Datto SIRIS vs. Zerto on IBM Cloud

Datto is a fantastic option for smaller businesses who don't have as large of a budget. It might work well for larger businesses as well, but the features are not exactly on par with more prevalent backup solutions. So, that should be kept in mind while determining a good fit for a company. But if selling a backup solution is met with push back, this can be a great option to give a good working backup solution. It offers the main features solutions should have, so it's definitely not a compromise. Just keep in mind the features it does not offer.

Incentivized

Zerto on IBM Cloud is great to get your datacenter redundant and highly available. It overcomes geographic contingencies and makes your production environment reliably flexible. If you do not like the added cost of redundancy or cost of cloud services, this inconvenient fee may not fit you well. But you'd be better off in the long run to have Zerto protecting your bottom line despite the cost.

Incentivized

• Simple agent setup for new machines to be protected. A new machine can be setup on the server in under a minute whether it be a Linux or Windows based machine.
• Local virtualization on the Datto is quick to start up. After a physical problem with a server I had the machine locally virtualized on the Datto before users had a chance to report service issues to me.
• Nothing to do on my end to get backups shifted to offsite data center. Schedules are setup for each machine or group of machines and I sleep well knowing all our backups are safely stored offsite.

Incentivized

• It is easy to get started.
• It is also very simple to set up the backup.
• Disaster recovery is no longer a dreadful or painful process.

Incentivized

• Initial backup sync: The downside to the cloud backup is that, if you have a lot of data, you need an external hard drive to seed to the cloud. And you usually have to request this after you've already got everything else working.
• Unsyncing: We have pretty decent bandwidth, but with 8TB of data, we'd get syncing issues with the cloud servers every 3 months or so. The only way to address it was to request another external drive and resync it, but that also meant losing the older data.
• Availability and support: Datto only operates through MSPs and VARs, and will not help you directly without putting in a ticket with your provider. This causes delays, and extra epenses, and if you grow beyond the need for an MSP, you have to keep them around for at least that piece.

Incentivized

• Enable the ability to use IBM Cloud Object Storage as a target for Zerto's long-term retention feature.
• Easier access to the underlying VMware infrastructure would be nice. Right now we have to connect to IBM's VPN and use other tools to do some infrastructure management tasks.
• More insight into the IBM-side VMware environment that we replicate to (i.e. ability to see available IPs, etc). Most of that is managed by IBM.

Incentivized

I trust the product and service and am satisfied with the direction of the company

Incentivized

Usability is great. The web interface is simple and easy to use. While various options are available for client backups, it is very easy to re-use settings of the existing client, so adding new clients is a very fast process. Configuration of the agent on the client-side cannot be easier as well. Datto dashboard provides an overview of the client status, and email notifications can be configured for various events.

Incentivized

My specific example or reason for this rating goes back to a need for support after a client on this platform has a fire. In a nutshell, Datto had no idea how to BMR the image back to the server correctly, and as a result, the RAID on the server was lost, due to the Datto BDR environment not being able to see the RAID card, and the support technician knowing how to inject drivers.

Incentivized

Datto seemed to be better than other vendors I trialed, and I inherited an Alto device, so it was easy to stay with them. I also assumed the backups had been working with the previous contractor, but it turns out they had been failing for months and no one knew it.

Before we were using native backup solutions. We elected to bring in Zerto on IBM Cloud so that our team could have the ability to take small increments of data over time so that the final cutover would be quick and efficient.

Incentivized

• In most cases, Datto will provide the appliance free of charge with a 3-5 year contract which results in a modest monthly fee instead of a large initial outlay and monthly fees.
• The contract's warranty is top-notch. Failed drives or issues with the appliances are replaced/corrected with free replacements and shipping.

Incentivized

• Positive is the option of bringing your own license.
• Negative - the complex environments are not supported.
• This cannot be used as a backup replacement rather DR tool.

Incentivized