mind that we can recover, if needed. We have never had a problem (knock on wood) of recovering anything via Spectrum Protect. Whatever we backup has always been there. It is a good product.

I like the new GUI. It makes things really nice. The previous GUI that they had was slow, and it did not have enough information on it. Therefore, they have truly improved in what they are offering. It is moving into the main stream, like all the other backup solutions are. 

I also like what I am seeing with some of the new features which are coming out.

Stability is very good.

We have approximately 30 servers right now. It will always be our solution for our midrange Power boxes. As we grow with Power servers, we are going to stay with Spectrum Protect as it is growing with us. We are going to upgrade a bit more aggressively than we previously have, because we are excited about the newer stuff coming out.

For technical support, you just call the 1-800 number, tell them your customer number, and voila, they are there. They have been pretty responsive.

While I was not involved in the initial setup, new releases and implementation have gone smoothly. I have never had problems.

We had another product brought in to take care of the other side of the Microsoft servers and VMs. They thought about dragging us into that as well and getting rid of Spectrum Protect. I said, "We don't need something that complicated. Spectrum Protect is a perfect fit for what we need."

NetBackup was previously running, but they have moved to Commvault, and I said, "There is no way that I am going to CommVault. It is too expensive and complicated. Spectrum Protect is not expensive, and it is simple to use." 

Even some of the people in our group, like our DBAs and non-technical people, can restore some stuff themselves via Spectrum Protect. They don't always need me. That is how simple it is. That is what I like about it.

I would recommend Spectrum Protect, especially for use with Power servers.

It serves as a backup solution, and although its user interface may not be perceived as unique, its administration process is reported to be smooth. The community project aspect ensures reliable backup communication, especially when dealing with lost backup features. It simplifies tasks such as fixing the entire system and storing data on platforms like Gmail or Hyper-V.

It has expanded its capabilities and is now part of the Storage Defender suite. This suite is designed to enhance cybersecurity, particularly in safeguarding against ransomware attacks. In addition to disaster recovery, the Storage Defender suite aims to protect against cyber threats by providing measures to recover data in the event of encryption by malicious actors.

The most valuable is its versatility, allowing users to efficiently manage IBM V and Hyper-V in diverse environments. The flexibility extends to cloud transitions, enabling easy movement from one vendor to another. The tool proves invaluable in scenarios where systems need recovery, such as restoring damaged data. Users can leverage it to migrate data between different environments, making tasks like moving from on-premise to the cloud straightforward.

The administration tools for GI need improvement, as the current assessment suggests shortcomings in the back-end system. Dealing with administrative tasks from my perspective has not been straightforward. The user interface for administration lacks the ease that is found in other tools, especially when dealing with storage.

I have been using it for four years.

It is a very mature tool and it has been reliable and stable throughout our experience. I would rate it ten out of ten.

I didn't have any issues with scalability, it has been good.

My experience with customer service and support has been satisfactory. I would rate it ten out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup was straightforward.

The deployment process takes one week.

Overall, I would rate it eight out of ten.

The solution's use cases would mostly involve its use in finance and insurance companies.

The two features in the solution that I have found valuable are its functionalities related to UFS and KMS.

The solution's ability to integrate with a cloud solution is one area that needs improvement.

In the next release of the solution, I would like to see the solution being able to integrate with EFS storage.

I have experience with IBM Spectrum Protect and have been working with the solution for thirteen years. Also, I am a reseller of the solution from the sales department. I have worked with versions ranging from IBM Spectrum Protect Version 9.x to IBM Spectrum Protect Version 11. The latest one I am working on is IBM Spectrum Protect Version 2.1.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a four or five out of ten. More precisely, I rate the solution's scalability a five out of ten. The low rating is due to its inability to integrate with the cloud providers today. So, if the integration is within an IBM cloud, it is good, and if it is outside IBM cloud, it is really bad. Also, most of our clients are enterprise-sized ones.

Regarding technical support, if one has the entire enterprise support, I would rate it a nine out of ten, but without enterprise support, I would rate it a five or six out of ten. So, to be more precise, without enterprise support, I would rate it a five out of ten owing to the timelines required for the technical support to resolve any issues.

Neutral

The solution's initial setup is straightforward as long as the prerequisites are followed. So, I rate the solution's setup between seven to eight out of ten.

The time required for the deployment process is somewhere between two to three weeks.

Around 200 to 300 steps are involved in the deployment process of the solution. So unless specified, explaining all the steps involved in the deployment process can be difficult.

The solution's pricing is fair. Price-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

To the ones planning to use the solution, I would like to say that as long as your use cases aren't transactional, you can use IBM Spectrum Protect for anything they want. For transaction storage, it is better not to use IBM Spectrum Protect. Since the solution can only be launched on IBM cloud and not on Google or Amazon cloud, I rate the overall solution a seven out of ten.

I'm an IT analyst and we are customers of IBM.

One of the benefits for the company is that if a major error has been made we're able to restore to a backup prior to when the error occurred.

The most interesting feature is without a doubt the 'management classes'. A management class allows us to configure the number of previous versions of each file that we want to keep as well as the number of days that we want to keep them. Thanks to the way in which the management classes can be assigned to file, the possibilities are endless.
To my knowledge only SP offers this flexibility.

We've noticed that restoring massive number of files is a time-consuming process and should be improved. We found a way to deal with it by using the 'no query restore' where the restore operation is done on more than one thread and is restartable as opposed to the 'query restore' which is a single thread process. The 'no query restore' needs setting a few parameters for the node in order increase the number of resources that will be used by the restore process.
In addition, we've found that this is not the best solution for backup and restore of virtual machines. Even with Spectrum Protect for Virtual Environment which could be improved a lot. I believe they're working on that with the new product Spectrum Protect Plus.

Finally, the licensing is complicated and could be simplified.

I've been using the solution for 15 years. 

Scalability becomes somewhat limited with the growth of the database, but we are still able to run with only one instance on one database, although we are reaching the limit. We have thousands of users. We have three network administrators dealing with the solution. I'm an analyst and the others are service administrators. 

We haven't used technical support for quite a while but when we did use them, they were very good. 

Deployment is a difficult question because we've been using the product for so many years that it's simple for us. I think implementation for the server and the node is simple but the configuration is a little complex. Part of the issue is that there are so many features and if you want to use them all, it needs to be via configuration. There are a lot of configuration parameters in Spectrum Protect. To add a new computer to the server takes a minute. To deploy a new server might take a day or two. All our deployments are done in-house. 

The cost is high and the license is complicated. You have to figure out which license best suits your needs. It's not as simple as Veeam or the other software products we use. We need an ILMT license with IBM. We have a computer dedicated to compute the license we need for our IBM project. We pay an annual license fee of somewhere between $100,000 and $150,000.

I recomment this solution if the need is to be able to quickly recover one or more files destroyed by mistake a few weeks ago. We must ensure that the configuration meets the needs of the users. The best advice I can give is to read the tutorial provided by the IBM documentation. And for anyone administering the backup, they should perform restore tests regularly.

I rate the solution eight out of 10. 

However if the needs are to be able to quickly restore a cloud infrastructure, there is undoubtedly better solutions.

The solution is primarily used for backing up all of our servers and data. We also use it for a lot of driving data.

I'm new to the company, so I don't know if I can answer how the solution has improved the organization.

The archiving feature is the most valuable aspect of the solution.

Although I am not a technical user, I would say the cloud integration features could be improved.

I'm fairly new to the company, however, I've been using the solution for probably just over five years now.

The solution is very stable. We haven't faced any bugs or glitches. There haven't been system crashes. It's reliable. An organization won't have to worry about stability.

The solution is highly scalable. An organization that needs to expand the services should be able to do so without any issues.

The solution doesn't have a high user count. Rather, it is used by our IT department to protect our organizations' data. No end users would have access to it. About 10-15 people from our storage and data protection team have access to it currently.

Technical support is great. they're very knowledgable and technical people. We've been satisfied with the level of support they've provided. It's been very good. We've had cases in the past where they've been able to help us overcome issues effectively.

I wasn't at the company at the time the solution was implemented, so I don't have knowledge as to if the solution is difficult or straightforward to set up.

I don't have any information about the pricing of the solution other than to say it's a little bit higher than we would like.

We are always looking at different solutions. For example, we are looking at Cloud Work, Cohesity, and Rubrik. We're very early in the process of evaluating them, so we don't have clear differentiators yet. It's too early to discuss a comparison of features.

We're not partners with IBM. We're just customers. We have a good relationship with the company, however, we are not reseller partners.

We're using the latest version of the solution.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. It's a great solution, and we've been very happy with it, but it does lack cloud integration features. If it offered that, I'd rate it higher.

We use it for our enterprise backups. By enterprise, I mean Oracle, SAP, and all other business-critical applications.

Initially, we started using Spectrum for backing up our business-critical applications, such as SAP running on AIX, and then we had Oracle RAC clusters. We also had Veeam for VMware, but then IBM Spectrum came up with their version of the virtual environment. IBM was initially not into the virtual environment, but over a period of time, they got into this.

IBM is providing us a good and cost-effective solution. We also get more robustness for daily backup where we can restore a virtual machine, just like Commvault and Veeam. 

We have been using it for several years, and it is quite reliable and predictable. We are quite comfortable with this solution. They're coming up with new features as well. 

It has good scalability, and it provides good integrations with business-critical applications or databases, such as SAP HANA. It works as expected, and we don't see any issues.

Its management part can be better and simplified. It is kind of a beast as compared to Commvault or Veeam, but they are more user-friendly. They are also easier to learn, whereas Spectrum Protect definitely takes time. They should simplify it. Our teams are pretty comfortable with it because we have been using it for a long time, but from the perspective of a new user who is evaluating or using this solution, it is definitely more complex in terms of manageability.

Its monitoring could be improved so that it can even monitor the jobs that are scheduled by external schedulers. There are situations where a database team might decide to use their own schedulers, but currently, Spectrum Protect is not able to catch those jobs in the Operation Manager console.

I have been using this solution for more than ten years.

We have been using it for several years now, and it is very good in terms of stability and reliability.

It is scalable.

We don't have any issues with technical support. They're okay, and we're fine with their support.

We also use Veeam, which is mainly for the virtual environment. IBM Spectrum covers everything. It covers virtual and physical environments and heavy databases and applications such as SAP HANA. We are using Veeam only for a subset of our environment. 

Its initial setup is complex and not very easy. The deployment duration depends on a lot of factors, but generally, one week should be enough.

It is not very intuitive, and you can't do it all by yourself. You need someone for initial deployment. We have a seller who helps us out. This solution has been here with us for years, so our team is now comfortable implementing it, but it is still not that intuitive that you can do it all by yourself.

Its licensing is complex, and its price is not really reasonable. It is on the expensive side. IBM, in general, is slightly expensive, but with IBM Spectrum for the virtual environment, they are looking into the aspect of helping customers with the cost and providing a cost-effective solution.

It is a reliable tool. It has been there for so many years. It is a good solution that provides many options. I would recommend this solution for large-scale environments with mission-critical applications running on complex hardware, such as AIX.

I would rate IBM Spectrum Protect an eight out of ten.

It is performing very well. However, our customer feedback is the product is very complex, and mainly built for the enterprise customer. They will need to do some developments on the Spectrum Protect, especially on the Plus series. Maybe on Spectrum Protect, they can simplify it, so the admin can get more easily access the console, and generate jobs and alerts.

As a product, it is very nice. People love it, but the only issue is it requires a very unique/rare skill set. 

80% of the core business is running on-prem, and some of the applications which are add-on, go on the cloud. This is a mixture: 80% is on-premise, which is non-critical.

The problem with moving to the cloud is the government compliance agreements. The government says the data should not leave the country, or if the data is leaving Iran, it should be encrypted and no one else can read it. This is why Amazon is coming with their data center. Once it is live, all the Ministry's data should be part of Amazon and it should not go out. Those are the compliance issues with the Ministry.

We manage approximately 20 customers, except Saudi Arabia.

Especially for the banking and ministry sectors, they have core businesses running and they can't have a single bit of data corruption or data loss. This is a very important product for them, because it gives ease of access and the type of data consistency where they can rely on it and its safe on-hand. When there is a need or a disaster, they can get the information back from the archive. So, it is very much required.

The backup on real-time, especially for the virtual machine, archiving, and retrieving the reader from the backup repository and getting it online, getting it validated, then performing the data consistency check over the backup.

• I would like the users to have a better experience with the product.
• Easier recovery
• It needs better connectivity with other non-IBM application hardware and non-IBM platforms. If it can get connected with other applications, the customer would be happier because they would not need to stick to a single vendor, so they could have a backup on multiple environments.

It is very stable. It is meant for the enterprise customer's core business. I have never seen any customer talk about a system crash and not being able to retrieve their backup. 

It takes a lot of time to configure on the first setup. Once setup, you do not need to touch it again. You just need to do a formal check on possibly batch updates.

If you are attaching with IBM products, it is all compatible and very easy. Issues arise when you are working with non-IBM products. Then, you need to find all the APIs with the Spectrum Product. There are some issues with HPE and Dell, because these two do not support Spectrum Protect. You have to be on certain versions before they will support integrations.

Spectrum Protect will meet our customers needs as they grow, because as the data is growing they need to have a backup. We are talking about on-premise backup, we are not talking about cloud backup. We are discussing out of the country backup. There are tapes which are getting shipped out of the country with an encryption key. Spectrum Protect is playing a vital role, because they do the encryption. It is a very reliable, consistent, unhackable product. 

Technical support is okay, but their skills are limited.

Example: Our customer was not able to do certain activities. So it went from Level 1 to Level 2, then Level 3. Level 3 takes a longer time to bring up the batch or find a resolution. I think that is a part IBM could fix something. They should have a proper technical support team serving the customers and get issues resolved earlier.

The initial setup starts straightforward, but as soon as a customer opens the requirements for the backup because they are happy it, they will want to export their system, virtualized platform, or some applications on the databases. This is when it starts getting complex. Then you need to run multiple jobs, multiple consoles, and bring it all together. Of course, customers want to have a single console to connect all their different environments.

I would recommend IBM, but I am a business partner.

Other market competitors include EMC NetWorker, Veritas (Plus Edition), and Veeam (for virtualization).

Customers main criteria when selecting a vendor: presence in the market, and onsite and offsite support.