Recommended backup software for PowerVault RD1000

Question

We recently purchased two PowerVault RD1000 (in the rack mount) to backup our PowerEdge R310 running Windows SBS 2011 locally. The hardware is very good: the RD1000 is easy to install, the cartages are solid and data transfer is relatively fast (thought the R310 has only USB 2.0 ports). On the software side, however, I am not fully satisfied. The Windows backup application does not recognize the cartiges as removable storage devices. That is probably a limitation of the OS, but annoying nevertheless because it is a very simple solution. The software that comes with the RD1000, Retrospect, feels unintuitive and lacks a few important options such as backing up open files which is a must for us. Since I have to purchase this option separately, I am wondering if not buying something else altogether. I looked into Symantec Backup Exec and although a little pricey, it seems a more complete option (I think it came with earlier versions of the RD1000, not anymore). Alternatively, there seem to be a number of appliances that could do. In the medium to long term, I am planning to move to an online backups solution (probably when we upgrade to Windows 2012 Server), but I would like to keep a local copy with frequent local files snapshots as well and the RD1000 seem to be a good option, especially for archiving the data periodically. Currently we have a Windows Small Business Server 2011, but we are not using the Exchange and SharePoint servers as I moved that to a cloud solution already. What software, appliance, or other type of solution would you recommend? Thank you.

Addicus1111 · Answer

I wish I never purchased the RD 1000....Win 2012 doesn't recognize it under Windows Server Backup. I have looked for newer drivers with no such luck. I tried Veeam Backup Software and they don't offer at this time a way to rotate offsite media including tape solutions.

Good Luck and if you find something that works let me know

Dev Mgr · Answer

Have you looked into solutions from Symantec, Arcserve or Commvault?

giovanni79 · Answer

@Dev yes, but they are so expensive and they are kind of a double thing when Windows SBS 2011 supports backing up to removable USB drives.

giovanni79 · Answer

Windows was never very good with tape drives and for some reason, the RD1000 is treated as such... Not sure why. It would be so good if it worked out of the box.

SMARTech · Answer

Use backupassist which fully supports RDX drives.  You can find more info here: www.backupassist.com/index.html

RPaguaga · Answer

I use Retrospect (8.1), provided by Dell. Works fine with RD1000 under Win 2012. Thanks

jflores476 · Answer

Why doesn't Dell mention this as a limitation on the product page?

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