What’s new in Vembu BDRSuite 5.3 [sponsored]
Vembu recently released a new version of their Backup & DR solution, BDRsuite version 5.3. Their solution aims to protect your business-critical data, whether it is virtualized, physical, or running in a cloud. In this post, I will review the release notes and provide my opinion on them.
The release notes, which you can find here, mention the following primary new features:
File Server Backup from BDSuite Backup Server UI
You can now add Windows and Linux file servers to the Data Source and configure file & folder level backup from the BDRSuite Backup Server console. The backup agents can be automatically pushed from the backup server or manually installed on the required servers. This feature allows you to manage the backup & recovery of a large number of machines from the centralized BDRSuite Backup Server.
Instead of having to capture an entire fileserver, you can now directly protect one or multiple shares and include them in your backup jobs. Having the capability of directly adding business-critical file hares (on both Windows and Linux) is a solid capability to protect them and provide them with a suitable RTO and RPO without the infrastructure overhead.
Endpoint Backup from BDRSuite Backup Server UI
Now, you can configure File & Folder Backup of many Windows & Linux Endpoints directly from the BDRSuite Backup Server console. The agents can be manually installed on the target system or pushed automatically. Also, you can add multiple endpoints in bulk using the CSV file.
Being able to backup your endpoints can be helpful if they contain a lot of local data. Being able to do so from a single console makes it extra powerful as it makes managing the environment so much simpler.
Azure Blob as Backup Repository
Primary backup data and backup copy data can now be stored in Azure Blob storage directly.
This is a strong capability in the fight against ransomware. Being able to store your backup data directly outside your corporate datacenter, perhaps even on immutable Blob storage. However, I would always consider having your first backup set close by to be able to meet the RTO and prevent any bandwidth costs that might come with cloud storage.
Active Directory Integration
BDRSuite Server now integrates with Active Directory for user management. You can import and add AD/LDAP users to the BDRSuite Backup Server and grant them different levels of access to the BDRSuite Backup Server.
Being able to granularly control access to your backup solution is a no-brainer. And being able to do so based on Active Directory or LDAP objects helps greatly in compliance with the different industry regulations.
Integrity Check on VMware ESXi Server
You can now run the automated boot test on VMware ESXi hosts to confirm the recoverability of the backup machines.
One thing that organizations tend to forget is to validate their backups. Unfortunately, having a backup job that says all is well doesn’t mean you can use it to restore your services when needed. Therefore, having the automated integrity check capability is extremely important in a successful BCDR strategy.
Enhancements
Next to the major additions to version 5.3, some smaller enhancements have been made as well.
- Backup data retention for deleted/excluded VMs
- Performance improvements in the server rebuild process
- Backup support for the Microsoft 365 accounts enabled with Multi-Factor Authentication(MFA)
- Parallel backup processing of Microsoft 365 & Google Workspace users
- Option to exclude Microsoft 365 mailbox folders from backup
- Breadcrumbs view for SharePoint site & Teams data restore
- Download Microsoft 365 mail data in EML format
- Download Microsoft 365 mail data in MBOX format
- Microsoft 365 & Google Workspace mail recovery based on time range
- Search option for Microsoft 365 & Google Workspace emails during the restore
- Parallelly initiate PST export for multiple Microsoft 365 & Google Workspace user’s mail data
- Logs download for Microsoft 365 & Google Workspace backups
- Enhanced backup progress window for Google Workspace backup
- Tree view for Google Drive data restore
- Enhanced report for Google Workspace backups
These enhancements primarily focus on protecting your cloud resources hosted in Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, which is nice to see that they are still adding capabilities in this area. As I feel it is important to take responsibility for backups of your cloud-hosted data.
In closing
If you want to know more about this release, or Vembu BDRsuite in general, visit one of the links below.
I hope I can find the time to take some of these features for a spin in my lab, as I’m specifically excited about the integrity check functionality. And when I do, you can expect a blog post about it here!
