Veeam Data Platform Reviews

The primary use case is backup and replication. This solution is a backup, so it is used on-premises.

From my experience, Veeam is very good. Its interface is user-friendly. We can restore it whenever. It's not complicated. It's very easy to manage and administration is very easy.

Veeam should go for a different version of a hypervisor. For example, they are concentrating on Microsoft Hyper-V and on VMware. There are some virtualizations there, like AHV Nutanix. In that case, they need to rebuild application-wise. I checked with an AHV for my personal knowledge, and I couldn't find the same as in the VMware and Hyper-V. It's totally different. It opens with a different port.

They need to do some repository and improve the backup chain and logs. For example, sometimes we still need to call support for small things, and they're looking for the log. 

In this case, they need to give some training to the administrators. It should be easy. In this case, there are some knowledge bases. If you go to the Veeam site, you will see the knowledge bases, but there should be a little awareness. Administrator awareness should come up for that, like with the small issues and how you want to replicate. When you have some small issues, you should be able to go through it by yourself and solve the issue instead of opening the ticket and waiting for the engineers to troubleshoot.

It was scalable.

Technical support is amazing.

Veeam is totally different from Veritas when it comes to virtualization and virtual machines. For Veritas, we are just using the standalone, physical servers.

Veritas is good for a small environment. We are taking more backups in Veeam only, and we're only taking some backups in Veritas, which is like a physical server.

The cost is expensive. It will depend on how you are managing your environment, your requirements, and if you can easily manage a license. It's not that difficult, so you can manage it, but the cost is high, so you need to check directly with Veeam as well as the local partner so you can get the discount prices.

I would rate this solution 10 out of 10.

Our primary use for Veeam Backup & Replication is for enterprise backups and replication.

It's used pretty heavily by us.

The features I find most valuable are probably the VMware snapshot backups and the Veeam replication. Their replication is very good.

It can easily be used for disaster recovery in a number of situations.

I don't know how it would compare to Zerto, for example, but considering that it can leverage backups for replication purposes, this makes it superior to either a backup product or a replication product. The fact that you can mix and match, for example, you can replicate off of a backup or off of a backup copy somewhere else, or off of the source machine directly, makes it superior for me.

In terms of what could be improved, they need a better solution for backend storage. Other backup products that I've used, like Commvault, have at least a disc based backup. If you don't have a D duplicating appliance, like Commvault who has its own duplication engine, it's doing its best to duplicate data going into the repository. Veeam is not very good at that. There is some level of data reduction, but it's not much. So if your backup targets don't have a good D duplication data reduction, it's a problem because you just create massive amounts of data on the backend.

I like that you can use any kind of disc target and you can use any kind of high speed fiber channel as backend.

On a scale of one to 10, I would say that Veeam Backup & Replication is one of the best, so I'd probably give it a nine. There is not one perfect backup product and I think one of the challenges with Veeam is the lack of clients. Meaning, we have certain older systems that there is no Veeam client for, and there's no incentive for Veeam to make the client for it. But it does VMware backups very well.

I primarily use the solution for replication, backup, and disaster recovery.

It's basically BaaS, Backup as a Service in in physical and virtual environments, 

and DRaaS, Disaster Recovery as a Service. It allows for backups on-premise. 

The solution allows for incremental backup and incremental reverse. It's very helpful. 

Overall, it's a good product. The tool is very important to our organization. 

They've gone ahead and improved 90% of the tool. They have the software that we need and we've really enjoyed using them overall.

The solution is easy to install and the programming is pretty basic.

The solution can work for companies no matter the size or scope.

In the future, I would like to see the product offer a full backup, virtual machines, and point systems as well as database and application power in the Veeam Backup. There needs to be more integration with VMware and the virtual machine.

For my client, bandwidth is a problem. We do not know the sizing of the environment and it's a problem in every RPO in the time of sizing. This is a big problem.

If the solution could offer a backup for SAN as part of its functionality, that would be a major advantage in comparison to other software companies. It is made for VMware. This is a specialty tool for VMware virtual machines. It would be ideal if it could also be for Veeam and you didn't have to leverage it via VMware. 

I've been using the solution for about three years at this point.

We handle all sizes of company. It doesn't matter if it is medium, large, or small - including government organizations and banks, which can be quite sizable.

I don't have too many tickets with Veeam, however, I do find it hard to communicate with them. They could be better in that sense. I do use them rarely, although I do have an open ticket right now.

I'm also using CloudConnect, as well.

The initial setup is not overly complex. It's pretty easy to install. For us, the implementation is straightforward, as it is what we do. We handle implementations for a variety of clients.

We handle the implementation ourselves for our clients. We don't need an implementor or consultant to help us.

We have looked at other solutions in the past - for example, VMware.

The difference is in licensing. Veeam is licensed via a virtual machine or a physical machine. Other companies have a different setup.

However, VMware is very easy to use in terms of functionality, and the console makes it easier to create jobs from a backup.

We are partners with Veeam.

We have the solution on-premise in our data center. I have platforms in VMware and Hyper-V.

I'd recommend the solution to other organizations. I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten.

We use this solution on a daily basis to monitor all of our environments.

We use it for supplemental monitoring. Veeam ONE is based on our VMware. Although we receive alerts with VMware, Veeam ONE goes another step further with analysis.

With Veeam ONE, we're easily able to determine what has been impacted. For example, VMware will get an alert for an ESX host, and Veeam ONE will know exactly what VMs and what applications are impacted. It's not our primary source of monitoring, but when we have an issue, we go to Veeam ONE to figure out exactly where things are and to help us connect the dots.

The reporting features are great for our business and managers, It takes a lot of the guesswork out. The monthly reports come complete with graphs and summaries, it's really helpful.  

The threshold could be easier to configure. I would like to see more automation and integration with their own backups. Currently, you can stop and start a backup, but it would be nice if you could initiate a reinstall using Veeam ONE.

I have been using this solution for roughly six years.

We experience problems with our SQL database. Our SQL database grew quite large in size with Veeam ONE. This is an area for improvement. They should also provide more guidance regarding calculating how big the environment might grow for the SQL database. We experienced a couple of issues where the Veeam ONE server went down because the SQL database grew too much, and we had to recreate it a couple of times. We don't quite understand how the Veeam ONE database works and what causes it to grow so quickly. 

The technical support is responsive, however, there have been times when we have had problems, but the technical support will determine it's not a Veeam issue, so they just drop it. They will only help us if the issue is directly related to Veeam. They could go a bit further and give a few suggestions, but they don't. In some cases, we have to get both VMware support and Veeam support together on one call and go through our account rep to pressure them. They'll eventually do it, but you have to force their hand.

The initial setup was quite straightforward. The Installation process was completed in one day.

We got the Veeam Enterprise Suite, which comes with Veeam ONE and Enterprise Manager. I'm not exactly sure what the pricing is.

Veeam ONE is a great product. My main advice would definitely be to do a complete overview of the setup, and accurately design the database because otherwise, it will grow out of control.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give this solution a rating of eight.

Replication (fast recovery for replicated servers).

It has decreased downtime issues. By using replication, we decreased our downtime for crashed servers and having other service/system issues.

It is very simple and fast to power-on a replicated server, making it come online again.

I'm not sure if this option is available in new versions. But different types of licenses could not be used on the same Veeam server in the past, it would be good to be able to use mixed types of licenses in the same server.

About four years.

No, it is working nice and smooth.

No, because we are using this product in a small environment.

We do not encounter many problems with the product, but we do get an instant response when needed.

We are still using a different product for backup. Veeam is being used for replication only.

Since it was a single server setup, it was easy to install and configure.

It is acceptable for us because we having been using it for approximately four years. However, I think for new buyers/customers it may be cheaper than other products.

Another product is being used for backup. We did a PoC with Veeam, then bought it.

It is easy, with many features, (I think) it is cheaper. Very useful for virtual environments.

Before Veeam our customer used to backup data with obsolete tools and had no central console management, so every site had single task to be checked everyday. Now, he receives the full backup report as an email attachment everyday.

The WAN accelerator feature has been the most valuable for me. My customer was in trouble because he found a huge quantity of data to be moved from foreign countries sites to the HQ in Milan. That feature reduced the time needed to complete the task from 25 days to less than a week! This is compared with the original tools used: ntbackup, robocopy and Windows Server Backup.

I think user support can be more analytic. Some support replies for a broken backup task have been "rebuild the job from scratch" and this is a bad thing to do if you have many VMs and repositories.

During a WAN copy we found an issue that if the connection drops and the program reaches the retry limit, sometimes this damages of the backup chain. Strangely, the program runs the day after but it looses the retention points number. For instance, if I set up a 30 day retention point, instead of deleting the oldest file and merging the new one, it keeps going on till the repository is full.

I did not encounter any issue with scalability.

I would rate support 7/10.

I used many other tools: Acronis, vSphere Data Protection, Symantec BES. I moved to Veeam because I initially found many high level features missing in the other tools. Now the gap is thinned, but I feel more confident with Veeam.

The initial setup has not been simple due to the complexity of the customer's infrastructure and the number of features to be aware of. Veeam initially can be complex. If you want to enable all the modules, you must know how Veeam organizes its console and where to find a feature.

I think the price is good when you choose the Essentials Suite, but when you buy a full featured version (for instance the Enterprise Plus) the price is a little bit expensive. This is typical when a company becomes an industry leader.

We evaluated Veritas Backup Exec, Acronis and many others, but Veeam was clearly better. That is the reason why we switched.

If you have a complex environment, first study well how Veeam works. Having some days of training before is better than loosing some weeks after to rebuild the logical structure and jobs many times.

This product has improved the entire RTO and allows us to restore applications and services to customers within a few minutes.

• The object level restore from the Active Directory
• Microsoft Exchange
• Microsoft SQL
• Backup and restore of vCloud Director Objects
• Direct SAN integration with 3PAR

I like these features because they are helpful in offering additional and detailed disaster recovery services for managed services customers. The direct SAN backup feature perfectly integrates with our 3PAR storage infrastructure. It has significantly reduced the time it takes to backup virtual machines.

The direct SAN backup integration can be perfected by improving the snapshot removal mechanism and process from the storage volumes. This will prevent stale snapshots from accumulating on the data stores, which in turn consumes precious space.

There were no stability issues that I can think of. When the best practices for deploying Veeam Backup and Replication are strictly followed, the system can be stable without any issues.

We didn’t have any problems with scalability at all. It all comes down to how to deploy the Veeam infrastructure. If it is well designed, scaling is no problem.

The technical support is fairly good.

I have used other solutions in the past, but I switched because Veeam just works. It is pretty easy to set up, use, and it has fewer limitations.

The setup is straightforward, depending on how you want to deploy it. The installer can configure everything for you on the same server with all the relevant databases. It will also automatically install any required external software needed for Veeam to operate.

The licensing is based on the number of cores you have in your ESX or Hyper-V environment. That should be taken into consideration when purchasing the Veeam Backup and Replication solution.

I have used TSM, Backup Exec, and Retrospect.

I would recommend IT professionals who run their infrastructure in a predominantly virtual environment to go for the Veeam Backup and Replication solution. It does the job and it is relatively easy to set up.

For most clients I look after, the most often used feature is a simple restore. Once the backup is on disk, most restores can kick in within 15 minutes and be restored within 30 minutes for files, emails and SQL databases etc. It doesn’t matter if it’s from last night or last year, the restore timeframe is often the same.

After a simple backup, the next most used feature I see is restoring a full VM due to doing a DR test to validate systems, VM corruption, testing new software, testing windows updates, ransomware/virus corruption or human error in managing the VM. A VM of say 40GB can, in most cases, be restored within an hour from the get go. Naturally, the faster the infrastructure (10GB, fibre), the faster the restores. Restoring to different locations naturally takes more time as often one needs to prep the environment.

As for the most valuable feature I suppose it’s bringing in the disaster revovery functions (SureBackup, Replication, offsite jobs) to sites that just wouldn’t normally have the budget or be bothered due to the complexity of the more traditional solutions.

Veeam B&R saved many files that had accidentally been deleted. By using file level recovery, all of them got restored easily and in a timely manner.

From a business point of view the recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO) can now be realized and improved.

Cross job deduplication and dedupe across full backups would be interesting. This would help the backup footprint for long term backups. Saying that, Server 2016 dedup (when it's released shortly) should cover some of this for small to medium sites, and larger sites can pick a number of appliances to do the job (Dell DR4300, ExaGrid Storage, EMC Data Domain etc.).

I've been working with many clients over the years, and I have been using Veeam since v4, which I think was around 2011.

Patch release and support are both very efficient and it doesn't take ages for most issues to be resolved.

As with any product things can break down. Backup to disk is very intensive and all the parts need to be reliable. Poorly configured NAS devices as Veeam repository can cause all sorts of issues. Lack of free space or resources will be a burden.

It's been able to scale for our needs. Simply add more Veeam proxies if compute is needed or more cheep storage for backup as needed.

Excellent is the word I'd use.

The support from Veeam is very good and most issues I’ve logged with them over the years turned out be non Veeam related. One such call related to failed backups on a number of VM’s. After some investigation it turned out to be Symantec AV device control on servers blocking a VSS snapshot from within the guest (from MS Shadow copy or Veeam). Another issue where backups which were taking over 10hours failed and turned out to be a Linux/NAS time out. I’m always very satisfied with their support levels, more so than any other backup vender I’ve used over than last 10 years.

I’ve worked with agent based backup solution and other virtual backup solutions over the years. PHDVirtual for XenServer has very good dedup but wasn’t compatible with Hyper-V or VMware (superseded now by Unitrends). Agent based backups usually rely on a bare metal restore which can be time consuming. Veeam just makes the whole restore process very simple. Veeam upgrades take a fraction of the time that most other products take.

Veeam backups in its simplest form is very straightforward. Install on a clean VM, point to Hyper Visor and repository, create backup jobs and go. Saying that it’s a very powerful product with many options and one would be advised to seek professional advice on the backup solution as a whole before jumping straight in and buying hardware/software.

I’ve being installing Veeam for our customer base for many years and gained a lot of experience and my advice to anyone is to seek professional advice on the backup solution as a whole. Buy more backup to disk pace than you think you need and play with the Surebackup function.

It wasn’t too long ago that one paid a high price for something that would cover DR and was usually out of the reach for most small customers. Veeam fills that gap with very keen pricing, reliable backups, reliable restores and ofsite VM replication. For me its a small investment for peace of mind.

Over the years we have seen more Hyper-Visor backup products hitting the market, and those I have tested still fall behind Veeam, but to be honest I don’t bother testing them much these days as Veeam ticks most, if not all, of the boxes that my clients require.

Try it out, Veeam B@R give a free 30 day trial key. Seek professional advice.