What advice do you have for others considering N-able Backup?

Overall, I rate N-able Cove Data Protection as nine out of ten. The only feature I'd like to see included is disaster recovery support for AWS. It's currently compatible with Azure for disaster recovery but not with AWS. You can take backups from AWS servers and use all the features, but you can't set up a disaster recovery site on AWS.

I recommend those who plan to use N-able Cove Data Protection buy it. I rate the overall solution a nine out of ten.

I would rate Cove Data Protection a nine out of ten because nothing is perfect. The only reason why I wouldn't give it a ten is that I haven't yet gone through a full disaster recovery from them. Everything so far is A+. We did a few restores just to test them out, and it did okay, but we wouldn't know until we do a full-scale restore on someone. Another thing with Cove Data Protection is that when you're in the cloud and when you're talking about large amounts of data, it takes time. It can take over a day or two days to restore data. It's not done within an hour. That's the only reason why I wouldn't give it a ten.

I give the solution an eight out of ten. The problem with the solution for me was that I didn't get NFR licenses, so I was constantly paying to try and figure out the product, which was frustrating. I need to test the product to know how it works, and so if I'm paying to test the product, that's not helping me. As new users, we need to understand the product. We need to figure out what we want to get out of the product and what our primary business model is. If our primary business model revolves around backup and data recovery or continuity, we will get more out of the product because we will understand it better. We can take the time to learn more about the solution. If our business is around managed services, N-able Cove Data Protection can be frustrating. The solution does not provide the granular nature required in order for us to save money and tweak our costs.

N-able Cove Data Protection should be an essential part of any IT structure.

I would rate this solution as nine out of ten. There are a few things that would make the solution a lot better. There are some issues with the agents going offline, which might be fixable. I haven't really pursued that with their technical support because I don't have time. It's just easier for me to dump it and reinstall it. I would love to get it fixed so I don't have to do that. On the other hand, I can't figure out why this keeps happening to various machines. My advice is that whether or not you have a targeted machine or server, you need to make up your mind as to what happens the morning you walk in and it won't turn on. Do you need to bring back a bunch of files, or do you need a machine that will boot up and work as that one did? That's what tells me whether or not someone needs a full image backup or if they just want a file and folder. If it's somebody who doesn't think they need to back up a workstation, then I challenge them to turn off that computer and go about their day and see what happens. Most of them change their mind. To a colleague who says that image-based backup is the only way to go, I would say that if you don't have some kind of image-based backup of a business critical machine, you're making a huge mistake. A positive of the cloud-first architecture is that we have a backup in the cloud. The negative is that the initial backup can sometimes take forever. I have dealt with a less-than-perfect Internet connection, so I've had backups run for days before we had the first full backup in the cloud. If we had been able to get one locally, then at least we would've had a backup. It depends on the situation, but in a 50/50 scenario, it's great that it gets to the cloud first, but it's a problem if some clients don't have the best Internet connections because I'm not able to get a backup for days unless I do a seeding, which is a hassle. When it comes to delivering data protection, the solution hasn't had a big impact on reducing our resources. However, it has been a big time-saver. Compared to previous solutions, Cove is equally as efficient, if not more, when it comes to restoring points.

I would rate this solution ten out of ten. For someone who says that image-based backup is the only way to go, I would say that in today's world, with all the different types of hacks you could have, ransomware, and different data corruptions, it's important to be able to back up to multiple servers and physical devices, and to have another copy saved to a hard drive and one in the cloud. Let's say you have one image backup and that's it. If that becomes corrupted or ransomed and it's encrypted and locked out, it's really dangerous to have just one type of backup. We have multiple sets that do backups to different locations and different devices. I've had some clients that only have one type of backup and to dial that backup can be really scary because if it doesn't work when you go to restore it, you're in a lot of trouble. It's really nice to be able to recover files when needed, especially if there is ransomware or you suspect any type of infiltration. You can get the files back and then scan them. To me, you need to have multiple layers of backup to really feel secure. Only having one type of backup is extremely risky.

I'd tell a colleague who says that image-based backup is the only way to go is that there's a place for that, but you usually don't have to do an image-level backup. Sometimes, all you have to do is to get the little bits and pieces. Cove Data Protection has a bit of a learning curve and it involves your users. How do they take care of themselves? You need to have those processes in place. Users should be able to restore their own stuff if they need to. Train them on how to do that and make documentation available out there to explain how to grab one little file, if that's all they need to do.

We're consultants. We also have a reseller agreement with Cove as well. On top of that, we also use the solution ourselves. All the products we resell, we use as well. In terms of using an image-based backup, I would say we’re going to store a lot more data doing an image-based backup, however, it'll catch everything. The problem we've had in the past, seeing other colleagues' backups, and then being unable to restore certain pieces, is due to the fact that they're only backing up the user's profile, documents, downloads, music, pictures, et cetera, as opposed to backing up an entire machine. Google, for example, stores its Chrome bookmarks in a nonstandard location. If we don't know where that is, the chances are they're not going to get backed up and not get restored. However, an image-based backup will catch everything on the machine. I would give them a good solid nine out of ten. The only reason I wouldn't give them a ten out of ten is we aren't able to restore in the cloud and test everything out as we can on Datto, without having to download the full image onto bare metal hardware.

You will never miss a backup with this solution. With other solutions, if it missed a scheduled backup, it wouldn't back up that day at all. But with N-able Backup, backups run like clockwork. If a machine was off at the scheduled backup time, a backup will run as soon as the customer switches their machine on, even when they are working remotely. You are able to throttle transmission speed to limit data usage during certain hours. The on-premises cloud is a cost-saving option for anyone with fast fibre lines, proper servers, and secure server rooms. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten. I would have given it 10 out of 10 if the image restore was a bit better.

We are just a customer and an end-user. We use a variety of different versions, including 21.1, 21.2, 21.3, and all the way back to 20.10. We do not use its automated recovery testing. I do it manually. I know there is an automated feature, however, I don't want to use it. I prefer keeping everything inside my own box. I want to maintain all my keys. Therefore, I test the keys myself, to make sure that the files are recoverable. I would advise those considering the solution to look at the total cost of ownership. That would be my big takeaway from this. It's just not the amount of money that you're spending on your bill today, but what are you getting out of it down the road. There may be intangibles that you haven't factored into it yet. Whether it's archives are included in the costs or the fact that I have tech support people that are available to help me manage my platform so that I pay the least amount of money on it. If there's optimization that needs to happen and they'll help me with it, that's great. It all factors in. You need to measure it in its totality. On a scale from one to ten, one being the worst and 10 being the best, I would rate the solution at a ten. It has all the notifications, all the bells, and whistles. I could sit down and look at the pane of glass or I can have it send me 5,000 emails a day if that's what I prefer. It's flexible, whichever way you want to go. I particularly don't want a whole bunch of emails. I want to be able to sit down and look at things myself and analyze them myself. It makes it easier to find the needle in the haystack - and I'm happy that it gives me the option.

It is a very good system. We have very few problems with it. Just do it. If you get stuck, find the guys in support and they'll talk you through it because it's very quick and easy. They are quite happy to come onto a Remote Desktop Session, and go, "No, you've got that wrong." It's a good product that is sensibly priced. Anyone who has a modicum of IT skills can make it work. I would rate the solution as a 10 out of 10.

If you want to go through the motions of testing it, I get it. You have to do your own due diligence. But I've done the homework and it works. And if you have a RAID drive and you need a RAID controller driver, you can actually insert the RAID controller driver into the boot media so that it saves the volume. And it will just work. We use a neat feature called Virtual Disaster Recovery (VDR) status. It only works on servers. I believe it's $5 a month to do recovery testing and it's certainly worthwhile. We even bill out for that, and having that feature built-in is making us money. It's automated. Once or twice a month it will virtually mount the backup and provide a screenshot and advise whether or not there have been any errors. Some of our clients' servers are very big, so the VDR process will be completed with errors. I've since been told that's because they've got very large volumes. If the volume is larger than one terabyte, they're not going to mount it, probably because of resources and to make it economically affordable to do a test. But most C-drive partitions, which is the system partition, are short of a terabyte. Most of our clients will have one terabyte or less for these partitions. What this feature does is provide you with a verification result and shows you a screenshot. It mounts the operating system, provides you with logging, and reports an error if a volume is too large. And I'm okay with that. The whole verification process, to make sure that the integrity is there, works out-of-the-box. The VDR status functionality, which is an add-on—you have to add each service to it—gives you peace of mind that the data is mountable and that you're good to go. That peace of mind is enough for me to go about my day and do whatever I have to do. It works. If it reports an error, that's because the volume might be two, three, four, or five terabytes in size. As a result, they're not going to be mounting that. It would take a long time. We would need resources and the type of an environment to be able to download the tens of terabytes that we have for clients. We didn't want to be out of compliance when downloading that locally on our network. We don't have the resources to be able to store that kind of data locally. Everything's cloud-based now. The option to do so is certainly there, but we don't do it because that's what the VDR testing does for us. It's a major time-saver because it's already being done by them when you elect to do it on a particular server. You enable VDR recovery testing, choose once a month or bi-monthly, and you're done. The next time it's scheduled to run, it runs. You can see the history and the status. It's very easy. There's nothing to set up. If you do Office365, which we're going to be embracing, SolarWinds seems to be the leader with Office365 backup, or at least they're dominating the market with advertisements. I feel good that I'm using a product for both backups and for Office365. The Virtual Drive also looks pretty cool. I've never used it, but I could see how it would be cool. I'd have to find out whether that's something we can just install on a server and, if we need it, it would be there and allow us to restore a file right away without even having to log in to the Backup Manager. That would give us direct access to the files as if it were a regular file system. And they do support that functionality. The Recovery Console has worked, 100 percent. I used to do recoveries that way for each of the clients, but it would take a long time for downloading. That's why they introduced the Virtual Disaster Recovery testing. I don't use the Recovery Console anymore to test backups. If it tests in the cloud, I trust it will test fine if we were to download it. I try to embrace the SolarWinds solutions as much as possible. They've served me and my company and my clients well. For servers, first and foremost, it's just a rock-solid solution. The restorability is excellent. We've had very few problems. And usually, if there's a problem, it's not on their end, it has to do with the server itself.

If you're looking for something that's going to be easy to use, cost-effective, but also provides a great backup and more importantly, a recovery solution, this is definitely something that you should look at and keep in mind. It's a great product. It works very well and I don't have to worry about if a backup is working or not. Make sure that you don't undersize things. It's okay to oversize a local storage device. It's easier to come and oversell the opportunity or the option versus underselling it. I would rate SolarWinds MSP Backup & Recovery a nine out of 10. I'd give it a 10 if we had a little bit better reporting. For the functionality and the feature set within it, I would give it a 10.

I know there are a lot of companies out there that it's hard to switch from what you're doing. I would be willing to sit in a room with people that have evaluated as much as I have in terms of backup products over the years and talk and round table with them. I feel that SolarWinds had some issues with their per device charge and how much you are allowed with their RMM product, but as far as their backup products, they are rock solid. We've had no issues. None. I realize the backup is just part of their RMM thing, but that is the one part that there's just no question about. Their product is reliable, easy to use, and fairly priced. It's not the cheapest, so if you're looking for the cheapest, then SolarWinds is not it. If you're looking for a quality solution that lets you sleep at night, knowing that you're not worried about your backup, your customer's backup, anything like that; I would definitely say, this is something you should really investigate and look into. I would rate SolarWinds MSP Backup Recovery a ten out of ten.

The biggest lesson I've learned from using MSP Backup & Recovery is that there are options out there that I can be confident in, and I don't feel like I have to break a customer's bank to offer them. It's a really big deal for us to be able to do that. Having tested it and used it at this level, it's changed so much how we view what can be done, for keeping even our small customers' data safe. Before, it felt like I had to do a lot of extra things for the smaller places, because they couldn't afford the solutions that were better. Now I have something that I can trust to just do that for them. And it's so easy to maintain that it's really hard to look back and see that we were using other stuff before. My advice would be to understand that the features are there. Price it out, compared to the other solutions. Because they give you such clear-cut pricing with the system itself, it's really hard, when you get down to dollar and cents, for anybody else to compete, in my opinion. The only use case where that changes is maybe where many terabytes or petabytes of data are included, and you do not need a cloud solution. In that case your cloud solution is some sort of data center or solution you've set up yourself. If you need to back up to the cloud, and this goes for any size organization, and a data center is not an option, SolarWinds is something you have to consider. At least to price it out, especially considering you're never under any commitment, even if you want to try it for a month on one system. The worst case would be that you would get charged for a month of trying it out. What I did for us, beforehand, was that I tested how it worked on our systems. The R&D for that, for researching that and figuring it out, is $10 on a workstation, or $50 for that one month. How are you going to compare that to anything else, where you have to sign a contract? You might get a trial, but it's unlikely that you are going to be able to figure everything out in that time. It's so much easier to work with, in all aspects that I can think of, specifically as an MSP. It's not that I think this is the solution for everybody, but for MSPs that don't support incredibly large organizations, this is perfect. It is exactly the solution that I wish I had found years ago. When it comes to resource and bandwidth use in terms of backup recovery, for the most part I have not yet run into an issue. The one thing I have seen is a light blip on the VoIP. One time, when I was new to this and I restored a grouping of folders for a customer, while it was pushing stuff down we had some reduced phone quality. That download was taking up some of their VoIP. People could hear them fine but they were getting some static. What I found out is that there's an option to limit bandwidth during the day. For every customer now, when I install the product, I just do a quick audit of their internet speed. Based on what they can get, I give the download and the upload a percentage of that, so that it won't affect other systems. The bandwidth usage is completely customizable. If you want it to, it'll use your whole connection to get something important, and you can change that on the fly. It's not like it takes time for those settings to push down. But if you want good, everyday operations, you just limit it to a healthy percentage of the bandwidth during the day, and you're good to go. I am not using it to sell the automated recovery testing and I do not like that feature. I believe it has more of a risk for a false positive than anything. I have done the testing internally up until now with a team. When we have issues, we work on it as a group. We're all very aware of some of the pain points of restorations. One of those pain points is that, sometimes, that virtual disaster recovery is so good that even if I had a technician that did not configure a backup properly, if an error was made on our end, I don't get to see it because the virtual machine will spin up almost no matter what, Windows 10 and past. This system is that good. Even if I have a messed up computer that got backed up, it will still run and work and I've got to do a little bit more digging to figure out if it has an issue. I had exactly that happen; not in a real-world scenario, but when our team was testing. I could have just said, "Okay, I'm going to do recovery testing and give you a green light when the VM turns on." It can do that. This system is so great that it can turn almost any VM on. This is more of a personal philosophy for how our company runs stuff, as opposed to the viability of the tool itself. SolarWinds does the most that it can really do, without manual interaction from a human being. It does a good image test to see if all your stuff is there and if the VM turned on. But if you do that and it allows you to become complacent, you could miss backing up the drive and never know it. We actually almost had that happen and it might have if we didn't do our own recovery testing and check for stuff like that. Overall, I would give SolarWinds MSP Backup & Recovery a good 10 out of 10. There is not another product in the SolarWinds line of products that I'm happier with. This is the best of what they have, and I use almost every product they have, except their antivirus. The highlights of this solution are the way that they price it, how easy it is to use, and how customizable it is. I get to choose exactly how I want to use it, since it comes, default, with every feature. I get to choose how I present it to customers, if I want to do that. This is a good product that's really fair, and it's not complicated.

For us, this product works well. Our use case is fairly simple and it covers exactly what we need. I recommend using it, especially for an on-premises deployment. My advice for anybody who is implementing this solution is that it might be perfect as a cloud-based solution, but you may need some time to figure it out. I think that it should be just as easy on the cloud as it is on-premises. As a hybrid model, I think that it makes sense. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.