LiveVault vs. StarWind Virtual Tape Library

Our company was originally with VaultLogix which was taken over by LiveVault. The transition to the new product was not as smooth as expected and presented us with issues especially with a restore. Restore and what files needed to be included in the backup policy were not communicated to us correctly and it was not until a customer's server failed that we found out we couldn't do a restore because we were missing files that were needed for a complete restore.

I don't believe it works very well for backups of virtual servers. Installation of the product is user-friendly.

Incentivized

Starwind VTL is a great solution for customers that want the benefits of a physical tape library without the hefty price tag and the manual intervention required when changing tapes as it is automated. In addition, Starwind VTL virtual tapes are "air-gapped" as they are in LTO format.

• Easy to install the client piece.
• Easy to setup the backup policies.
• Data encryption and security.

Incentivized

• Allows you to use Veeam and other software that uses Virtual Tape Libraries while getting rid of actual tape drives and tapes
• Backblaze B2 implementation is great - keeps storage costs low while automating backups to the cloud storage
• Low cost and great support by the Starwind technical team
• Feature-rich and in constant development

• It does not play very well with virtual servers.
• Support is not always responsive.
• Issues with failed backups have cost our company time and money.

Incentivized

• Set-up is confusing.

Their support is great and the interface is not as user friendly

The initial setup took some time, however, with the help of the Starwind technical team, we were able to set it up from start to finish including seamlessly adding it to our existing backup solution. After that, there was no need for any additional setup or troubleshooting.

Great and reliable product with little need for support

LiveVault is the only product we have used. The reason is that we chose it initially was the fact you can restore individual files. Also that the data is transferred offsite to a secure data center and data is backed up again, providing a second offsite copy.

Incentivized

We've looked at physical tape backups, however, the infrastructure is too costly compared to Starwind VTL and it also requires manual changing of tapes that users will not want to do or forget to do. With VTL, it works exactly like a physical tape library with the same benefits and full automation.

• LiveVault has initially cost us more labor time than we anticipated for our IT staff.
• Installing cloud backup has given us a piece of mind that our data and our customer's data is safe.

Incentivized

• ROI was immediate as we got rid of expensive sneakernet backups with hard drives in a Pelican case
• One-time cost of the product is very cost-effective
• Support contracts are reasonable and we received excellent support throughout
• We have much better peace-of-mind with our data being protected better