SharePlex vs. HPE Zerto Software

SharePlex is best suited for replicating relatively small but steady streams of data, instead of huge amounts of data surge. Keep in mind that it relies on database logs (redo logs in Oracle) to replicate data in the form of "messages", and therefore it is mandatory to put the database in forced logging mode - that may be a prohibiting factor in some situations.

Incentivized

Zerto is well suited for disaster recovery and virtual machine replication between multiple data centers. DR testing for audit or regulations is much easier with Zerto, great reporting, dashboard etc. It is not well suited for physical server replication for disaster recovery or as a primary backup solution.

Incentivized

• Replicate data for Dev/QA
• Easy setup/upgrade
• Support is easily reachable

Incentivized

• It is simple to set up and use. In my opinion, one of the most important functions of a tool is its interface. If you have the best product in the world but it takes an arm and a leg to configure and a doctorate degree to use, then the product isn't worth very much.
• The continuous replication is done very well. The failover and failback process runs smoothly.
• This has less to do with the product than the company, but Zerto as a company really listens to their customer base. We've always had a very good interpersonal experience with their support and sales teams. Having great people behind their product is definitely one of Zerto's strengths.

Incentivized

• Documentation: There are some areas where the documentation is weak or dated. In particular, running SharePlex on RAC is a more involved process than the implementation guides would have you believe. When reaching out for assistance, the answer from Dell (a few years ago) was to engage their consulting team.
• Built in scripts/agents: SharePlex comes with a handful of monitoring and management scripts that can be run as cron jobs. Unfortunately, these scripts are primitive and rigid, requiring the user to hard-code values into the script body and limiting their usefulness when you're running multiple replication streams. Some of the methods and dependencies are heavy. We ended up writing custom scripts that do what we need but it would be helpful if there were greater functionality and flexibility out of the box.
• Compared to other tools, there is not as wide (or at least as active) a user presence. If you're having difficulties you may have to engage a consultant since it's less likely that you'll find an answer in a forum or blog post.

Incentivized

• Moving a VM from one protection group to another could be simplified.
• I would like to see an executive-style report of recovery and testing for upper management.
• The ability to deploy Zerto as a virtual appliance, without the need for a windows server.

Incentivized

We depend on it to supply data to our various OLTP and Data Warehouse environments

Incentivized

We really like the easy setup of this replication solution, as well as the ease of management. Not to mention, our internal IT Economist determined that the Zerto solution would provide the best ROI out of the competing solutions we analyzed. So far, his calculations have been spot on, and we have saved substantially

Incentivized

It is very usable once you get over the initial setup.

Incentivized

Zerto is very easy to implement and support. Uses are broad, only issues are once something doesn't sync it is difficult to get assistance until your reach tier 2 or tier 3 support. Basic file and folder recovery is great. Live and test fail overs are also easy to implement without issue.

Incentivized

Support is very responsive. They take ownership of the problems and see them through to the finish. When a bug is found they work towards developing testing and making the fix available to us to solve the problem.

Incentivized

Very responsive, very capable. Overall, the product is very easy to set up and configure. Problems usually encroach when lower-level components are updated for changed, for instance, vSphere. Support usually can help us work through any issues that pop up from upgrades to other software, but their own updates can lag behind a little.

Incentivized

Ease and speed of initial co figuration.

Incentivized

SharePlex was a clear winner in comparison to its competitors. It beats GoldenGate on price, providing equivalent features and performance at a fraction of the price and without the need to license costly Oracle features at the database level. DB Visit was a strong contender for us as well and it is an excellent product I would also recommend, but it did not have quite enough of a user and community presence and penetration for our management to feel comfortable with.

Incentivized

Zerto solves issues with snapshot-based backups and provides continuous data protection up to 14 days with an astonishing granularity. Zerto's One-2-Many can provide local and offsite backups with near real-time and fast restore of a VM

Zerto does not backup physical machines or VMs that are turned off, but there are other products to do that.

Other backup products are stepping up with ease of deployment and small organizations would find them a little easier to use as there are fewer configuration options.

Incentivized

• Data migration allows the company to make solid business changes, more so on new business plans.
• Further, system flexibility supports multiple business plans, hence, efficient and reliable.
• Finally, real-time decisions are arrived at using SharePlex, a procedure that ensures there is transparency in the entire operations.

Incentivized

• DR and CyberSecurity recovery can be done in minutes or a few hours via Zerto, as opposed to days with backup/recovery.
• DR testing and recovery can be done anytime in an isolated environment to test recoverability and functionality.
• Zerto licensing is very affordable to protect critical business functions.
• On-prem to cloud migrations are very quick and easy to perform.

Incentivized