Enterprise disaster recovery.

How has it helped my organization?

We went from an organization with minimal to no disaster recovery. I was able to spin up the disaster recovery environment with AWS rather quickly and meet business requirements. We continue to build off of it as well. It is in place, and it is simple enough where we can continue to add licenses and systems, and swap systems out too. As we remove some servers, we can always add new ones in with the same license.

What is most valuable?

The speedy, quick configuration and installation was the initial reason for the product and what I enjoyed about it. Now, it just continues to be simple and works well.

What needs improvement?

One item that they did fix was, and this was when we first started, they had only one type of license. Then they did come out with a Tier 2 type of license, which costs a little less money. It updated a little less frequently, which seems to fit our needs. That was definitely helpful.

There are some servers where we do get failures with the CloudEndure client. I don't know necessarily if it's the CloudEndure issue, but it's something that my engineers fixed on our end. It's always something that's easily repairable, though. There is a constant update of the servers.

It's a fairly simple product once the infrastructure's in place. We did hire a third-party to help us build the AWS infrastructure to work with CloudEndure, but once it was up and running, it pretty much runs on its own now.

For how long have I used the solution?

One to three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

There were no stability issues, once it was up. We built the environment once, but that was because we migrated to the additional licenses. However, once it was up, the only instability was just some random servers. There was pretty much always fixed on the client side, and usually it was Linux machine.

I don't recall any CloudEndure crashes with server usage.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We just did an upgrade, and it went fairly smoothly. Once it is on the machines, if we are not changing anything around, it seems to work fine. Even the reporting features on the dashboard are pretty cool. You can see what state all the servers are in. You can get reporting if something is not updating, so the visual stations are good as well.

How is customer service and technical support?

Technical support has always been responsive. We engage with a third-party to work with us on CloudEndure and the infrastructure, so we work with them most of the time. For any of our dealings with CloudEndure, they have been pretty responsive.

Which solutions did we use previously?

We had an old school type of DR with replication.

Since we put CloudEndure in place, which is our DR for our Tier 1 and 2 servers, replicating out from our facility to AWS, and it has been bare-metal to bare-metal type of disaster recovery. This is our first cloud-based DR solution.

How was the initial setup?

The setup was fairly simple, and we spun it up pretty quickly. We did have a third-party help us, so most of the effort was putting into building the AWS environment, but that wasn't too difficult. We designed the AWS environment, then on a smaller subset, we installed the client and the client started replicating, and that was our initial test. Then from there, we kept adding servers.

What was our ROI?

It helped us build our disaster recovery. Our organization was moving towards the cloud in a lot of areas, so it saves us ample dollars from having to buy hardware for disaster recovery. We even used it for other cloud systems for disaster recovery as well. The other piece to it was not relying on any specific type of server. It worked on our Window servers and our Linux servers, because it is versatile.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing is better now that they had come out with the Tier 2 which replicates a little less often. In comparison to what I would have been spending with any other type of solution, the pricing is fair.

Where the price adds up, there are CloudEndure licenses, then there is the AWS environment, and finally, there is the AWS storage, so cumulatively, it adds up. The license would be better if it cheaper. I do not think it is great pricing, but I would say it's fair.

Through my third-party, I locked-in for the long-term. I received some price discounts from a three-year deal versus a one-year, which I probably question a bit now. It forced us into a certain amount of licenses. From year-to-year, I can't really play with it that often or drop it if needed. I am sort of locked into a certain amount of serviceable licenses because of the long-term deal. This has nothing to do with CloudEndure. This is between the third-party and me.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

When we first went with this, it was we did lay out three options. We had somebody help us with making this decision. It was CloudEndure, it was moving towards a metal to metal type of DR solution, and the other one that we had up and running was VMware. I don't even know if they sell the product anymore, but VMware had a DR type of solution. We used the three of those, and we were testing them. VMware didn't seem to cut it. From a cost savings, it seemed like it made sense to go with CloudEndure and AWS versus a metal to metal type of DR solution. We did have a VMware solution in place, but we canceled it.

I haven't really compared other cloud-based DR solutions, so I can't compare it to anything else.

What other advice do I have?

I was able to build this up real quick and testing has always been successful as well. I have had issues bringing data back to the facility, but the restore has always worked with CloudEndure.