Try CrashPlan Pro. It will become your "Crash Plan"
Updated September 07, 2016
Try CrashPlan Pro. It will become your "Crash Plan"
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with CrashPlan
We have 15 local users and 35 remote users. I set up a parent and two sub organizations. The subs were set not to inherit the parent settings so I could control who could make changes to the settings. The remote users are locked down so we can be compliant with regulations about data archiving and retention. Remote users can not delete from backups and backups are set for unlimited retention. The backup is set to run continuously. The only issue we have had was with a user that has a satellite internet connection with limited or capped data. The first backup used most of her data allotment for the month. Users had to be educated to leave their computer on while the first backup was running.
- After the install the user doesn't have to do anything. Our remote users were used to having to copy data to an external drive for archiving. Which meant it usually wasn't done. The central office didn't have access to any of those files either.
- I am able to monitor which users are backed up and contact those that appear to be having issues.
- Since the install package exceeded the attachment size allowed with our email client I included an HTML link to the location of the download.
- The install took less than 10 minutes including the download of the software. Our documentation included screen shots of what the user should expect to see. This allowed remote users to install without having central IT get involved.
- The management website times out frequently requiring a re-login.
- Some of the information reported isn't consistent. Because each user can have multiple devices the number of devices doesn't match user number.
- The number of users is the number of accounts that you have set up. Not the number of active users.
- Some of the settings report inaccurately when first entering the screen. Refreshing the screen will update the settings. The help desk is aware of the problem and they are working to resolve the issue.
- We were using iDrive for the central office backup. With the amount of data we were using monthly the upgraded plan would have cost us as much as the entire install of Crashplan.
- Getting a backup solution for our remote users was a very high priority. We paid for the dedicated engineer to help with the install. This saved a lot of time researching or hunting information for the install. It paid for itself is saved time for our IT department.
The deduplication feature and continuous backup puts this application ahead of others. The ability to prevent users from deleting files from backups is another feature that was attractive for our management and legal team. Set and forget is great. No intervention from the remote user is even better. I don't have to worry about whether they did the backup. Cost wise the application is on par with other cloud based backup [solutions]. Plus CrashPlan will keep the user from deleting files from the backups. We evaluated iDrive, Carbonite, Zipcloud, BitCasa, and SpiderOak. CrashPlan required a little more IT setup on the front end but was a better fit for our organization.
Using CrashPlan
IT Manager
All you need is a browser pointed to the dashboard site. Select the area you need to look into.
- Employee changed a BIG excel spread sheet and the formulas stopped working. Restored to previous version in seconds.
- Complete user profile restore after a hard drive crashed.
- local restore of a remote users files when cloning a laptop for a new employee
- Ransom ware recovery.
- Meet government requirements for data retention.
- Peace of mind for our board knowing we have the data backed up and accessible.
Evaluating CrashPlan and Competitors
Yes - We used several "solutions" for data backup. None was centrally managed. None allowed us to see the backup was actually being done.
- Price
- Product Features
- Product Usability
- Product Reputation
- Third-party Reviews
Just look at the other users. There are some pretty heavy hitters there.
Look at crash plan sooner.
CrashPlan Implementation
- Implemented in-house
Change management was minimal - Plan on a couple hours to work with the install engineer.
- Getting remote users to install.
CrashPlan Support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed No escalation required Immediate help available Support understands my problem Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response | None |
Yes - It is a separate line on the invoice but charge is zero.
From the start. They assigned a dedicated support engineer to get us up. He stayed on the phone until The install was up. Any questions I had or things that I wasn't clear on were answered right away.
Using CrashPlan
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Like to use Relatively simple Easy to use Technical support not required Well integrated Consistent Quick to learn Convenient Feel confident using Familiar | None |
- How about a central dashboard for the program.
- Make a change and push it out to all or a select group of users.
- No remote user intervention required.
- A function I used (night dashboard look) was removed in an update. I had to search to find why it changed and wasn't working.
Yes - Web based dashboard. Look at it from anyplace.