Squeeze More Out Of The Network Right Now

It is, in fact, all of the above.

Networking products have come a long way from the days of hubs and token rings. Heavy demands are placed on today's data centers. From converged traffic emanating from a variety of sources such as VoIP and storage systems to combating the pervasive onslaught of security threats, network administrators have come to expect the devices and software that are components of a network to be efficient, secure, reliable and have proven ROI.

The six products presented here differ in functionality and features. Yet, each one of them meets the criteria to make it a leading-edge networking product. They all come from vendors with a track record of industry accolades. These are products that yield from each vendor's dedication to research and development, a consideration for cost to the consumer and rapt attention to the needs of solution providers.

CA: ARCserve Backup r12.5 for Windows

CA has overhauled ARCserve r12.5, making Release 12.5 so much more than a backup product. It integrates data protection and storage management and is more of a multilayered offering. An added boon is the intuitive interface and granular options for handling all kinds of backup jobs.

There are a slew of new features in this release, and backup data deduplication may be the most noteworthy. By searching for duplicate backup data, this feature can significantly reduce an organization's storage needs. Deduplication in CA ARCserve is an in-line process that occurs at the backup server, within a single session. ARCserve scans incoming data and segments it into chunks. Thus, disk space needed to back up this data stream is smaller with deduplication than in a regular backup job.

Another impressive new feature is the ability to back up Hyper-V Virtual Machines. Full backup of VM images is supported as well as the backing up of VMs at the file level. VM backup works well in this product and is easy to initiate. Need to restore a VM? That isn't a problem with ARCserve. It can perform granular restores from image backups or do file-level restores.

Security is beefed up in this release as well. If an administrator wants to recover encrypted backup, there is no need to remember the encryption password, which can (and should, as a best practice) change on a regular basis. It's simple to configure this software to remember the password for data restoration.

There are some preinstallation requisitions for ARCserve Backup. They include SQL Server Express, Microsoft's .Net framework 3.5 SP1, Microsoft's XML Core Services and Java Runtime Environment 1.4.2.16. No need to hunt for the prerequisites; they are all included with the software. During install, ARCserve will check a machine for all necessary components and if any are missing will guide a user through installation. It's a fast and hassle-free process.

CA has really made ARCserve almost "idiot-proof." After installation, the rather juvenile-sounding "My First Backup" wizard guides a user through every step needed to create a detailed backup job. There is nothing juvenile, however, in the precise, step-bystep manner the setup aids users in building a backup job. There is also a handy definition lookup in which a user can get clear-cut definitions to technology terms featured in the wizards.

CA: XOsoft r12.5

XOsoft release 12.5 is CA's solution for replication and high availability. It's an all-inclusive disaster-recovery solution. Why did we include disaster recovery in a feature on network products? Easy—a network is only as sound as its last good backup or disaster-recovery capability. Business-continuity planning is not merely a nice-to-have, it is a must-have.

This product provides replication and restoration for both files and platforms. Some of the supported platforms include Microsoft Exchange, SQL Server, Oracle and IIS.

Installation has multicomponents to it. The Control Service role is the single point of control of the CA XOsoft operation. An outstanding feature is the Continuous Data Protection Recovery option. It allows IT staff to perform restorations nearly effortlessly without a lot of overhead. Users can also get down to some real nitty-gritty management with the included Power Shell command-line interface tool.

Once the Control Service is installed, clicking on it opens up the browser-based CA XOsoft Overview page. From this page, there is a scenario management link. Clicking on this link automatically installs CA XOsoft Manager. From the Manager, engines are installed for both the Master (source) and the Replica (target) machine. After the engines are installed on the Master and Replica, a user can choose the directories to replicate from Master to Replica. A click of a button initiates a replication; as replication takes place, an animated graphic of the data exchange between the master and host is displayed so a user can easily see its progress.

Both the Master and Replica in each scenario has associated, configurable properties; scripts can be made to run before or after synchronization, parameters can be established such as maximum spool size or minimum disk free size, and a user can configure event notification and reporting.

NEXT: Cisco's UC500