{"id":5007,"date":"2022-09-29T12:03:55","date_gmt":"2022-09-29T16:03:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/solutionsreview.com\/backup-disaster-recovery\/?p=5007"},"modified":"2022-10-04T17:08:30","modified_gmt":"2022-10-04T21:08:30","slug":"software-defined-backup-vs-appliances-whats-the-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/solutionsreview.com\/backup-disaster-recovery\/software-defined-backup-vs-appliances-whats-the-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Software-Defined Backup vs. Appliances; What’s the Difference?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Software-Defined<\/p>\n

This is part of Solutions Review\u2019s Premium Content Series, a collection of contributed columns written by industry experts in maturing software categories. In this submission, FalconStor<\/a> Vice President of Customer Success Abdul Hashmi offers a comparison of software-defined backup vs. appliances.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"Enterprises large and small need to consider 10 factors when choosing between a software-defined backup target or a dedicated all-in-one backup appliance for data protection<\/a><\/strong><\/span> and disaster recovery<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. The primary goal of the best enterprise backup solutions<\/a><\/strong><\/span> is to protect the ever-increasing amount of mission-critical data in the daily backups, and eliminate tapes to simplify the backup process with a backup system that optimizes data management<\/a><\/strong><\/span>, data recovery, data storage<\/a><\/strong><\/span>, and retention.<\/p>\n

Enterprises are looking for automated, tape-free backups at their site that can keep up with the demands of daily backups, offsite replication, cloud storage, and business continuity<\/a><\/strong><\/span> in the face of a malware or ransomware attack.<\/p>\n

The challenge is that each customer site needs to be outfitted with a backup-to-disk target that is tailored for their needs today and will grow with them in the future to accommodate their needs. Each customer site has their favorite hardware vendors with whom they have negotiated pricing, and in which their people are trained. The same is true for the MSP\u2019s data center.<\/p>\n

MSPs should not use purpose-built backup appliances (PBBA) as the basis for their BaaS offering to their customers. Rather, they should seek a software-defined backup-to-disk target that supports cloud backup and cloud environments, runs on industry-standard servers, can be scaled-out as needs grow, and that can use servers and storage from any vendor. Here are ten reasons why:<\/p>\n

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\"Download<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div><\/div>\n

Appliances are Special Hardware from one Vendor, with Special Administration Needs<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Every MSP and enterprise have their favorite vendors and models of servers, networking equipment, and storage.\u00a0 Uniformity in the datacenter is important so there is little enthusiasm for specialized hardware that requires specialized training and administration, such as dedicated backup-to-disk appliances. With a software-defined approach datacenters can run on the industry-standard hardware they have already negotiated pricing for, know, and prefer.<\/p>\n

Limited Appliance Configurations Make it Hard to Get the Right fit for Each Customer Site <\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Backup-to-disk appliances come in a fixed selection of sizes from small to medium to large to extra-large.\u00a0 However, it is inevitable that the backup-to-disk appliance chosen for a given customer site is going to either be too big or too small to meet the needs, so it\u2019s not a perfect fit, wasting money. Some sites are tiny, while others are large and demanding. With a software-defined backup-to-disk target, you get a perfect fit every time for customer sites extra-large and small.<\/p>\n

Cannot scale CPU, RAM, and Storage Separately to Meet Needs Over Time<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Backup-to-disk appliances come with a fixed amount of CPU and RAM, bundled with the fixed amount of storage, that is held captive within the appliance, and can be extended with additional disk shelves.\u00a0 As disks are added to the base configuration, it will place additional demands upon the fixed amount of CPU and RAM, so the backup-to-disk appliance runs slower and slower as it fills up.\u00a0 With a software-defined backup-to-disk target, you can add additional industry-standard servers to increase your compute power and it\u2019s easy to expand storage by increasing the size of the storage that you provide to it, saving money.<\/p>\n

Can<\/strong>\u2019t Increase I\/O Throughput or Data Deduplication Horsepower of an Appliance if Required <\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Once a backup-to-disk appliance has been selected it will deliver a fixed amount of I\/O throughput that cannot be increased.\u00a0 More importantly for some, in demanding environments when data deduplication cannot keep up there is no ability to increase the deduplication horsepower.\u00a0 Some backup-to-disk appliances have found a way to protect data by stealing CPU Power from the backup servers and application servers to mitigate this architectural problem. Sound scary? When the backup-to-disk target is software-defined, you can add additional servers to increase your IO throughput or your deduplication horsepower or both, if needed.<\/p>\n

Storage is Trapped in Backup-to-Disk Appliances, Rather Than Being on a SAN<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Backup-to-disk appliances have a limited amount of storage.\u00a0 Data center operators know that storage capacity should be in a disk array or an object storage system that is accessed over the SAN or Ethernet network.\u00a0 By centralizing storage, it can be allocated where it is needed, and all storage gets managed uniformly at scale.\u00a0 Once again, a software-defined backup-to-disk target provides an advantage over a backup-to-disk appliance because it uses storage provided to it by the storage administrator. Centralizing storage externally slashes storage costs.<\/p>\n

An expensive Forklift Upgrade will Happen as you Outgrow the Smaller Appliance<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Whichever size backup-to-disk appliance a customer selects, they\u2019re going to outgrow it.\u00a0 Then the customer is forced into an expensive and disruptive forklift upgrade from their old backup-to-disk appliance to the new bigger one.\u00a0 When a backup-to-disk target is software-defined, you just add virtual machines or industry-standard servers in a high-availability configuration to protect against hardware failures and downtime as well as storage available from any vendor that you prefer for a smooth and painless upgrade.<\/p>\n

Having a Twin at the MSP for Every Appliance at a Customer Site is not a Good Architecture<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

When it comes to hybrid cloud and public cloud recovery solutions, it certainly works to put a backup-to-disk appliance at each customer site and a matching one at the hub, where each customer site\u2019s backup data can be securely stored offsite but is far from optimal.\u00a0 At the hub you don\u2019t need much deduplication horsepower because the data that\u2019s coming in is already deduplicated at the edge, at the customer site.<\/p>\n

What you need at the hub is a large amount of inexpensive storage that can be used to service all the customer sites securely.\u00a0 With a software-defined backup-to-disk target the exact right fit of hardware can be placed at each customer site and at the hub, be it at an MSP data center, or at the data center of an enterprise. Further, multi-tenant management across sites and clouds is required, which is only provided by the best backup-to-disk software-defined products.<\/p>\n

Can<\/strong>\u2019t Tap External Object Storage and Object Archive Storage to Save Money on Backup Storage<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Backup-to-disk appliances use storage that is provided, and the price cannot be negotiated separately.\u00a0 Most customers want the ability to leverage inexpensive object storage on-premises or in the cloud for storage of backup data and retention for years to protect against data loss for their scheduled backups.\u00a0 This can make a big difference in the storage bill that will accrue. The best software-defined backup to disk targets can leverage object storage, decreasing storage costs.<\/p>\n

Appliances Result in Lock-in to the Backup-to-Disk Appliance Vendor and Expensive Upgrades<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Negotiating the price for the new backup-to-disk appliance is not an easy task because there\u2019s only one vendor that makes that backup-to-disk appliance.\u00a0 The customer is forced into an expensive and disruptive forklift upgrade from their old backup-to-disk appliance to the new bigger one.\u00a0 When a backup-to-disk target is software-defined, you just at industry-standard servers and storage available from any vendor that you prefer, and they all must compete for your business are you get the best price possible.<\/p>\n

Backup-to-Disk Appliances Can<\/strong>\u2019t Read and Write Physical Tapes, Which Enterprises Require<\/strong><\/h3>\n

While the future is all about a scenario in which the on-premises backups are protected by transmitting them securely to a remote site for safety, the past has been all about tapes.\u00a0 This means it organizations have hundreds and thousands of legacy tapes that they need to read.\u00a0 Backup-to-disk appliances cannot read old tapes.\u00a0 They cannot refresh whole tapes either.\u00a0 And they cannot create physical tapes to be sent to offsite locations which is the preferred method by many organizations today.\u00a0 The best software-defined backup to disk targets support modern physical tape libraries and all the con and tape formats to provide the bridge that customers need to move from the past to the future which is touch-free and tape-free.<\/p>\n

A Software-Defined Backup-to-Disk Target Overcomes All of the Backup-to-Disk Appliance<\/strong>\u2019s Problems<\/strong><\/h3>\n

When it comes to protection solutions When the backup-to-disk target is 100 percent software-defined, runs on industry-standard servers, and can use hardware from any vendor, MSPs can tailor fit a solution for each customer site that is perfect on day one, and will scale effortlessly as the customer\u2019s needs grow over time. Each customer can use the hardware they prefer, and the MSP can purchase the hardware they prefer to run in their data center.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
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\"Download<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is part of Solutions Review\u2019s Premium Content Series, a collection of contributed columns written by industry experts in maturing software categories. In this submission, FalconStor Vice President of Customer Success Abdul Hashmi offers a comparison of software-defined backup vs. appliances. Enterprises large and small need to consider 10 factors when choosing between a software-defined […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341,"featured_media":5008,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1245,32],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSoftware-Defined Backup vs. Appliances; What's the Difference?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"FalconStor Vice President of Customer Success Abdul Hashmi offers a comparison of software-defined backup vs. appliances.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/solutionsreview.com\/backup-disaster-recovery\/software-defined-backup-vs-appliances-whats-the-difference\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Abdul Hashmi\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"9 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/solutionsreview.com\/backup-disaster-recovery\/software-defined-backup-vs-appliances-whats-the-difference\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/solutionsreview.com\/backup-disaster-recovery\/software-defined-backup-vs-appliances-whats-the-difference\/\",\"name\":\"Software-Defined Backup vs. Appliances; 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