Symmetrix Remote Data Facility Review

Reliability and stability, 3 SAN storage star replication (1 box only with storage cache, no disks).

Currently is not used but was implemented 4 years ago for UNIX filesystems and Oracle DB replication.

SRDF compared with EMC Recover Point has less capabilities, for ex. CDP (local or remote) is missing, only EMC assets compatibility, as a TCO is more expensive than implementing IBM SVC or EMC VPLEX virtualization and replication (more supported assets).

2 years.

No.

No.

No.

Very good.

Very good.

Because lack in systems heterogeneous support, only EMC storage, no CDP, no visual planned/unplanned switch framework for failover/failback.

No, very easy but need to understand differences compatible with IBM SAN Storages.

Yes we used a local vendor S&T SRL.

I cannot say SRDF has a ROI because its role is to mitigate the risks such as system unavailability or system loss (DR).

This info is confidential but the TCO is very good compared with other vendors.

In the past we used IBM Remote replication and mirroring.

My advice in nowadays is to look first inside current infrastructure and decide if SRDF is the only choice, for ex. we use mixed data replication: DB replication or application aware replication or filesystem/block level. We use CDP features where is available but we are oriented for app level replication and integrity.