Data Protector vs. Backup Exec.

[Michael Desjardin]

I have a client that current ly has an MSA 1500 with (2) MSA30 shelves maxed at 14 300gb SCSI drives per. The client is looking to implement a Virtual tape solution (vls6106) which would then back up to tape (MSL4048 960 FC Tape library).

He is currently heavily invested in backup exec and is reluctant to move to Data Protector (not Express) if there is no compelling reason to do so. I am looking for any information that can assist us in this decision either way. I am looking for reasons based on functionality not cost.

If anyone can assist me in this regard I would appreciate it.

Thanks,

Mike D.

[Zoel Krieger]

there is no need to change software. the VLS is designed specifically to negate the need.

it will appear to any software as a tape library. it will NOT appear as disk, so if their intent is to expand their disk to disk backups, it is not the right product.

I went from Backup Exec 10d to data protector 6. If you have no software reason to do so i recommend against it. there are many things that BE simplifies that DP does not. its more "unix" than "windows" if you understand what i mean.

i have not done data migration in BE, but it depends on how he wants to backup. if his intent is a dual backup (backup to the VLS and real tape simultaneously) thats easy, never had any problems with it in BE. if its to archive data from the VLS to tape at some later time, i've never done that in BE, so cannot help you. in DP its not hard, but its very hard to get working stable.

I would ask why they want a VLS. Disk to disk has far more advantages and you can do disk to disk to tape easier than disk to VLS to tape.