Dell has extended its data protection facilities with a PowerProtect Data Manager Appliance, Cyber Recovery for Google Cloud, and backup targets added to the APEX Storage Services cloud-like subscription.
The Data Manager Appliance (DMA) is a deduplicating target backup system, scaling from 12 to 96TB of capacity, with software to automatically discover and protect databases, VMs, filesystems, and Kubernetes containers. It appears to be an Integrated Data Protection Appliance (IDPA) + system.
Jeff Boudreau, president and GM of Dell’s Infrastructure Solutions Group, said in a statement: “Point solutions don’t go deep or wide enough to help protect organizations. Dell helps customers strengthen cyber resiliency by offering integrated data protection software, systems and services to help ensure data and applications are protected and resilient wherever they live.”
Think of this DMA as IDPA hardware running Dell PowerProtect Data Manager software which provides backup, deduplication, replication, recovery, instant access and restore, search and analytics, tight VMware integration, and disaster recovery in, and long-term retention to, the cloud, as well as support for multi-cloud workloads.
The DMA provides insights into protected on-premises and in-cloud workloads, applications, filesystems, and virtual machines, and has oversight and governance features to ensure compliance. It protects VMware systems with Transparent Snapshots which it says are unique and ensure VM availability with no disruption. They simplify VM image backups, with little impact on running VMs and VM resources, increase backup performance, lower costs, and simplify management.
The DMA software also has Identity and Access Management.
Dell says data owners can perform self-service backup and restore operations from their native applications via the DMA, with central governance and oversight.
DMA and PowerProtect range
The PowerProtect range now has three product families: DD deduplicating target appliances, DP Integrated Data Protection Appliances (IDPA), and this new DMA system, the DM5500.
The IDPA DP4400 and DP5900 products provide backup and recovery and replication, deduplication, instant access and restore with VMware integration, search and analytics, plus expanded capacity with a cloud tier for disaster recovery and long-term retention.
The deduplicating disk-to-disk PowerProtect target appliance range, the rebranded DataDomain systems, include the DDVE (Virtual Edition), DD3300, DD6400 and DD6900 appliances.
The first DMA box, the DM5500, provides 12TB to 96TB of capacity and is for small and mid-size use cases. It is an all-disk system with 12TB SAS interface drives. We think at least one larger system is coming. A comparison of its base specs with the IPDA range indicates to us that it could be a possible IDPA replacement:
In fact, we think Dell could have launched this as a next-gen IPDA system with a big software upgrade and used it to replace the DP4400 and signal a coming DP5900 upgrade. Get an IDPA datasheet here, a DMA data sheet here and spec sheet here.
Google Cloud and APEX
PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for Google Cloud is a storage area in GCP described as an isolated vault. It’s isolated because access to management interfaces is locked down by networking controls and can require separate security credentials and multi-factor authentication for access. Dell now has the big three public clouds covered as its arrival follows that of PowerProtect for Microsoft Azure and CyberSense for PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for AWS.
Customers can use their existing Google Cloud subscription for purchasing PowerProtect Cyber Recovery through the Google Cloud Marketplace, and the service can be acquired directly from Dell and its channel partners.
The APEX Data Storage Services cookbook is expanding to have a backup target option; in other words PowerProtect target appliances in a pay-per-use, flexible consumption model.
Finally, Dell is also offering a Cyber Recovery Guarantee to try to provide assurance to customers that their data will be recoverable following a cyberattack. This expands the Dell’s Future-Proof Program, which also includes a Data Protection Deduplication Guarantee.
Availability:
- PowerProtect Data Manager Appliance is globally available this month in more than 15 countries across North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia Pacific.
- PowerProtect Data Manager software is globally available today.
- PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for Google Cloud Platform is globally available today.
- APEX Data Storage Services Backup Target will be globally available in the first quarter of 2023 in 16 countries across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.
- Dell’s new Cyber Recovery Guarantee will be available in the US only starting in January 2023.
Bootnote
The Cyber Recovery Guarantee requires the user organization to purchase a minimum of storage capacity, a DD Retention Lock Compliance Edition software license, a Dell ProSupport with Mission Critical maintenance agreement, Dell ProDeploy Plus for PowerProtect DD and Cyber Recovery, and Dell Professional Services. Applicable products include PowerProtect Cyber Recovery Solution vault models PowerProtect DD9900, DD9400, DD6900 and DD6400. Signed Terms and Conditions and other eligibility criteria apply.
