We compared IBM Spectrum Protect and Zerto based on user reviews in five categories. We reviewed all of the data and you can find the conclusion below.
Features: IBM Spectrum Protect is highly regarded for its ability to integrate with tape libraries and its customization options. Users also praised Spectrum Protect for its compatibility with various products, scalability, and stability. Users say Zerto offers excellent data protection, and it’s easy to create VMs. Zerto users also like its real-time replication features. IBM Spectrum Protect could improve its integration with cloud services and make its interface more user-friendly. Zerto could improve cloud environment configuration, PowerShell scripting, and multi-site replication.
Service and Support: IBM’s customer service is described as high quality, friendly, knowledgeable, and responsive. At the same time, some said the support process can be lengthy. Customers have generally had positive experiences with Zerto's customer service, noting their quick response times and ability to resolve issues. Some customers have encountered slower response times and needed to go through multiple levels of support to get their issues resolved.
Ease of Deployment: IBM Spectrum Protect's initial setup is challenging and demands skilled professionals to configure multiple parameters and features. This process can be time-consuming. The setup process for Zerto can be either simple or complicated, depending on the individual's experience with backup solutions.
Pricing: IBM Spectrum Protect is considered expensive. The pricing model is complex, taking into account factors like processor type and volume. Zerto’s price tag is considered reasonable and in line with industry norms. Others said it was somewhat expensive but still worth the cost.
ROI: Users have realized benefits from IBM Spectrum Protect’s data protection and retrieval. They appreciate its ability to reduce storage requirements with larger tape sizes. Zerto reduces risks while saving costs and time. It increases efficiency, ensures compliance, and helps businesses grow.
Comparison Results: IBM Spectrum Protect is a reliable, customizable solution that allows smooth integration with tape libraries. At the same time, some say that the user interface could be more intuitive and Spectrum Protect could integrate better with the cloud. Zerto offers top-tier data protection, excellent customer service, and real-time replication, but some users say its cloud and multi-site functionality could be better.
"It has a lot more capabilities and functions than a lot of other products. Even though it is more complex, the reason is because it gives you a lot more features. This is what I prefer, especially for a long retention."
"It is pretty easy to use and maintain."
"The tool proves invaluable in scenarios where systems need recovery, such as restoring damaged data."
"You can protect your data and keep it for long durations, without it spending too much time on the local disk."
"The technical support for Spectrum Protect is very mature. It is very committed to giving a top-notch support experience."
"It is a very mature product."
"It allows us to have one interface."
"The archiving feature is the most valuable aspect of the solution."
"Continuous replication is the primary feature we use now because we originally purchased Zerto. I'm starting to utilize the long-term retention and instantaneous file restoration features, which have been introduced since the original purchase in 2015. Initially, we deployed Zerto as a second data storage point, but ultimately it will probably facilitate some of the migration of my workloads up to the cloud. It's evolving with the network and how we deliver computation."
"Zerto gives us peace of mind knowing that if we were attacked by ransomware, we would be able to recover data from the time before the ransomware to get us back to being fully functional."
"The communication between the VM and the secondary data center is the most valuable feature."
"If we lost our data center and had to recover it, Zerto would save us a great deal of time. In our testing, we have found that recovering the entire data center would be completed within a day."
"When we replicated our data, I turned up the machine, and it was up in seconds. It blew my mind. I could not believe it."
"Failover using Zerto is simply a one-button click, and it does everything else in restoring the VMs at a different datacenter (recovery site)."
"Zerto is an excellent solution for cloud-based environments, but for DIY clients who have another site to recover their systems it also works well."
"The DR - Disaster Recovery - is the main selling point."
"It would be helpful if the solution included some sort of ransomware protection."
"It seems like they are a little behind on the integration to Azure Cloud as well as Amazon."
"Getting technical support all the necessary diagnostic information is still very painful."
"Customers have migrated off of it because of its lack of virtual environment functions."
"The software is very complicated. You have to do a lot of configurations to build a server, and you would need to backup and restore."
"We recently had a situation where we quickly got code, and the number of tapes exceeded the library capacity so we were waiting a while to change. We got a fix for this right away."
"I would like to see the operations center be a lot more functional. It was nowhere near as functional as the admin center, and I'm doing a lot of command line with it."
"Its price can be better. It is very expensive. Its interface is very old and not user friendly. They can improve its interface. Their support can also be better. My clients are not very satisfied with the support because they are not really quick."
"We had a situation where we had to relicense VMs once they were moved over. We later found out that that feature is built-in, but it's not easy to find. The way it's done is that you have to go to the target site to turn it on. If that were explained a little bit better up front, that would be helpful."
"With the VPG (virtual protected group) it would be nice if you could pick individuals in the grouping instead of having to failover the whole group."
"It needs more documentation and automation features. I would like more documentation on designing an environment and network operations. On the automation side, I would like automation to clean up the environment in cases of a failed DR effort. An API interface to perform the DR exercise would also be nice."
"Zerto needs to improve its documentation."
"An area for improvement is the support because it gets really expensive. They need to make it a little cheaper. Support also takes time."
"One thing I would like to see, and I know that this is on their roadmap, is the ability to use long-term storage in the cloud, like in Azure or AWS, making that even more seamless. Whether it's stored in glacier or on-prem, being able to retrieve that data in a quick manner would be helpful. They're just not there yet."
"It has some quirks. We have quirks with appliances. Some things don't really work as expected, but it is minor."
"It has a file restore feature, which we have tried to use. We have had some issues with that, because the drives are compressed in our main file system. It is a Windows-based file server. So, it compresses the shares and can't restore those by default."
IBM Spectrum Protect is ranked 17th in Backup and Recovery with 146 reviews while Zerto is ranked 2nd in Backup and Recovery with 236 reviews. IBM Spectrum Protect is rated 8.0, while Zerto is rated 9.0. The top reviewer of IBM Spectrum Protect writes "Performance and recoveries are better, and customers are happier with performance". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Zerto writes "Gives us business continuity capabilities during hurricane season and in case of ransomware". IBM Spectrum Protect is most compared with IBM Spectrum Protect Plus, Veeam Backup & Replication, Commvault Cloud, Rubrik and Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain), whereas Zerto is most compared with Veeam Backup & Replication, VMware SRM, Rubrik, Commvault Cloud and Dell RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines. See our IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Zerto report.
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We monitor all Backup and Recovery reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.
