Help! Need an opensource backup solution to work with OVM, Linux, Windows, Sql server, Exchange, Sharepoint. Plus bare metal recovery.
Looking for an opensource backup solution. Currently using R1Soft and have major issues. We need the software to work with OVM, Linux, Windows, Sql server, Exchange, and Sharepoint. We also need bare metal recovery functionality.
Systems Admin at a wholesaler/distributor with 501-1,000 employees
Real User
Top 20
Oct 4, 2017
In my opinion, there should be no expense spared for protecting the companies data. I've used many solutions, and only one was open source. That was Bacula and I was only using it for Linux. Since there was no support, configuring took a lot of time and had to be manually maintained as to remove old backup data. It also created multiple backup files for a single server based upon backup data file size.
My suggestion would be find a paid solution that will handle all of your needs.
Things I would look for:
1. Reliability
2. Support
3. Redundancy
4. Data Deduplication
5. Capacity
6. Cost
Only you can determine how important your data is and what the cost would be if you were unable to recover the data or the system.
Search for a product comparison in Backup and Recovery
If you want an opensource application than there are severals, Amanda for instance.
If you want a backup software that has wide support, then Spectrum Protect is my best advice. Progressive incremental forever (always incremental backups). Philosophy: Why backing up data again if it has not been changed?
The fastest way to backup data is to not back it up (again).
Also faster for restoration as only one backup is needed to restore.
Has also many other features, such as replication (multiple copies of data on different sites), data reduction (de-duplication with compression) saves data, encryptions, and many more features.
If you want to have a simple interface and the ability to protect any data, then one can mount the Spectrum Protect storage like a filesystem using SPFS.
I would strongly recommend you Veritas Netbackup. It will solve all your problems.It will provide you a complete BMR functionality.If you need further information on this solution please do let me know.
Infrastructure Specialist at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Consultant
Oct 4, 2017
Not open source,but my recommendation is Veritas NetBackup.
It support a variety of environments and infrastructures, it's a very reliable and unified solution.
Find out what your peers are saying about Veeam Software, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Commvault and others in Backup and Recovery. Updated: January 2026.
In the old days we relied on the simple grandfather method of backups but recovery was painful. These days we have Tivoli Storage Manager across multiple OS for our production environment but across the whole business Avamar is used to provide DR to desktops and servers.
You get what you pay for. Don't skimp on cost as it will hurt you when it really counts.
You want a solution with minimal ongoing configuration so employing someone with key experience and skills when you commission the system is critical. Good quality planning and commissioning of the solution will likely only require ongoing monitoring and very little additional configuration.
With some careful planning, most commercial DR products will provide you enough to implement bare metal recovery too.
Product Manager at a tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Oct 4, 2017
Rather than looking at an open source solution, look for a solution that support open source. This provides you with multiple benefits. 1. You will have support when something goes wrong. 2. you will have a clear road-map on developments and enhancements 3. you will be able to reach out to trained certified professionals who will advise you on best practices and guide you when you have issues.
Having said all that, you also need to be sure you are not spending too much on this. Quest Netvault i think is a very good fit. It has a capacity based licensing model, that will help you buy an overall capacity and not really spend on any plug-ins. i think the price is also very attractive for 1 year support.
Both Bacula and Amanda can meet your requirement, and Bacula definitely does BARE METAL Recovery, I think AMANDA does also. These guys have no idea how good both of these apps are nowadays. Plus you can get the code.
Don't be bullied.
Senior Account Executive at a tech services company
Consultant
Oct 7, 2017
I'm surprised no one mentioned Unitrends in this thread. We normally lead with Unitrends and Veeam and they work well with many different environments -- virtual, physical -- various supervisors, various operating systems. I like Quest and Veritas as well. A good BURA/DR strategy depends on your level of pain tolerance in the event of an outage.
Never heared of it. I assume you are facing budget limitations, nevertheless the implied costs of losing and disclosing sensitive data, plus protecting it with an opensource platform could be way higher than initial investment on any back up and recovery tool.
This product has the capability of Backing up - with OVM, Linux, Windows, Sql server, Exchange, and Sharepoint. We also need bare metal recovery functionality.
Information Technology Technician at a tech vendor with 51-200 employees
Real User
Oct 5, 2017
Please be aware of that you select a backup software that also can protect your applications.
We selected Spectrum Protect because it can with 3rd part vendors LIGTAS
Area Sales Director, Asia Pacific at a tech vendor with 201-500 employees
Vendor
Oct 4, 2017
Hi, my view is similar to Justin. Unless that environment is really not so important and you just want to use a backup software to put some minimal amount of protection then go for open source. Otherwise if this means something to your business do buy a product so that there is product support when things break. In my view use Veeam or some common and proven products for backup software.
ICT Network Manager at a government with 501-1,000 employees
Vendor
Oct 4, 2017
hi,
In my time i have used Symantec backup Exec, Dell Appassure and now Arcserve UDP. I would recommend Arcserve UDP as it does bare metal recovery and can recover at file level and can back up to tape. We moved to arcserve only a few months ago and don't regret it.
At the same time we moved our SAN to reduxio. Have a look again highly recommended as it can give you very much less sleepless nights in these times of ransomware etc. Hope this helps.
Why opensource? Are you actually doing something with the source code or is it just a buzzword in the title? That kind of limits options. Are your servers virtualized in VMware or physical? If yes Veeam would cover your needs for the most part provided you don't need opensource software. Not sure about a solution for the OVMs though.
Based on requirements (what about amount of data - also a big factor?) your better options to go with commercial software (choice is endless). Besides mentioned, you may take a look into DPX (www.catalogicsoftware.com/products/dpx) covering all your needs and provides more.
I will recommend Symantec NetBackup of Commvault Simpana. Theses work very well with Linux, Windows, VMware, Oracle & SQL Databases, Microsoft Exchange and SHarepoint etc.
Advanced Technology Solution Specialist at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Oct 4, 2017
This is an interesting question. Your statement says you need an open source backup solution for an enterprise.
You then go on to list enterprise applications, OS and bare metal recovery as a functional requirement. This on the outside appears to be delivered by R1soft. Has R1soft not been able to resolve the issues?
Business risk, Data and availability are likely to be your most important reasons for data protection. I would question how you think using an open source product would be appropriate.
You have just stated you have issues with a vendor backed product.
At your time of need, are you going to trust an open source community to get your business back on line. Or will you trust a data protection vendor.
If you are offering it as a service, what costs would you have to wear as a result of non-compliance to a contract.
TL;DR
Backup = risk reduction
Don't take shortcuts
Backup and Recovery solutions protect data by regularly copying and securely storing it, ensuring quick restoration when necessary. These solutions minimize the impact of data loss, ensuring business continuity by restoring data in case of hardware failure, cyberattacks, or human error.
Backup and Recovery encompass a wide range of strategies and technologies designed to maintain data integrity. Businesses can leverage cloud-based storage, on-premises systems, or a combination of both to...
In my opinion, there should be no expense spared for protecting the companies data. I've used many solutions, and only one was open source. That was Bacula and I was only using it for Linux. Since there was no support, configuring took a lot of time and had to be manually maintained as to remove old backup data. It also created multiple backup files for a single server based upon backup data file size.
My suggestion would be find a paid solution that will handle all of your needs.
Things I would look for:
1. Reliability
2. Support
3. Redundancy
4. Data Deduplication
5. Capacity
6. Cost
Only you can determine how important your data is and what the cost would be if you were unable to recover the data or the system.
If you want an opensource application than there are severals, Amanda for instance.
If you want a backup software that has wide support, then Spectrum Protect is my best advice. Progressive incremental forever (always incremental backups). Philosophy: Why backing up data again if it has not been changed?
The fastest way to backup data is to not back it up (again).
Also faster for restoration as only one backup is needed to restore.
Has also many other features, such as replication (multiple copies of data on different sites), data reduction (de-duplication with compression) saves data, encryptions, and many more features.
If you want to have a simple interface and the ability to protect any data, then one can mount the Spectrum Protect storage like a filesystem using SPFS.
With SPFS one can protect almost any type of data
https://www-356.ibm.com/partne...;solution=56435&lc=en
Not open source, but Cobalt Iron and Veeam are both excellent and easy to implement backup solutions.
I would strongly recommend you Veritas Netbackup. It will solve all your problems.It will provide you a complete BMR functionality.If you need further information on this solution please do let me know.
Not open source,but my recommendation is Veritas NetBackup.
It support a variety of environments and infrastructures, it's a very reliable and unified solution.
i think your best bets are to Commvault or Netvualt. Other products like avmar, veeam, etc, do not support a lot of open source.
U need to check out avamar and veeam. I Would recommd veeam to you.
In the old days we relied on the simple grandfather method of backups but recovery was painful. These days we have Tivoli Storage Manager across multiple OS for our production environment but across the whole business Avamar is used to provide DR to desktops and servers.
You get what you pay for. Don't skimp on cost as it will hurt you when it really counts.
You want a solution with minimal ongoing configuration so employing someone with key experience and skills when you commission the system is critical. Good quality planning and commissioning of the solution will likely only require ongoing monitoring and very little additional configuration.
With some careful planning, most commercial DR products will provide you enough to implement bare metal recovery too.
Check Commvault backup solution.
PLz go through this link.. opensourceforu.com/2015/10/ten-must-have-open-source-tools-for-backup-and-recovery/
Rather than looking at an open source solution, look for a solution that support open source. This provides you with multiple benefits. 1. You will have support when something goes wrong. 2. you will have a clear road-map on developments and enhancements 3. you will be able to reach out to trained certified professionals who will advise you on best practices and guide you when you have issues.
Having said all that, you also need to be sure you are not spending too much on this. Quest Netvault i think is a very good fit. It has a capacity based licensing model, that will help you buy an overall capacity and not really spend on any plug-ins. i think the price is also very attractive for 1 year support.
I think Bacula.
I would go for Spectrum Protect, as it can be used to backup opensource databases with 3rd parts softwares from www.ligtas.org/
I use EMC Networker, but it does not have support for OVM.
See EMC Avamar, it has support for OVM.
Emailed you the Product Presentation slides.. bit its in PDF. let me know if you need the Power Point version.
Check out Atempo Time Navigator. I have had R1Soft, BakBone, ArcServe and Symantec clients change to Atempo.
Both Bacula and Amanda can meet your requirement, and Bacula definitely does BARE METAL Recovery, I think AMANDA does also. These guys have no idea how good both of these apps are nowadays. Plus you can get the code.
Don't be bullied.
I'm surprised no one mentioned Unitrends in this thread. We normally lead with Unitrends and Veeam and they work well with many different environments -- virtual, physical -- various supervisors, various operating systems. I like Quest and Veritas as well. A good BURA/DR strategy depends on your level of pain tolerance in the event of an outage.
Never heared of it. I assume you are facing budget limitations, nevertheless the implied costs of losing and disclosing sensitive data, plus protecting it with an opensource platform could be way higher than initial investment on any back up and recovery tool.
amanda.zmanda.com/
A robust Open source _Data Management solution
This product has the capability of Backing up - with OVM, Linux, Windows, Sql server, Exchange, and Sharepoint. We also need bare metal recovery functionality.
Please be aware of that you select a backup software that also can protect your applications.
We selected Spectrum Protect because it can with 3rd part vendors LIGTAS
www.ligtas.org/
Hi ,
I strongly recommend you Veritas Netbackup for all your operation.It will solve all your problem.
Please let me know if you need more information on this solution.
Open sourced based with commercial support and addons, www.infscape.com/
Hi, my view is similar to Justin. Unless that environment is really not so important and you just want to use a backup software to put some minimal amount of protection then go for open source. Otherwise if this means something to your business do buy a product so that there is product support when things break. In my view use Veeam or some common and proven products for backup software.
Drive down complexity and increase reliability by protecting all your data with a unified solution like Veritas Netbackup.
hi,
In my time i have used Symantec backup Exec, Dell Appassure and now Arcserve UDP. I would recommend Arcserve UDP as it does bare metal recovery and can recover at file level and can back up to tape. We moved to arcserve only a few months ago and don't regret it.
At the same time we moved our SAN to reduxio. Have a look again highly recommended as it can give you very much less sleepless nights in these times of ransomware etc. Hope this helps.
The reason for opensource is cost. We have had very good luck using open source applications and always try to go that route first.
Why opensource? Are you actually doing something with the source code or is it just a buzzword in the title? That kind of limits options. Are your servers virtualized in VMware or physical? If yes Veeam would cover your needs for the most part provided you don't need opensource software. Not sure about a solution for the OVMs though.
Based on requirements (what about amount of data - also a big factor?) your better options to go with commercial software (choice is endless). Besides mentioned, you may take a look into DPX (www.catalogicsoftware.com/products/dpx) covering all your needs and provides more.
I have used Mozy in the past and moved away from it to use Crashplan. I appreciate your feedback
Commvault backup software can be suggested for this requirement.
I will recommend Symantec NetBackup of Commvault Simpana. Theses work very well with Linux, Windows, VMware, Oracle & SQL Databases, Microsoft Exchange and SHarepoint etc.
I hope this works out well.
Hi,
You can use Backup like
BrightStor
www.ca.com/us.html
Backup Exec
www.symantec.com/en/au/products-solutions/families/advantages.jsp
The tough requirement you have is bare metal backup. Bacula or Amanda can handle the rest. Try looking on sourceforge.
Have you tried vProtect or Bacula?
This is an interesting question. Your statement says you need an open source backup solution for an enterprise.
You then go on to list enterprise applications, OS and bare metal recovery as a functional requirement. This on the outside appears to be delivered by R1soft. Has R1soft not been able to resolve the issues?
Business risk, Data and availability are likely to be your most important reasons for data protection. I would question how you think using an open source product would be appropriate.
You have just stated you have issues with a vendor backed product.
At your time of need, are you going to trust an open source community to get your business back on line. Or will you trust a data protection vendor.
If you are offering it as a service, what costs would you have to wear as a result of non-compliance to a contract.
TL;DR
Backup = risk reduction
Don't take shortcuts
blog.bacula.org/
I Suggest you look at HPE Data Protector
Have you checked on Bacula? It is open source and should help you.
If your budget allows, go for MozyPro or higher, with a Server Plan.
Best Software for Backup and Recovery specially for Bare Metal is Veritas Netbackup!!!