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Warning: using disk for backup? Prepare to pay more in V7.x

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goony

Technical User
Apr 15, 2003
170
US
As mentioned in another thread, I am using the Sun-branded version of Networker (for now) and will be switching to Legato-branded Networker in a month or two.

Info on the Sun-brand product is at
Since I am under software maintenance with Sun I received upgrade discs for V7.0 "Sun StorEdge Enterprise Backup Software" and I upgraded one of my 6.1.x servers to 7.0 and that is when the fun began!

I had been doing backups to a disk array, and then in turn to tape ('staging' in the Netwoker parlance) and before V7.0 this function was a part of the standard server.

Before V7.0 it treated a file device pretty much like a tape drive: If a backup to the disk was running you had to wait for it to finish before you could read a file from it to do a restore.

Well, with V7.0 they have expanded the disk backup capability greatly so you can now do concurrent backups, restores, etc. and all sorts of other stuff (details at:
The downside is that after the upgrade to V7.0 the backup to disk no longer works in any shape or form without a 'DiskBackup' enabler or license. I called Sun and logged a ticket with them to at least get an enabler code (45 days) but that even seems to have them in a tizzy: they have enabler codes for just about everything except DiskBackup, so they are off making lots of phone calls to figure out what to do about it.

Whether you are using the Legato or Sun software though, you will have a problem upon upgrading to V7.0 if you are using backup to file-type devices (disks)- it will stop working without an additional license.

My basic complaint is that it appears I must purcha$e a licen$e to still use the disk at all and that this is a retrograde, or crippling of previous existing function. I understand there is more functionality in V7.0 DiskBackup, but they should have preserved the primitive disk function I already had in V6.1.x for no additional cost.

I am not sure what the DiskBackup additional license price is but it appears to be tiered pricing: the larger the disk backup space, the larger the license fee. The Sun pricing appears to range from $1300 up to $23,475.
 
Goony,

Have Sun check with Legato......... Legato was grandfathering people who used diskbackup prior to V7 and they could get a free enabler

John7
 
I knew one had to pay for a "DiskBackup" enabler with the new
version.

Can anyone verify that this enabler is indeed "tiered" ie..
based on the size(or number) of the disk devices? The more
we backup, the more we pay??


 

This is tiered, I believe it is based on the size of the partition you back up to

John
 
The sizes are:

Tier 1 0..1 TB
Tier 2 1..6 TB
Tier 3 6..10 TB
Tier 4 10..50 TB
Tier 5 >50 TB

of maximum available capacity for NetWorker. It does not matter whether you use it for the old 'file device' or the
new (NW 7) 'advanced file device'.

Legato implemented these licenses more than a year ago after
they found out that customers prefered backups to disk instead of jukeboxes. So they were loosing autochanger licenses.

In NW 7, this licensing scheme is now enforced, but it is
not really new.
 
If you update your version to NW7 you will get 2 file device licenses for free.

BUT you HAVE to ask for them!!



cyberted
 
cyberted:

I regretfully have to say, that for Sun-branded EBS this does not seem the case. Sun really needs the cash, i think...

___________
I'm in yer face, even when you don't want me to be
___________
 
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