Dell and CommVault Partner On New Backup Appliance

Dell and CommVault Systems have introduced the Dell PowerVault DL Back-to-Disk Appliance, the latest in a line of backup and archiving appliances. It has storage capacity of up to 300TB and throughput of up to 3TB per hour, double the capacity and throughput of previous versions. The device, which runs CommVault's Simpana 8 software, can deduplicate data to maximize storage. It can also serve as an edge device in the cloud to let organizations back up and archive data off site. The product is available now starting at $17,000 for 3TB.

Organizations can use their existing backup software, such as Symantec NetBackup or Backup Exec, or change to different backup software. They can set attributes to back up data and archive files that meet certain criteria, such as those that haven't been used in 60 days. Data can be sent from the appliance to a cloud service such as Microsoft's Windows Azure or Amazon Elastic Computer Cloud, says Michael McMahon, senior director of OEM for Dell. Similar appliances are typically sold to remote offices, where they are backed up and replicated to a central environment, or used in larger environments where users want the ability to back up to disk with features such as deduplication and scalability.

The new product reinforces the ongoing transition from tape to disk, says Lauren Whitehouse, senior analyst at the Enterprise Strategy Group. "We've seen this migration from people reducing their dependence on tape," she says. "They're not eliminating it, but there's a higher reliance on disk for data, potentially on its way to tape or to the cloud." By placing data on disk, organizations have more options for moving data, such as using the cloud for a "second data center" for disaster recovery. Whitehouse says CommVault supports the largest breadth of cloud storage providers in the market compared to competing vendors such as IBM Tivoli, EMC and Symantec, who have not made similar announcements.

CommVault has made two other partnership announcements regarding cloud support. First, the company announced its Cloud DR mid-market disaster recovery service. It lets users back up and archive software to Rackspace Cloud Files. Users must purchase Cloud Files storage for approximately 15 cents per GB per month. CommVault Simpana Disaster Recovery Licenses are available starting at $1,000, while a Rackspace Cloud Server costs $11 per month.

The company also announced a partnership with Mezeo Software that integrates the Simpana software with the Mezeo Cloud Storage Platform. Through the integration, organizations can use the Mezeo cloud for disaster recovery, business continuity and compliance.