What has VMware quietly created? VDR is VMware's introduction into the backup market, and it is a disk-based backup and recovery solution that is easily deployed as a virtual machine. It is fully integrated with VMware vCenter Server, and it enables centralized management of backup jobs. It also includes data de-duplication to save on disk storage.
So if backing up and restoring virtual machines is so important, what took VMware so long and why aren't they tooting their own horn? Like so many other features added into vSphere, VDR is a welcome addition to the vSphere virtualization suite. However, it too puts VMware directly in competition with its long-term ecosystem partners like backup solution providers PHD Virtual, Symantec, Veeam, and Vizioncore.
Doug Hazelman, director of the Global Systems Engineer Group for Veeam, agreed that VMware has been quiet about this latest product. "We believe that's because they don't intend this as a strong move into the backup market, and they don't want to upset their ecosystem partners," he explained.
Hazelman added, "In our opinion, this is a 'good enough' solution designed to offer a built-in option for very small customers with 10-20 VMs who have requested it. For organizations that need a mature, feature-reach product, we believe VMware will continue to rely on its partners, like Veeam."
Veeam isn't worried about VMware entering the backup market. The company noted the Veeam Backup & Replication product is in its fourth generation now, and it offers advanced data protection options that VMware's solution does not. It also claims to have a superior architecture as the Veeam solution doesn't add a burden on the ESX host for backup activities, and they offer replication and backup in a single product.
While VMware may not be able to compete head-to-head right now with other backup solutions on the market, it is making enhancements with its new version of Data Recovery 1.1:
- File level restore functionality — File Level Restore (FLR) provides a way to access individual files within restore points for Windows virtual machines. While the feature itself isn't new, it is now officially supported with this release and no longer "experimental."
- Integrity check stability and performance improved — VMware says the integrity check process is now faster and more stable. But keep in mind, these checks are computationally intensive processes and can take significant periods of time.
- Integrity checks provides improved progress information — VMware has improved the process with a progress indicator display, although it still may not provide all of the levels of detail some require.
- Enhanced CIFS shares support — The backup appliance can now use CIFS shares for storing restore points.
- Support for Windows 2008 R2 and Windows 7 virtual machines — Requires upgrading the vSphere 4.0 Update 1.
- Requires upgrading the vSphere 4.0 Update 1.
VMware Data Recovery is improving but still has a long way to go. However, this appliance may provide "just enough" basic functionality today for a small VMware environment's backup and restore needs. If you need more features and functionality or need to backup more than 100 guest virtual machines (today's limit with VDR), you probably want to consider one of the other third-party virtualization backup solutions currently available. They all provide quite a bit more functionality and have been proven for quite some time now.
VDR is included in vSphere Enterprise Plus, Advanced, and Essentials Plus Editions, but can also be purchased a la carte with vSphere Standard Edition.
