Arctera Backup Exec is a backup and disaster recovery solution. It works in virtual, physical, and multi-cloud environments and integrates with several third-party software releases and applications.
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IDERA SQL Safe Backup
Score 5.3 out of 10
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SQL Safe Backup from Houston based software company Idera is a data recovery and protection option.
$1,036
per instance with first year maintenance included
Pricing
Arctera Backup Exec
IDERA SQL Safe Backup
Editions & Modules
Veritas Backup Exec
Contact sales team
Standard via eCommerce
1,036.00
per instance with first year maintenance included
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Arctera Backup Exec
IDERA SQL Safe Backup
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
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More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Arctera Backup Exec
IDERA SQL Safe Backup
Features
Arctera Backup Exec
IDERA SQL Safe Backup
Data Center Backup
Comparison of Data Center Backup features of Product A and Product B
One of the differentials is that of all the backup tools I used, Veritas Backup Exec has the best management and control interface. It is very easy to use and configure the rules. There are several options that we can optimize our work for our specific needs, from scheduling a backup, restoring data, directories, alerts system, error reports, backups, inconsistencies and other very interesting things. It has integration with SQL, vmware, hyper v. Backup and restore speeds are fast and secure.
It may be cheap but the system stuck in the 90's, the UI\UX are not as you will expected. The alerts are not provide reliable evidence and human supervision is needed constantly. The system not knowing how to backup automatically the secondary server in the availability group, you need to configure that explicitly.
The user interface can sometimes be sluggish and hang between options.The minimum spec is 2Gb but if running on a dedicated server I think 4Gb is recommended
As more companies seem to be entering the backup software market, Acronis is very aggressive on pricing and even offer discounts if you are replacing other backup solutions, the Backup Exec pricing plans have become a more expensive
Our version is an older 2014 version and has inadequate support for VM backs
When you're adding a new SQL server, sometimes the install from the management server to the SQL server will fail. I'm guessing this happens because of some version difference in Windows components or similar. Not a huge deal because you can just copy the agent to the SQL server and install it there, but considering how easy everything else is, I would expect this to be a little more fluid.
I ran into a situation where part of our business decided to move their servers to a third-party data center. When they took away a SQL server that I was managing with SQL Safe, anything having to do with that policy took forever. Click. Wait 10 minutes. Window reacts. I'm guessing this is because the Management Console is trying super hard to contact the server in question, but I wish it handled losing a server better than it does.
This software is a mess in my brutally honest opinion. I've spent more time babysitting this software while backing up 20 servers than I did with Veeam backing up 600+. I've had multiple jobs run fine for weeks at a time that just randomly fail out of the blue for seemingly no reason whatsoever. There's no intuitive way to chain jobs, so automation becomes somewhat more problematic if certain jobs depend on other jobs. The forever incremental feature feels tacked on since the merge operation merges all your incremental jobs into the most recent backup and doesn't have the option set a limit on how long to keep your point in time restores.
It can do a lot of things on paper and sounds terrific, but in practice it doesn't do any of them well. It can easily be sold to non-technical minds and C-levels, but of all the backup solutions I've used in the last 15 years of my career, Backup Exec is easily the least fault tolerant. Unless this software is a sunk cost and you're on a shoestring budget, I recommend almost anything else. Jobs fail often with obscure error codes and the KB articles in the Veritas support portal are a mess. Within 30 days of a fresh deployment I've logged more tickets with their support than I did in 3 years with Veeam.
In the few instances of having to contact support, our overall outcome was always good. They would have received a better score if the wait time was less, but I attribute this to the timing of support calls - it was during the previous owner's time. We have not had to open a support ticket since Veritas Backup Exec took the product back over.
Veritas Backup Exec is very comparable to Unitrends and in some areas is easier to use. The license side of Veritas Backup Exec is much more difficult to manage compared to Unitrends. Unitrends seems to be a much smoother solutions to protect virtual environments. Restoring data with Veritas Backup Exec is logical and easier to achieve, Unitrends is a bit less logical or intuitive.
SQL Safe is the first managed backup solution I've used. Before SQL Safe I used SQL's native backup mechanism and scheduling. And as an extension of that I used Ola Hallengren's SQL Server Maintenance Solution (which is a set of scripts that take amazing advantage of SQL's native capabilities). However whenever changes were needed (moving backups to new storage, adding/removing a server), it just took a long time because I had to touch each server. With SQL Safe, I can seriously change the backup location of every server I have by changing one policy setting. Likewise, I can quickly add or remove a server from being backed up with a few simple clicks.
As the person tasked with the job of protecting the company's data, I am glad that Backup Exec performs that job well. I am able to often set-it-and-forget-it and go about the rest of my duties. I have never had a situation where Backup Exec was called upon to restore data and it was unable to do so. This reflects well on both me and my department and provides a sense of security to the rest of the company.
I am not making full use of the product and have not licensed a number of its features, but even the base feature set is impressive. To be clear, Backup Exec is no longer the only product we reply upon for data protection, but it is still a large part of that program. If an SMB can find the budget to afford to license the set of features meet its particular demands, Backup Exec will do what you need.
As an industry leader, Backup Exec is well positioned to stay at the head of the pack (as they have done for many years) and provide their customers with a comprehensive set of capabilities that will always remain in the forefront of technology.
SQL Safe allows me to spend less time managing my DR plan and still maintain confidence that my backups and restores are solid. Saving my time means saving money.
SQL Safe does an amazing job at backup compression over and above SQL's native compression. SQL backups are probably our single largest consumer of network drive space. Any product that helps reduce my network footprint, saves money.
