A lot has been written about the size and scope of the purpose built backup appliance (PBBA) market. When backup appliances first came to market over a decade ago, they were designed primarily as large disk repositories, some of which incorporated deduplication and compression, and provided support for multiple backup applications. In recent years, some industry analysts have further segmented the market into “integrated backup appliances”. The challenge is this definition is misleading and doesn’t convey what actually constitutes an integrated solution.
At its most basic level, a backup appliance is a disk based deduplication backup platform which enables an existing backup application to store data on it via a CIFS or NFS share. While this is an important attribute, the real value of an integrated backup appliance is its ability to natively provide support for multiple applications simultaneously.
For example, the backup administrator may use a centralized backup application to backup critical business systems like Microsoft Exchange and user files, while an Oracle database administrator may choose to control their backup information through Oracle Recovery Manager (RMAN). Additionally, the virtual machine administrator may also be protecting server images with a VMware specific backup application like VRanger. Ideally, an integrated backup appliance would be able to accept backup workloads from all of these applications and universally deduplicate and store this information to attain the highest backup storage efficiency.
Going further integrated backup appliances could develop specific software modules so that each of the above environments could off-load some of the deduplication workload. For example, EMC’s Data Domain BOOST software technology can be used in conjunction with an existing backup application, like Symantec NetBackup, EMC NetWorker, Oracle RMAN or Dell’s NetVault product, amongst many others, to reduce the amount of data moved over network connections during the backup window. By moving deduplication processes upstream to the application or media server, where data resides, both backup window and network bandwidth reductions can be realized.
Regrettably, like many other industry terms, the term “integrated backup appliance” has been mis-applied to some backup offerings which are more proprietary in nature, resulting in confusion. As an example, some vendors have bundled their backup application on to OEM’d server and disk hardware and have labeled their appliance as an integrated solution. To be fair, this could help enable the rapid deployment of a backup system as everything is already pre-integrated. The end user merely has to supply power, an IP connection and configure the backup systems for protection and they’re done. But is that really “integrated”? And, aside from initial deployment speed, what’s the ongoing benefit of that type of integration?
The downside to this approach, however, is that any business system that can benefit from disk-based deduplication will have to use that vendor’s proprietary backup application. This means that pre-existing backup applications will have to be retired or operated in a separate silo – defeating the purpose and benefits of a backup consolidation initiative. Moreover, in the event of a company merger or acquisition, attempting to standardize on to a single backup application could result in significant cost over runs and be seriously disruptive to business.
On the other hand, deploying a backup appliance which integrates with multiple leading industry backup applications, as well as more specialized backup applications like the ones mentioned above, enables businesses to provide universal access to a common pool of protection storage. In much the same way that server virtualization provides the flexibility to rapidly deploy host resources as business demands, so too does an integrated backup appliance that provides multiple applications access to a shared set of deduplicated disk backup resources.
Some of these proprietary or close-ended backup appliance offerings are merely positioning their solution as an “integrated appliance” and attempting to re-define the term to mean an end-to-end backup system. In other words, the implication is that if a backup application is not integrated along with the server and storage resources in the appliance, it is an incomplete solution. The problem with this logic is that it assumes that all customer backup environments are green fields. Unless a new company is being boot strapped, very rarely is there a total vacuum of backup systems in any given data center environment.
The fact is most IT planners prefer to have multiple options and choice for protecting their data. While many centralized backup applications work well protecting a variety of business systems, most don’t have all the features and functions to satisfy all the business application owners in an organization. Perhaps this is most true in the case of database administrators. Many DBA’s closely guard their database storage and are equally maniacal about backing it up. IT Managers may be hard pressed to convince DBAs to learn and use a new backup tool rather than utilizing native application backup tools that they have been successfully using for years.
The bottom line is that a so-called integrated backup appliance which encapsulates backup software, is locking users in to using that backup application for a very long time. Given the rate of technology innovation, the last thing infrastructure planners want to do is voluntarily lock themselves into using a single backup application. If the next “must have” backup application hits the market but an investment in a close-ended backup appliance is already made, they would have to wait until the current system fully depreciates and then go through all the pains of migrating to the new application.
Conclusion
When surveying the full landscape of integrated backup appliance offerings, it would serve IT management well to adhere to the old maxim – “Caveat Emptor”. In short, labels don’t always apply. The move by some technology suppliers to label their backup appliance solutions as “integrated” is merely a sleight of hand at trying to lock users in to their proprietary system.
IT decision makers have always placed a high premium on the “open” attributes of any given solution offering. This holds true now, perhaps more than ever, given the rapid rate at which technology is evolving. Nobody wants to get stuck holding the bag operating on a defunct or outdated platform. For this reason alone, it is critical for businesses to always keep their options open by adopting technologies that permit the most choice.
EMC is a client of Storage Switzerland
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- A Tiered Approach To Data Protection (storageswiss.com)
As a 22 year IT veteran, Colm has worked in a variety of capacities ranging from technical support of critical OLTP environments to consultative sales and marketing for system integrators and manufacturers. His focus in the enterprise storage, backup and disaster recovery solutions space extends from mainframe and distributed computing environments across a wide range of industries.
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