SQL Backup™
User testimonials
"I discovered SQL Backup when attempting to consolidate the backups for our 25 SQL servers. Using Microsoft's native backup, we were barely able to squeeze 14 days of backups on disk. This presented a problem when we needed to do a data discovery project. The files were backed up to tape and only the month-end tapes were available. This resulted in two weeks of missing data for each month of the analysis.
Using SQL Backup Pro, I was immediately able to expand the on-disk availability to 45 days, which provided adequate overlap for our monthly backups on tape, not to mention the tremendous time savings, and the ability for the agent to automatically notify an administrator of backup failures.
Since then, we have begun using the mirror option, with all files copied to a central server. Currently, I am working to extend the on-disk retention to 90 days with no increase in required disk space, but just changing the schedules of some of the larger backup jobs.
We have been using SQL Backup for over two years now. I have been highly impressed with the organization's support team, as all my questions were either already answered on the online forum, or quickly handled by a representative."
"When I was first introduced to Red Gate Software by an outside consultant about three years ago, my organization had approximately 150+ databases that we were backing up three times per day. These backups were being done using Microsoft's native BACKUP DATABASE syntax, and they took between one and two hours to complete. Also, these backups totaled nearly 30 GB. We moved to SQL Backup Pro and saw the time to backup decrease to 20 minutes. The total size of backup decreased to less than 5 GB.
We perform these backups using SQLBackupC.exe, the command line interface. Today, we have more than 350 databases. We still back them up three times per day. They are all backed up within 27 to 30 minutes. The total size of backup is around 5.4 GB. I've always been impressed by the speed and the compression benefits of using SQL Backup Pro.
As an added plus, SQL Backup Pro is also very stable. The SQL Backup service rarely ever needs to be restarted. The command line interface runs very rapidly and dependably. I love the way the wide-open command line syntax gives me control over the process so that I can keep the process streamlined.
Red Gate's staff is always helpful and friendly. When given the opportunity, I highly recommend your software to my colleagues in the field. Thank you for great support and for a great product."
"SQL Backup is awesome, period. I read about it in a SQL newsletter I receive and decided to try out the claims of reducing backups by 50% in both time and space. I loaded it on a development SQL server and was able to take a database that totalled 130 GB and ran for five hours with normal SQL backup tools to taking up 22.2 GB of space and running for two hours. It worked so well that I gathered some information using the three compression levels and presented my findings to the IT manager. Since we have more than 105 GB on each of our two production SQL Servers, he was very interested in the software. We have purchased SQL Backup and installed it on one production SQL Server. Our seven and a half hour backups each night on that server are now cut down to under two hours and are getting 87% or better compression on the backups. We are very grateful for the shorter backup window and the lower disk space requirements, and we can now increase the number of backups we keep by fourfold."
"SQL Backup is an amazing tool that lets us manage and monitor our backups in real time. Red Gate's SQL tools have saved us so much time and work that I am afraid my director will decide that we don't need a DBA anymore!"
"We are already a user of the SQL Backup Product, and please pass along my sincere thanks to the product teams and developers. We previously used SQL LiteSpeed from Imceda, and I have to say your product BLOWS THEIRS OUT OF THE WATER in terms of usability, upgradability, ease of use, and performance."
"SQL Backup from Red Gate allows us to achieve results that far exceed the native capabilities of SQL Server. SQL Backup is pivotal in supporting the UK's online data repository of newspaper articles fed by the national publishing houses. Our administrative and system overheads have been considerably lowered, our resilience is second to none and, critically, we have received real cost savings as a result."
"I just downloaded SQL Backup 5 and upgraded our servers from version 4. I wanted to let you all know that you did an EXCELLENT job with this upgrade! I am very impressed with the improved functionality that you have provided with this release. The ability to upgrade all of my servers from my workstation is a huge plus and the process has been flawless. I showed our system administrator the timeline feature, and he was so jealous! You guys are awesome! Keep the great releases coming!"
"I spent some time investigating the various products available to fulfil my SQL offsite backup requirements, and I have been very pleased with my decision to go with Red Gate. The software has by far the most user-friendly, intuitive interface in its class; the backup routines are well-compressed, encrypted for peace of mind and are transported to our server rapidly. The support staff I have dealt with have all been very helpful, professional, and they have worked to help me choose the most relevant product in the range to suit my requirements. I couldn't be happier."
"Red Gate's SQL Backup 5 is simple to install, easy to use, and is very affordable. The ability to view the status of backups across several servers, using the timeline, allows easy tracking of what's happening. This is a must for any DBA. Red Gate is certainly our preferred backup solution, considering its speed and reliability."
"I want to congratulate your programmers on an awesome upgrade to version 5. It is much easier to edit and monitor jobs."
"I found SQL Backup to be a powerful tool with an intuitive interface. I particularly liked the timeline monitoring in the GUI, which clearly displays backup schedules for multiple servers, making it easy to identify any backup failures. It's then possible to drill into the details of the job in order to investigate the cause of the problem."
"Red Gate customer service really is to be applauded – everything is always simple and easy with yourselves. We definitely made the right choice for our backup solution."
"Our production systems have benefited from SQL Backup by allowing us to take snapshots throughout the day in about half the time of a Microsoft native backup, while reducing the impact on our users. Our development staff have benefited by being able to quickly restore a database from production into a test environment.
It is now possible for us to transmit one of our larger database backups to an offsite facility every night. The product is easy to use, extremely efficient, and very reliable.
Here's a quick comparison of backups run in a 'virtual environment' under VMWare ESX 3.0, on Dell Poweredge 2900 dual-core XEON processors":
Type of Backup
Time
Size of backup file
Size reduction
Microsoft SQL Server native backup 1,009,924
Red Gate (High speed compression) 313,331
Red Gate (Intermediate speed compression) 292,344
Red Gate (Maximum speed compression) 268,596
"I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for the pain that SQL Backup has alleviated from my IT department. With a business critical SQL database currently running at over 250 GB, the backup process was long, laborious and unreliable at best. I have searched the web before and even visited your site for info. But, due to my cautious nature, I never really believed the performance claims. Not only were your claims correct, they shattered all expectations that I had.
Now all of my servers are protected using your software. We recently had a disaster recovery situation and Red Gate effortlessly recovered all data and had all departments productive again within a matter of a couple of hours. Keep up the good work, and I will spread the word to all of my IT colleagues."
"SQL Backup Pro Edition includes two tools – SQL Backup and SQL Log Rescue – that should be a part of every DBA's toolbox. It was a crucial tool in our backup and recovery efforts surrounding Hurricane Katrina, and will continue to be a vital part of our data security strategy."
"Impressed is the word! Cut our backup times in half and reduced the space used by 80%! Thanks a lot!"
"I just wanted to thank you for a good product at a good price and let you know we are happy with it. We're installed on three machines and I'm busy creating new backup routines to use the extended stored procedure. The first test backed up a 180 GB database over a gigabit network. Two hours later it closed a 31 GB file. The native process ran 7.5 hours and left a 145 GB footprint. I also like the use of SMTP email for notification. It sure beats installing Outlook on every server we want to monitor."
"We are very glad indeed with the performance; backing up nearly 30 GB in just over ten minutes with a compression ratio of over 80% is very impressive...Thank you very much for your support and kindness, which, nowadays, is even more impressive than the software's great performance."
"I would just like to say that I am very selective in utilizing third party software. Red Gate SQL Backup is a great tool. I read a comparison between SQL Backup and three other similar SQL Server utilities. I ran my own testing between [the competition] and Red Gate SQL Backup. SQL Backup not only outperformed but is a great value at a fraction of the cost of [the competition].
I am currently saving over .5 TB in disk storage and tape backup space and have plans for more. I have reduced my nightly backups by 6½ hours combined time. In using this product I managed to put off buying a new LTO2 tape library which would be about a $10,000 saving. It also saved me from having to add additional LUNs on my SAN where I back up to. Thanks for a great product!"
"I have evaluated and used your SQL Backup product and have found it lived up to all your promises and have just purchased the product. It is efficient and easy to use."
"Of the products that I evaluated, I like SQL Backup the best ;-))"
"Just downloaded, installed and tested and SQL Backup backed up my data to less than half the size of the standard [SQL Server] Enterprise backup. And the restore was seamless. Very nice application."
"Based on my testing, I'm very impressed with this product. Backup speed and compression are very good and it offers excellent value for money for SQL shops that want to reduce their storage costs."
"After testing major competitors for SQL Backup, I found that it had the simplest interface, best overall speed and best ease of use. It did excellent in cutting backup times by 90% in my testing. Combine these items with encrypted backups, an SMTP mail client, and a great price for our clustered solution. This made it the best tool for our backup needs."
"I just wanted to give you some feedback on the incredible results we have experienced since implementing Red Gate SQL Backup. The combined size of all our SQL Server databases is currently in the region of 900 GB, with the largest of these databases being a massive 750 GB and growing at a rate of 20 GB per month. A full backup usually took about 10 hours to complete [but] since introducing Red Gate SQL Backup, our backup times have decreased to just over 2 hours with an average compression rate of 80%.
In my eyes, this is truly unbelievable in terms of performance improvement and everybody on our project team is amazed, to say the least. In my experience, the Red Gate products are all excellent and are still exceeding expectations."
"I work for a small bank where the IT team is 'subjected' to frequent DR tests. After being left extremely frustrated having to rely on native SQL backups, I found this tool which we purchased and implemented. Shortly after, the business pulled a surprise offsite DR test on us. We recovered 20 databases (some over 60 GB) in 1.5 hours. What used to take us the entire day, with major stress, is now a pleasure, painless and stress free. Thanks, guys!"
