We compared Dell Avamar and IBM Spectrum Protect based on user reviews in five categories. We reviewed all of the data and you can find the conclusion below.
Features: Dell Avamar earns acclaim for its scalability, data compression capabilities, swift incremental backups, and seamless integration with Data Domain and VM stacks. IBM Spectrum Protect is highly regarded for its ability to integrate with tape libraries and its customization options. Users also praised Spectrum Protect for its compatibility with various products, scalability, and stability. Dell Avamar could improve its tape connectivity and bare-metal restoration. Users also requested better Azure backups and a more user-friendly interface. IBM Spectrum Protect could improve its integration with cloud services and make its interface more user-friendly.
Service and Support: Some customers express satisfaction with Dell support, but others said there is room for improvement. IBM’s customer service is described as high quality, friendly, knowledgeable, and responsive. At the same time, some said the support process can be lengthy.
Ease of Deployment: Opinions on Dell Avamar’s setup were mixed. Some users found it to be straightforward, while others considered it complex and difficult. Deployment time ranged from a few hours to a week, and assistance from Dell engineers might be necessary. IBM Spectrum Protect's initial setup is challenging and demands skilled professionals to configure multiple parameters and features. This process can be time-consuming.
Pricing: Dell Avamar’s pricing is generally seen as reasonable, but some users think it is expensive. IBM Spectrum Protect is considered expensive. The pricing model is complex, taking into account factors like processor type and volume.
ROI: Dell Avamar provides cost savings through data reduction, deduplication, and compression. Users have realized benefits from IBM Spectrum Protect’s data protection and retrieval. They appreciate its ability to reduce storage requirements with larger tape sizes.
Comparison Results: Dell Avamar is a scalable solution that offers excellent data compression and fast compression. However, Avamar earned mixed reviews for support, deployment, and pricing. Users also requested better Azure and bare-metal backups and restoration capabilities. IBM Spectrum Protect is a reliable, customizable solution that allows smooth integration with tape libraries. At the same time, some say that the user interface could be more intuitive and Spectrum Protect could integrate better with the cloud.
"Source based deduplication is the most attractive feature as it drastically reduces the backup window."
"The most valuable feature is the integration with Data Domain and your VM stacks."
"The setup is very easy."
"Dell EMC Avamar is very good with endpoint backups."
"The data reduction feature and the ease of enabling a server in a DR location are the most valuable."
"The installation of the solution is easy."
"Avamar's source side deduplication is very strong, it can easily back up remote sites' data, and not much bandwidth is required on the Avamar side."
"Dell Avamar has helped our organization by allowing us to do backups."
"The ability to use S3 Data Store as a repository."
"The interface is easy to use."
"The most valuable feature for data recovery in IBM Spectrum Protect is its database protection capabilities."
"It is good in terms of functionality. My clients are very satisfied with this solution."
"Incremental forever: This feature helps us reduce backup time and backup storage space."
"In general, the solution is quite user-friendly. The GUI is very nice."
"For initial setup, we started with the blueprints, which were great. The blueprints allowed us to be able to decide if we needed to use small, medium,k or large. Because we are a large environment, we used a large blueprint. Once we followed everything in the blueprint, it was a smooth transition from there."
"It is pretty scalable. It will scale to anything."
"I want to see a more user-friendly and administrator-friendly Dell Avamar. The solution also needs a better UI and dashboard."
"The solution is not very strong on the Cloud. They should work out how they can use this as a backup as a service."
"It lacks support for certain plugins, like SAP HANA, for example."
"Its ability to back up very large objects can be improved. In terms of new features, they can include the ability to use cloud services, like S3, more natively."
"I would like to see better integration with third-party applications and platforms."
"It was challenging to back up our Exchange database, which is one of the reasons we did not continue using this solution."
"More integration would be helpful, as well as the addition of more applications."
"The product could be improved by simplifying the components available."
"We should be talking about the capacity of the tape drives. That's the only problem."
"It might be seen as leaning towards the legacy side, missing some features of newer solutions. The main drawbacks would be its complexity and high pricing."
"There is room for improvement in the service aspect."
"I would like to see a way to have "always on" implemented."
"Its price can be better. It is very expensive. Its interface is very old and not user friendly. They can improve its interface. Their support can also be better. My clients are not very satisfied with the support because they are not really quick."
"The solution is evolving, so it has to be evolved to fit all new types of software requirements too."
"The product’s recovery process in terms of agent installation needs improvement"
"IBM's support hasn't been so good in the last few years."
Dell Avamar is ranked 13th in Backup and Recovery with 81 reviews while IBM Spectrum Protect is ranked 17th in Backup and Recovery with 146 reviews. Dell Avamar is rated 7.8, while IBM Spectrum Protect is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Dell Avamar writes "Stable, integrates well with other solutions, and has a good price, but its UI needs a refresh". On the other hand, the top reviewer of IBM Spectrum Protect writes "Performance and recoveries are better, and customers are happier with performance". Dell Avamar is most compared with Dell PowerProtect Data Manager, Veeam Backup & Replication, Dell NetWorker, Dell PowerProtect DP (IDPA) and Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain), whereas IBM Spectrum Protect is most compared with IBM Spectrum Protect Plus, Veeam Backup & Replication, Commvault Cloud, Cohesity DataProtect and NAKIVO Backup & Replication. See our Dell Avamar vs. IBM Spectrum Protect report.
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