The software will compete head-on with the continuous data protection software that Symantec also launched this week. Both disk-to-disk products are aimed initially at small and mid-sized customers, both protect Windows file servers, and both provide self-service file recovery for end-users. The two carry very similar prices.
Microsoft’s DPM software was first unveiled last year. Symantec’s rival offering was unveiled in April, and was originally developed by Veritas Software Corp. Now owned by Symantec, Veritas is by far the largest supplier of Windows backup software, and the company is clearly hoping to prevent Microsoft from a gaining a foothold in this market.
Microsoft estimates that the street price of DPM will be $950 for one DPM server together with software agents to protect three file servers. Using Symantec’s CDP software to protect three file servers will cost $995, although that price includes a copy of Symantec’s Backup Exec 10d disk-to-tape backup tool.
IBM Corp, EMC Corp, and a handful of start-ups have also launched or are about to enter the CDP market, but they will not be competing anywhere nearly as directly as Microsoft and Symantec, because their products will either sell further upmarket, or are designed for different applications.
DPM has strong prospects. Since it began beta testing six months ago around 60,000 copies have been downloaded from Microsoft’s web site. In a recent survey of 200 IT staff by the Enterprise Strategy Group, 67% of respondents said they will evaluate the product within 2 years. Symantec’s software, which is called Continuous Protection Server, also has strong prospects.
While CP Server was still standalone beta software, it was downloaded 15,000 times in around three months. Now the software is only available as a free-of-charge component of Symantec’s Backup Exec disk-to-tape backup tool.
Symantec argued that its near-$1,000 three-agent CDP bundle is far greater value than Microsoft’s near-$1,000 bundle, because it includes a copy of Backup Exec. Even Microsoft advises customers to install disk-to-tape software, or an archiving tool, in MS-speak. But unless they are Greenfield sites, customers deploying Microsoft’s or Symantec’s products will already have paid for and installed running archiving software.
Microsoft acknowledges that DPM is not a full-on CDP product, because it only allows end-users to recover files from discrete snapshots. CDP by definition allows the clock to be rewound the clock to any saved version of data. Veritas insists that its CP server software qualifies as CDP, although it only allows the clock to be rewound at most to the last scheduled snapshot, which according to installation might have been made at most only 30 minutes previously.
Neither product can be used to recover Microsoft Exchange emails. Microsoft said DPM will be able to do this when version 2.0 ships, in two years’ time. Veritas meanwhile has said that its software will handle Exchange data in about nine months. Ben Matheson, group product manager for Microsoft said: I’ll believe it when I see it.
