Lab Validation Report

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1 Lab Validation Report Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 Agile, Intelligent Data Protection for Modern Data Centers By Tony Palmer, Senior ESG Lab Analyst January 2015

2 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 2 Contents Introduction... 3 Background... 3 Quantum Data Protection and the DXi6900 Series... 4 ESG Lab Validation... 6 Performance and Scalability... 6 Security, Flexibility, and Cloud Readiness The Comprehensive Quantum Data Protection Portfolio ESG Lab Validation Highlights Issues to Consider The Bigger Truth Appendix ESG Lab Reports The goal of ESG Lab reports is to educate IT professionals about data center technology products for companies of all types and sizes. ESG Lab reports are not meant to replace the evaluation process that should be conducted before making purchasing decisions, but rather to provide insight into these emerging technologies. Our objective is to go over some of the more valuable feature/functions of products, show how they can be used to solve real customer problems and identify any areas needing improvement. ESG Lab's expert third-party perspective is based on our own hands-on testing as well as on interviews with customers who use these products in production environments. This ESG Lab report was sponsored by Quantum. All trademark names are property of their respective companies. Information contained in this publication has been obtained by sources The Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) considers to be reliable but is not warranted by ESG. This publication may contain opinions of ESG, which are subject to change from time to time. This publication is copyrighted by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. Any reproduction or redistribution of this publication, in whole or in part, whether in hard-copy format, electronically, or otherwise to persons not authorized to receive it, without the express consent of The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc., is in violation of U.S. copyright law and will be subject to an action for civil damages and, if applicable, criminal prosecution. Should you have any questions, please contact ESG Client Relations at

3 Introduction Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 3 This report examines Quantum s DXi6900 deduplication disk backup appliance, powered by Quantum s StorNext 5 data management technology, with a focus on how the DXi6900 fits into Quantum's broad and deep data protection portfolio. ESG Lab examined the performance, deduplication, replication, data availability, scalability, and encryption capabilities of the DXi6900. Additional testing included virtual machine backup and archiving with Quantum s vmpro, disaster recovery solutions with Quantum s Scalar tape libraries and Q-Cloud services, management with Quantum Vision software, and integration with independent software vendor (ISV) offerings such as Symantec's NetBackup OpenStorage (OST) and Auto Image Replication (AIR). Summary ESG Lab validated that a Quantum DXi6902 was able to sustain more than 16TB per hour of multithreaded enterprise backup throughput with pay-as-you-grow capacity scalability. The DXi6900 demonstrated advanced security, virtualization, data protection, and management features suited to a wide range of requirements for backup and disaster recovery (DR). ESG Lab confirmed that DXi variable-length deduplication provided significant savings in disk capacity and network bandwidth as compared to fixed-length deduplication. The tight integration of the DXi6900 with other elements of Quantum s comprehensive data protection portfolio can help meet customers needs across physical, virtual, and cloud environments. Background As shown in Figure 1, ESG research indicates that improving data backup and recovery is once again near the top of the list of respondents most-cited IT priorities. 1 Considering this in combination with the similarly high priorities to improve information security, increase the use of server virtualization, and manage data growth adds emphasis to those data protection imperatives. Use of cloud infrastructure services made the top ten most-cited again this year. As these areas of IT focus become more important to the business, and critical data becomes more distributed, the need for solid business continuity and disaster recovery systems increases. Figure 1. Top Ten Most Important IT Priorities Over the Next 12 Months Top 10 most important IT priorities over the next 12 months. (Percent of respondents, N=562, ten responses accepted) Increased use of server virtualization Information security initiatives Improve data backup and recovery Manage data growth Desktop virtualization Use cloud infrastructure services Regulatory compliance initiatives Major application deployments or upgrades Business intelligence/data analytics initiatives Data center consolidation 23% 23% 23% 23% 22% 25% 24% 29% 32% 32% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% Source: Enterprise Strategy Group, Source: ESG Research Report, 2014 IT Spending Intentions Survey, February All ESG research references and charts in this Lab Validation have been taken from this research report.

4 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 4 Quantum Data Protection and the DXi6900 Quantum delivers a comprehensive digital asset storage portfolio. The Scalar LTO libraries provide traditional data archiving, and the StorNext storage solutions deliver online workflow storage with a scale-out architecture, which enables rapid scaling of storage to meet business needs. Quantum s data protection portfolio includes DXi-Series deduplication disk backup systems, vmpro virtual data protection software, and Q-Cloud cloud backup and disaster recovery services. Quantum Lattus provides virtually infinite object storage capacity, self-healing durability and heterogeneous access, delivering simultaneous workflow storage and data protection. Quantum supports geographically and technologically diverse customer environments, from the data center to remote offices and virtual implementations, and it can scale to meet growing data and throughput requirements, providing a continuous data protection lifecycle from creation to retirement. The DXi6900 Series is the newest member of the Quantum data protection family designed to provide simple, costeffective protection for midrange and enterprise sites. The DXi6900 is engineered to provide efficient disaster recovery of physical and virtual data, no matter the customer size, bringing even small and remote sites into a business continuance strategy. As seen in Figure 2, DXi6900 systems fit into the broader Quantum portfolio, providing pay-as-you-grow scalability to 510TB of usable capacity up to 7.2PB of logical capacity in 32U of rack space with the highest levels of performance. Figure 2. The Comprehensive Quantum Data Protection Portfolio The Quantum DXi6900 Like all Quantum DXi systems, the DXi6900 Series runs Quantum DXi 3.0 software, which resides on the latestgeneration DXi-Series appliances, providing enterprise-class data protection. At the core of the DXi software is Quantum s StorNext 5, a high-performance, extremely scalable file system first examined by ESG Lab in This file system handles the file management associated with the deduplicated files and blockpool. DXi software uses patented variable-length, inline data deduplication, reducing data stored on disk by up to 90%, while automatic 2 Source: ESG Lab Validation Report, ESG Lab Validation Report: Quantum StorNext 3.0, May 2007

5 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 5 bandwidth-optimized replication provides a choice of protection approaches for remote sites over existing networks. The Quantum DXi6902 is designed to provide high performance, flexible, pay-as-you-grow disk backup storage leveraging a number of unique differentiating features and technologies: A Broad Capacity Range with Pay-as-you-grow Scalability The DXi6900 offers 17TB to 510TB usable capacity in 17TB licensable capacity-on-demand (CoD) increments, delivering higher density and greater power-efficiency per terabyte than the previous generation, and proactive data growth management with non-disruptive capacity upgrades. Enterprise-class Performance Up to 16.3TB/hour performance with Symantec OST enables organizations to meet evolving backup windows with predictable performance. Improved Data Availability This is achieved via Dynamic Disk Pools (DDP) and data integrity checking. Dynamic Disk Pools (DDP) improves system performance during rebuilds without sacrificing availability. Comprehensive Data Security 4TB self-encrypting drives (SEDs) provide hardware-based data-at-rest encryption, allowing users to enable encryption with zero impact to system performance. Data is also AES 256-bit encrypted during replication. Complete Lifecycle Management Integration with Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) provides support as with Symantec OpenStorage (OST) and convergence of backup and disaster recovery as with Symantec Automatic Image Replication (AIR). Integrated path-to-tape (PTT) provides offsite DR, archive, and compliance capabilities. Universal Connectivity and Presentation Options Multi-protocol support provides simultaneous support for CIFS, NFS, and OST over Ethernet, and VTL via Fibre Channel. Simple Licensing All required software licenses including replication, direct tape creation, VTL, OST, and DXi Accent are combined in one package. Additional Quantum data protection products and technologies include: DXi V1000 A virtual DXi appliance that enables the Quantum enterprise-class feature/function set to run in a virtual machine for organizations without a dedicated hardware appliance. DXi Accent Optimizing remote backups from Symantec media servers using OST, DXI Accent deduplicates data before it is sent over the wire and only sends unique data to be stored. Quantum Scalar Tape Libraries Provide long-term retention for up to 75 PB of data. vmpro Software Works with DXi appliances to provide backup, restore, and disaster recovery protection in native format for local and remote virtual environments. Quantum Vision Reporting Software Offers enhanced multi-site reporting across an entire data protection landscape, simplifying multi-site monitoring and enterprise diagnostics. DXi Advanced Reporting Tool provides robust reporting and monitoring of enterprise-wide backup, restore, and replication operations. Quantum Q-Cloud Protect A low-cost, business-class, cloud-based data protection solution designed to simplify backup and disaster recovery for heterogeneous environments, integrated with existing backup solutions. Oracle RMAN Integration Oracle administrators can leverage Quantum DXi to enable business continuance, improved RPOs with increased retention, data security with no performance penalty, shared deduplication between Oracle data protection products and traditional batch backup software, server-less path to tape, and automated replication, all using familiar Oracle data protection tools and techniques.

6 ESG Lab Validation Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 6 In 2013, ESG Lab examined the broad spectrum of Quantum s data protection offerings in the context of data protection in the distributed enterprise. 3 This report examines the newest DXi offering from Quantum, the DXi6900 series, looking at performance, data reduction, scalability, flexibility, and how it fits into the Quantum ecosystem. Performance and Scalability ESG Lab tested the DXi6900 in a standard configuration, using Symantec NetBackup 7.6 to validate performance. A simple data center environment was simulated as seen in Figure 3. Eight NetBackup media servers were used to back up multi-terabyte data sets to a Quantum DXi6902 appliance over a 10GbE LAN. The DXi6902 was tested with four 10GbE connections. 4 Figure 3. The ESG Lab Test Bed ESG Lab Testing To examine the performance of the DXi6900 in an enterprise data center environment, ESG Lab started with a series of backups to the DXi6900 via Symantec NetBackup OST. Full backups were simulated with data sets collected from a production environment. Testing began with eight media servers backing up data from 16 disk arrays to a DXi6902 with five expansion modules and 187TB of usable capacity. A script was used to kick off 40 concurrent backup jobs using NetBackup. The DXi Advanced Reporting tool was used to monitor numerous DXi metrics. Throughput, Ethernet activity, disk utilization, and data reduction were all captured, as was CPU utilization. The first test attained throughput of 16.3TB per hour, seen in Figure 4. 3 Source: ESG Lab Validation Report, Delivering Performance, Scale, and Security for Backup and Disaster Recovery, June Configuration details are listed in the Appendix.

7 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 7 Figure 4. Quantum DXi TB Per Hour Backup Throughput ESG Lab examined the NetBackup Activity Monitor, seen in Figure 5, and confirmed that all jobs completed with no errors, in under 30 minutes. Figure 5. Symantec NetBackup Activity Monitor Results of the two performance test runs are detailed in Table 1. Table 1. DXi6902 Performance Results Symantec OST 5 Media Usable Number of Servers Capacity (TB) Spindles 10GbE Ports GB/sec TB/hour Run Run It s important to note that in previous tests executed on the DXi6800, ESG Lab validated that sustained throughput was independent of the amount of storage enabled in the system. A system with 17TB of usable space licensed but 5 Maximum performance varies by method of presentation.

8 Real Disk Space Used (GB) Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 8 the same number of expansion modules installed could be reasonably expected to perform just as well as a system with all storage capacity licensed. Next, ESG Lab examined data reduction using Quantum DXi deduplication. DXi leverages Quantum s variable-length deduplication to optimize capacity efficiency in the data center and across the enterprise by efficiently deduplicating data locally, then only replicating deduplicated data. The tests used two data sets harvested from production systems: a 2.2TB structured data set, representative of data generated by a database or application, and a 3.4TB unstructured data set, representative of file shares and home directories. The first series of tests used the structured data set, which had a 10% daily change rate. In this test, daily full backups of the data set were run to a DXi6902 appliance using a common, commercially available data protection software application that provides fixed-length deduplication as an option. One series of backups was run with DXi deduplication on and the fixed-length deduplication in the backup software disabled, then the data set in the DXi6902 was wiped, and the test was repeated with deduplication disabled in the DXi, and enabled in the software. This methodology was also used to test deduplication of the unstructured data set, running 47 days of backups using a full/incremental backup schedule: one full backup every seven days, followed by six days of incremental backups. In both cases, the data set backed up was identical, as was the backup schedule. The only difference was the type of deduplication. Results of the tests are shown in Figure 6. Figure 6. Quantum DXi Variable-length Deduplication versus Fixed-length Deduplication 4,000 3,500 3,000 2,500 2,000 1,500 1, Structured Data Real Disk Space Used (Smaller is Better) Unstructured Data Data Set Fixed-Length Deduplication DXi variable-length Deduplication Both systems performed consistently using both data sets and backup methodologies, with fixed rate deduplication reducing the footprint of the original data set by about 50% in both cases. Quantum variable-length deduplication was able to reduce the structured and unstructured data sets by about 85%. ESG Lab also tested the efficiency of Quantum replication by backing up a generated data set with known compressibility and uniqueness to a DXi6902 appliance and replicating to a DXi8500. In this test, the DXi6902 reduced the data set by 90%, storing the 2.17TB data set using only 218GB of disk capacity, as shown in Figure 7. During this single-threaded backup, throughput averaged 169 MB/sec.

9 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 9 Figure 7. Backing Up to a Local DXi6902 As the backups progressed, the DXi6902 automatically began replicating the unique blocks to the remote DXi8500, as seen in Figure 8. Once replication completed, ESG Lab observed that the DXi6902 transferred only 234GB across the wire to the DXi8500. Figure 8. Ethernet Traffic During Replication Figure 9 shows the data volume overview on the DXi8500 after the backup replication completed. Figure 9. Data Volume Overview at the Replication Target

10 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 10 ESG Lab observed that the data stored on disk matched the data on disk in the source DXi6902. For this backup, DXi deduplication saved nearly 2TB of data movement, both to the local DXi6902 as well as to the remote DXi8500. What the Numbers Mean The DXi6902 was able to sustain 16.3TB per hour of Symantec OST performance with four 10GbE connections. Quantum DXi variable length deduplication was able to provide 85% data reduction for both structured and unstructured data, using full and incremental backup schedules, compared with just 50% reduction for the fixed-length deduplication method tested. This translates to easier integration into an organization s existing backup environment since backup admins don t need to adjust their schedules or methods and substantial disk capacity savings. The DXi6902 clearly demonstrated significant network bandwidth savings as well, efficiently replicating only unique, deduplicated data with no reconstitution required. Finally, ESG Lab upgraded an entry-level DXi6902 by entering a license key and rebooting the appliance, as shown in Figure 10, to test the ease of accessing capacity on demand. Figure 10. Pay-as-you-grow Scalability Expansion

11 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 11 Why This Matters According to ESG research, improving data backup and recovery one of the most-cited IT priorities reported by enterprises and managing data growth was reported nearly as often. IT administrators have been struggling for years to get nightly backups completed before business resumes in the morning. In addition, ease of implementation and management has been reported to ESG as one of the top concerns when choosing a data deduplication backup solution. Performance ESG Lab has validated that Quantum s DXi6900 is not only Quantum's highest performing disk backup and deduplication solution, but also that it achieves this feat while delivering high levels of data reduction. ESG testing demonstrated that a single Quantum DXi6902 disk backup system could be used to protect more than 130TB of data in an eight-hour shift utilizing less than 20TB of disk space using Quantum s variable-length deduplication and restore individual files in a matter of seconds. Capacity Efficiency Quantum DXi variable length deduplication was able to provide 85% data reduction for both structured and unstructured data in ESG Lab testing, under both full and incremental backup schedules, compared with just 50% reduction for the tested fixed-length deduplication method. This translates to easier integration into an organization s existing backup environment since backup admins don t need to adjust their schedules or methods and substantial savings in both disk capacity and network bandwidth. The DXi6902 clearly demonstrated the ability to efficiently replicate only unique, deduplicated data to another DXi with no reconstitution required. Pay-as-you-grow Scalability ESG also validated the pay-as-you-grow scalability of the DXi platform, which enables organizations to scale to 510TB of usable capacity up to 7.2PB of logical capacity with deduplication in 17TB increments, on demand, with no disruption to operations. In summary, Quantum provides enterprise-class performance while reducing complexity and eliminating the need for capacity and performance planning. Combined with Quantum variable-length deduplication, the cost of data protection capacity is minimized as well.

12 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 12 Security, Flexibility, and Cloud Readiness The DXi6900 Series was designed from the ground up to be a secure, flexible, and cloud-ready deduplication disk backup solution. The DXi platform can be configured to meet practically any data protection requirement, offering broad flexibility via pay-as-you-grow scalability, universal connectivity, and tight ISV integration. Quantum Q-Cloud provides Quantum-branded backup-as-a-service (BaaS) and DR-as-a-service (DRaaS) which is natively supported by the DXi platform. Security It's important to note that some vendors use the term full-drive encryption (FDE) to describe self-encryption capable drives, but the functionality is the same. SEDs were designed to prevent unauthorized access to data if a drive or a group of drives is removed from a system. It s all accomplished in hardware using 256-bit AES encryption, so there is no performance impact. Data in flight is also protected using AES 256-bit encryption. As Figure 11 shows, encryption is one part of Quantum's overall strategy of end-to-end security to protect data everywhere while it is in transit and at rest, whether it resides on tape or disk, including the ability to securely shred deleted files or virtual tape cartridges, or securely erase an entire DXi system. Figure 11.Quantum Comprehensive Security and Encryption ESG Lab Testing ESG Lab first examined secure file shred capability on the DXi6800 series in First, files on the DXi NAS share were deleted, then secure shred was started, as seen in Figure 12. During secure shred, all residual data and metadata associated with the deleted files or cartridges is securely erased from the disk drives by performing a single-pass overwrite with zeros. While secure file shred is running, the DXi operates in limited mode, meaning no backups or restores may be performed and scheduled jobs (including replication jobs) are stopped. If necessary, secure shred can be canceled at any time to return the DXi to normal operation. It's important to note that the amount of time it takes for secure file shred to complete is directly dependent on the total capacity enabled on the system.

13 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 13 This is not the case for whole-system secure erase, which occurs very quickly because it leverages the SEDs capability to provide cryptographic erasure. Cryptographic erasure orders SEDs to regenerate their internal key, which makes all existing data unrecoverable because it was encrypted with the old key. Figure 12.Secure File Shred Flexibility The DXi architecture leverages intelligent metadata management, broad protocol support, and ISV integration with storage optimization for both high throughput and highly transactional data to provide the flexibility to support any data protection requirement. The DXi6900 uses Dynamic Disk Pools (DDP) based on NetApp E-Series Storage to improve system performance by spreading data and spare capacity across all available drives in each shelf, as shown in Figure 13. This reduces the rebuild time on 4TB drives, improving availability and performance simultaneously. Figure 13. Dynamic Disk Pools and Pay-as-you-grow Scalability

14 Quantum Q-Cloud Protect Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 14 Today s Quantum portfolio includes Q-Cloud Protect BaaS and DRaaS, which give users the option of a subscriptionbased model for deploying and leveraging deduplication for backup and DR, engineered to provide business-class cloud SLAs. The DXi6900 Series, like all members of the DXi family, has the ability to replicate between DXi appliances or to a private cloud, as well as leverage BaaS and DRaaS. DXi deduplication can reduce data 90% or more before replicating across the WAN. This capability enables rapid replication to Q-Cloud and reduces bandwidth requirements. Quantum has designed Q-Cloud Protect to leverage powerful synergies with the DXi platform and provide significant benefits: Efficiency Highly efficient deduplication equals less bandwidth required to replicate to the cloud and reduced capacity requirements, both of which help lower costs. Security 4TB self-encrypting drives (SEDs) provide hardware-based data-at-rest encryption in the cloud, with AES 256-bit encryption further protecting data as it replicates to the cloud. Q-Cloud Protect is always single-tenant, offering an extra layer of security over multi-tenant approaches. Capital and Operational Efficiency Organizations benefit from the ability to keep copies of their data offsite for disaster recovery which is a data protection best practice without consuming valuable IT resources. Quantum Q-Cloud Protect offers a cloud-based service with Quantum deduplicated replication to optimize offsite protection and recovery for as little as $.01 per GB per month. 6 ESG Lab has validated Quantum's deduplicated, optimized replication and found that DXi Series data deduplication brings the same level of compelling economic value to WAN bandwidth optimization as it does to disk capacity. Customers can essentially reduce their bandwidth requirements up to 20 times, enabling a global data protection strategy for data centers and remote offices. 6 Quantum Q-Cloud BaaS and DRaaS are offered in the US and EMEA today, with other regions coming soon.

15 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 15 Why This Matters Security Widely publicized data breaches, privacy laws, and boardroom jitters are driving a behavioral shift toward data encryption. ESG research indicates that information security initiatives are tied as the most-cited IT priority for Should personal or financial data become compromised, the corporation would potentially be liable for damages and heavy fines. The costs associated with the loss or theft of personal credit card information alone have been staggering: Consider, for example, one of the many public disclosures associated with the loss of unencrypted tapes containing the personal data of 3.9 million customers. Estimating a cost of $30 to $150 per customer for notification and credit services, this single event translates into a total cost of between $117 and $585 million. This incident demonstrates that the risk is real and the costs are high. Encrypting data on disk reduces risk, avoids potentially crippling costs, and keeps the CEO out of the headlines. The Quantum DXi6902 secures data at rest and in transit with integrated AES encryption, and prevents unauthorized data access. Flexibility A growing number of organizations are struggling to not only protect their information assets, but also to manage growing volumes of data and provide off site protection and disaster recovery. With tens to hundreds of terabytes under management and annual growth rates between 11% and 30%, a data protection solution must be flexible enough to grow with an organization's data set while providing predictable performance and secure data protection. The DXi platform can be configured to meet practically any data protection requirement. ISV integration provides complete lifecycle management support and convergence of backup and disaster recovery. Multi-protocol support provides universal connectivity over CIFS, NFS, and Fibre Channel. Simple licensing combines all software functionality, including replication, direct tape creation, VTL, OST, AIR, and DXi Accent, in one package. Cloud Readiness Quantum Q-Cloud Protect leverages powerful synergies with the DXi platform. This platform provides highly efficient deduplication to reduce bandwidth and capacity requirements, and hardware-based data-at-rest encryption with AES 256-bit encryption to further protect data as it replicates to the cloud, resulting in enhanced capital and operational efficiency. Organizations benefit from the ability to keep copies of their data offsite for disaster recovery without consuming valuable IT resources. The Comprehensive Quantum Data Protection Portfolio Data growth continues to be a significant challenge for IT departments; and with flat or declining budgets, being able to store more data while minimizing costs is essential. In addition, there is an increased focus on the economic value of data companies are storing more data for longer periods of time and working to find new ways to use it. While many companies prescribe a single technology to solve this problem, data value changes and tends to decrease over time, so it doesn t make sense to keep all data on the same technology and pay the same price as the value of data declines. Quantum Tiered Storage Quantum uses a tiered approach to architect its data protection solutions. Organizations are empowered to keep more data available for longer periods by using the right combination of technologies to match data s value over time with the cost of the storage that data resides on. ESG Lab spoke with a Quantum customer who implemented a Quantum tiered solution using DXi deduplication as her primary backup target, vmpro software for virtual

16 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 16 machine protection, and a Scalar library for path-to-tape and Vision management. This customer reported that backups complete in one-sixth the time, and the time required for restores is reduced from days to minutes, yielding a significant improvement in productivity Figure 14. Quantum Tiered Storage in Practice Quantum s tiered storage architecture for data protection is built on a number of its core technologies: Variable-length deduplication reduces disk requirements by 90% or more and reduces replication bandwidth requirements. Extremely flexible and scalable disk and tape solutions address a wide range of data protection capacity requirements. Quantum Vision includes features and functions designed to reduce administrative time spent managing backups, including: 1. Management of multi-site, multi-device environments from a single console using an intuitive topographical view. 2. ilayer Proactive Monitoring and Diagnostics designed to reduce service calls and shorten resolution time. 3. The Quantum Vision app to provide the ability to manage backup environments directly from iphone, ipad, or Android smartphones. 4. Intuitive, graphical scheduling policies enabling simplified management of deduplication and replication tasks, including replication bandwidth scheduling for enhanced network control. 5. DXi Advanced Reporting of deduplication rates and capacity utilization to help reduce downtime and provide a more in-depth view into the deduplication environment. Integrated path-to-tape accomplishes long-term retention and integrated management of backup data over its entire lifecycle Quantum Vision When ESG Lab logged into the Quantum Vision Web console, the topology view presented a visual representation of all systems under management. This global view not only provided a snapshot of the status and health of every backup device in this environment, but also detailed the relationships between devices, as shown in Figure 15.

17 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 17 Figure 15. Quantum Vision Topology View As seen in Figure 16, the Quantum Vision Analytics view presented a summary of metrics including deduplication and bandwidth reduction, space reclamation, and replication. Quantum Analytics allows administrators to assess the data protection environment at a glance and drill down into the details with a click. Figure 16. Quantum Vision DXi6902 Analytics Quantum data protection solutions address the needs of organizations of all sizes, from the largest data centers to small remote offices. ESG Lab examined remote backup using the Quantum DXi4000 series with vmpro to protect virtual machines in a branch office. Both backup and WAN utilization efficiency were explored, as were granular recoverability for virtual machines and secure, encrypted replication. Quantum vmpro Quantum vmpro Software is a backup application for businesses that need to protect virtual machines. vmpro Software backs up VMs in native VMware format, designed to speed and simplify the restore of files and entire VMs to return those VMs to operations quickly. vmpro enables users to restore or boot VMs in seconds without the use

18 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 18 of a backup application, and reduces virtual server and network overhead by reducing VM image sizes before backing up those images. vmpro Progressive Optimization technology, working in conjunction with VMware Changed Block Tracking (CBT), dynamically eliminates the unassigned, unused, and deleted data blocks associated with guest file systems, which dramatically reduces host, network, and storage resources by up to 75%. When combined with Quantum DXi deduplication solutions, data is reduced even further, optimizing the usage of storage resources on the main site and in the cloud. ESG Lab used Quantum vmpro software to back up a Windows Server 2008 virtual machine to a Quantum DXi7500 backup appliance over a CIFS share. The DXi7500 was configured to automatically replicate backups to a DXi6902. The entire virtual machine was backed up. Figure 17 shows the Quantum vmpro configuration wizard, setting up the SmartMotion backup policy, location, and schedule. Figure 17. Backup with vmpro SmartMotion Using CIFS As seen in Figure 18, while more than 86GB of data was transferred, only 4.7GB was committed to disk on the DXi7500 after data reduction. During this single-threaded backup, throughput averaged 45.5MB/sec and CPU utilization never exceeded 10%, indicating plenty of resources in reserve to be able to handle additional jobs.

19 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 19 Figure 18. DXi Advanced Reporting: DXi7500 After Backup Completed After this backup replicated to the DXi6902, ESG Lab examined the Progressive Optimization I/O reduction statistics in the Quantum vmpro console, shown in Figure 19. When Quantum vmpro performs a backup, unallocated disk blocks are skipped, rather than read and written. For this backup, Progressive Optimization saved nearly 29GB of data movement, both to the local DXi7500 as well as to the DXi6902. Figure 19. Quantum vmpro Progressive Optimization Statistics Next, ESG Lab tested a failover/failback disaster recovery scenario. Failover is accomplished by simply pointing Quantum vmpro at the DXi6902 that the DXi7500 replicated to in the data center. Failback is where a remote office's backups must be restored to the same or a different location. Failback was initiated from the DXi6902 in a simulated data center to a DXi8500. The 86GB data set replicated in just over two minutes, and only 5.2GB of data was transferred across the wire. When the failback was complete, Quantum vmpro software was used to perform a file-level restore from the recovered data set.

20 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 20 Why This Matters In ESGs annual IT spending intentions survey, improving data backup and recovery, increasing the use of server virtualization, and managing data growth were all among the top IT priorities reported by organizations of all sizes. Tiered Storage ESG Lab has validated that with Quantum s tiered storage approach, organizations can keep more data available for longer retention periods by using the appropriate combination of technologies to match data s value over time with the cost of the storage that data resides on. Simplified Management ESG Lab found that Quantum Vision provides an easy-to-read topology view that offered a visual representation of all systems under management. This global view not only provided a snapshot of the status and health of every backup device in this environment, but also detailed the relationships between devices. Quantum Vision Analytics enables administrators to assess the data protection environment at a glance, including deduplication and bandwidth reduction, space reclamation, and replication. Virtualization Server virtualization has accelerated the pace of business by enabling nearly instant infrastructure provisioning with greater flexibility and availability. Recognizing these benefits, organizations are working to virtualize more production and mission-critical applications. At the same time, these organizations have little tolerance for business interruption and downtime. ESG Lab used Quantum vmpro software to protect VMs with high-performance inline deduplication and optimized replication to a central data center. vmpro protects data in native file format for improved accessibility and performance. This minimizes downtime and disruption to business users, while reducing cost to IT and the business. No matter what the backup/restore SLA, Quantum has a solution to decrease recovery time and streamline the recovery process.

21 Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 21 ESG Lab Validation Highlights ESG Lab validated that Quantum s DXi6902 is able to sustain 16.3TB per hour of multithreaded enterprise backup throughput. A single Quantum DXi6902 disk backup system could be used to protect more than 130TB of data in an eight-hour shift using less than 20TB of disk space and restore individual files in a matter of seconds. This means that Quantum meets and exceeds the protection requirements of the largest enterprises. In ESG Lab tests, Quantum DXi variable-length deduplication provides 85% data reduction for both structured and unstructured data, using full and incremental backup schedules, compared to just 50% reduction for the fixed-length deduplication method tested using the same data. This translates to easier integration into an organization s existing backup environment and substantial disk capacity savings in large environments. ESG Lab found that the DXi architecture enhances performance and availability by leveraging multiple complementary technologies. Storage optimized for balanced performance, data integrity checking, Dynamic Disk Pools (DDP) technology, and the StorNext file system's intelligent metadata management all work together to improve availability and performance simultaneously. The DXi6900 supports data in-flight and at-rest encryption and secure file shred to meet the most stringent data security requirements. Quantum uses hardware-based encryption to eliminate performance impact. With pay as you grow scalability, capacity can be added with a simple license key, reducing complexity of capacity and performance planning. The DXi6900 integrates with Symantec NetBackup AIR (Auto Image Replication), which can reduce the time needed to return to business in the event of a disaster and improve restore service level agreements by tightening recovery time objectives (RTOs). Quantum Vision provides enhanced monitoring and reporting on capacity utilization, deduplication savings, and backup and replication performance over time. Vision is now available for ios and Android devices. Quantum Vision provides insight into the status and health of every backup device in this environment, including the relationships between devices, enabling users to more easily manage remote sites and multiple technologies, through the entire data lifecycle. The DXi6900 works seamlessly with Quantum Q-cloud to enable organizations to leverage a cloud-based data protection and DR service that uses Quantum encrypted, deduplicated replication to optimize offsite protection and recovery for as little as $.01 per GB per month. ESG Lab used Quantum vmpro software to seamlessly protect heterogeneous virtual machines in branch and remote offices, to back up and restore files in their native format, and replicate their backups to a DXi6902 in a central data center. Issues to Consider ESG Lab tested the Quantum data protection products in a controlled lab setting. Due to the many variables in each production environment, capacity planning and application-level testing are recommended to ensure that the solution meets recovery time and recovery point objectives for your organization.

22 The Bigger Truth Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 22 Backup and recovery are perennially near the top of the list of IT priorities for many organizations, along with server virtualization, information security, and managing data growth. As virtual environments grow and enterprises struggle with expanding data sets, the need to provide flexible, robust, and high-performance data protection becomes ever more urgent. Even while data grows, the window to protect and retrieve lost data shrinks. Only solutions that work seamlessly within an entire IT ecosystem can truly provide the benefits of full data protection and disaster recovery. Those solutions need to be flexible enough to work with multiple backup software solutions and robust enough to handle the protection and security requirements for data at rest and in transit. Virtualization has introduced an additional challenge with its accelerated growth in recent years requiring solutions that can not only back up and restore entire virtual machine images, but also reach into those images to back up and restore individual files as required. Quantum s DXi data protection appliances are designed as a key component of a comprehensive solution to answer the needs of customers who require protection of the distributed enterprise, from data centers to remote and branch offices. ESG Lab looked at the effective performance of the DXi6902 and found that not only was the sustained throughput independent of the amount of storage in the system, but also Quantum s variable length deduplication was able to provide extremely efficient data reduction levels at the same time. The DXi system under test sustained 16.3TB per hour in both entry-level, moderate, and full-capacity configurations. Quantum Vision provided comprehensive, simple management and analytics that offered insight into the status and health of all systems under management, detailed relationships between devices, and provided a view into utilization to help IT effectively manage capacity. ESG Lab was also impressed with Quantum vmpro and its ability to protect virtual machines all the way down to the file level in native format, providing drag-and-drop restores of individual files, objects, and entire virtual machines. With the DXi6902, Quantum has once again produced an impressive solution to protect data in physical and virtual data centers of any size. ESG Lab believes that the combination of variable-length inline data deduplication, enterprise-class performance, pay-as-you-grow scalability, and comprehensive storage management software and services including an extremely competitive cloud-based offering that integrates seamlessly provides a unique approach for optimizing data protection and recovery in today's distributed enterprise. Quantum enables customers to retain more data for fast and reliable restores and longer retention periods, minimizing impact on backups, while its tiered storage approach ensures that data resides on storage matched to its value to the business. Quantum's DXi6900 Series offers a wide variety of capacity configurations with performance to satisfy the most stringent SLAs, reducing the need for performance tuning or planning. Comprehensive infrastructure management and analytics provided by Quantum ties the global environment together into a single, manageable entity. In sum, Quantum continues to excel at providing flexible, robust, and high-performance data protection.

23 Appendix Lab Validation: Quantum DXi6900 Deduplication Appliance, Powered by StorNext 5 23 Table 2. ESG Lab Test Bed Quantum Backup Infrastructure Version DXi Additional DXi Systems as needed for replication and recovery testing 2.1, 2.2, 3.0 Quantum vmpro Server/Storage Infrastructure OS/Version 1x Dell R810-Intel Xeon L GH CPU 64GB RAM 8x Dell D710 Intel E GHz CPU(x8), 8GB RAM VMware vsphere, ENT Windows Server 2008 RedHat Linux Version x LSI Logic 4980, 8TB, RAID 5 Backup Software Version Symantec NetBackup 7.6

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