EMC NetWorker

Networker has so many features that allow me to backup in a very detailed manner.

Troubleshooting could take a while, due to all the options available. However, this is a good thing.

Learn all the features, and you’ll enjoy the granularity the product offers.

Network is excellent for file level backup. I also like the deduplication.

Managibility, since EMC bought it, my opinion, is at least 500% better now than it was. We have it writing to Data Domain now, tape is gone. I've worked with Avamar too, but the ability to find a file when the location (directory is unknown is one of my favorite reasons. The indexes may be found to be its undoing one day, Avamar keeps the index in the saves (self referencing. But as it is now replication, cloning in NetWorker, to a hot site, works as three saves, the one at home site, the save to the hot site, and the index of the save to hot site. So, if you're thinking of implementing it, assure you test DR until you can recover at the hot site before signing off on replication functionality. Implementation of NetWorker can be completed by the client, Avamar and Data Domain require EMC or EMC partner to implement. So NetWorker is possibly more affordable, but if you get it, you'll definitely want Data Domain too, unless you don't have much data to save. NetWorker is saving over 20 petabytes at some implementations currently, and exabytes are probably less than 10 years off. With the amount of data being generated, I wouldn't trust anything but EMC NetWorker or Avamar. I think NetWorker will recover from a disaster faster than Avamar currently though, where you don't have a hot site. I've worked with NetWorker since version 4 in 1999 and Avamar 5 since 2011. I currently use NetWorker 8.2 on Data Domain and Avamar 7 on Avamar Data Store Gen4s. NetWorker and Avamar will most likely merge in the not too distant future with Data Domain or the Avamar Data Store as the storage media in the near future; no one will come close to the value in that for data protection.

Indexes in NetWorker for very large clients, where retention time is long and often. Very large indexes may be its downfall. If you're going to implement with very large servers, millions of files per server; over 5 million, go with Avamar. Indexes have to be in excess of 2.5 gb also go with Avamar. Avamar has index size solved by saving the index into the save. Even Avamar isn't designed for systems with over 10 million files per client. The presave has to look at all the files they will save and deduplication has to also for both products.

Protecting data. Since no longer using tapes, recoveries haven't failed.

I enjoy the way Netoworker makes Me think when troubleshooting. It provides reliable and fast recovery options. I throughly enjoy how it handles virtual machines as I work daily with them.

there isn't much I don't dislike. I would say that rebuilding a library is pretty tedious work, it's fun but time consuming, I have found.

I recommend .

library issues are huge, I like how the daemon log is easy to pull to find what my problem is.

EMC support is top notch. Creating jobs and labels is more streamlined. restores are more friendlier than Netbackup

sensitive to Windows patching and Java updates.

using multiple libraries to support multiple projects and their data retention requirements. data growth estimates through backups.

Despite the revised GUI interface in recent years, which is excellent, like most applications built on UNIX technology, everything is a file/command line underneath. This gives me the confidence of being in total control of the product. I also just like the logical way it's designed, i.e. with clients that are added to savegroups, and savegroups that are run according to a schedule. It makes it easy to control the timing of the backups of specific systems in the enterprise.

I love the mminfo command for reporting on backup clients statuses - definitely one to learn!

As Networker is an enterprise backup tool, and has a necessarily comprehensive GUI that can be quite intimidating upon first sight. Once shown/trained on how to configure a client and add it to the backup schedule, it's really quite straight forward though and everything is pretty much where you'd expect to find it. For absolute confidence, I'd recommend formal training funded by your employer and embracing the command line.. It's one product that definitely justifies knowing what you're doing end-to-end.

I'd definitely recommend official training. I was fortunate enough to have it back in 2000 and the product has evolved but the fundamental commands and the way it works remains the same. It is training you'd benefit from for your entire career as it doesn't become obsolete like many products from other vendors.

My current client has moved a huge number of servers, storage, databases and applications to remote datacenters and networker 6 and emc data domain were the products of choice to back it all up and de-duplicate the save sets which are then replicated to a second remote datacenter for disaster recovery purposes. backing up such a large eclectic mix of different nas vendors filesystems, vmware datastores, different databases on different operating systems along with exchange etc and replicating those savesets to a remote facility with very few failures is no easy task, but emc Networker makes it easy and Data Domain deduplication is so efficient that the unique blocks of saveset data achieve a 96% compression rate, making replication of that data to a remote site easy. You'd think that data that is that compressed/deduplicated would take an age to recover but in fact the opposite is true. Recoveries are insanely fast too. It is quite possibly the most impressive tech I've seen in a decade after VMWare ESXi. The details of the specific challenges overcome can be read on my blog here. I am independent and not affiliated with emc (at the time of writing.

http://www.cyberfella.co.uk/2012/08/28/emc-networker/

Rich feature and multiple ways to use it, I hope it is in the cloud.

nothing specific dislike but if they can improve some UI, it will be better.

It is pretty good if you are a large organization.

Disaster recovery

What do you like best?

What do you dislike?

Install and maintain enterprise class backup / recovery using EMC Networker & Avamar. Networker architecture and functionality of all application components such as Master Servers, Storage Nodes, Media Pools, Clients and Juke box configurations etc.

Networker Management Console on a virtual Windows platform.

we work on data center and installation, configuration of the enterprise using networker.

Multi application / platform support especially with legacy applications and less widespread platforms. We are able to protect all our applications including, but not limited to : Informix, MySQL, Oracle, SAP, SQL, AD, OpenVMS, SharePoint, Exchange, Domino Lotus products, windows, linux, Solaris, etc.

Lack of QA done by EMC on new releases, sub par backup application modules for Microsoft Applications. Expect bad Microsoft Applications Integration. (Exchange, SP, SQL, AD. Very slow compared to all other applications supported.

Good value, excellent customer service, great product, timely new features,

Disaster Recovery, good RPO / RTO solutions in Data Protection

I would say I like the reliability of the product. I have been using it in my past positions almost 20 years. Nothing feels worse when a restore needs to be done and for whatever reason, you are not able to get the file(s back. That is not to say other products are unreliable, but Networker definitely fits into my comfort zone. Over the years, I have used Windows, True64, and Solaris as backup hosts. When I started at my present job, we had Backup Exec everywhere with multiple backup hosts everywhere to keep track of. It was nice to consolidate all of them on a single target host.

The restore progress window in version 7.6 goes blank so you can't see what is going on. I am building a new server with version 8.2 so we will see if that is better and possibly if this is caused by a server bottleneck. Also, I must admit I have never looked to see if there is a solution to this, so it really just has been a minor nuisance.

Protection and consolidation from multiple backup solutions. DR with backup replication (Data Domain, cost savings since we no longer have to send tapes off site, daily.