At the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, back-up and disaster recovery vendor StorageCraft Technology Corp. made a major product announcement with the release of the cross-platform version of StorageCraft ShadowProtect SPX.
The SPX cross-platform intends to tie together the management of backup and recovery operations of Windows and Linux systems for speedy sector-level backup of both operating systems. It also leverages Volume Shadow Copy Service for solid backups and a proprietary kernel-level snapshot driver for fast backups of Windows systems. In the Linux camp, SPX has a new kernel-level driver.
SPX for Linux was unveiled in May, while the Windows side at the Microsoft show in Orlando.
Matt Urmston, StorageCraft’s director of product management, told CDN at the show that ShadowProtect SPX for Linux and Windows allows managing backup and recovery for both systems.
“SPX runs parallel to ShadowProtect 5 and Windows cross platform. The way we think Windows and Linux together as far as we are concerned you no longer have to go to another now you use the same platform,” he said.
Other new features in SPX are:
- A new user interface with job timeline for monitoring and managing backup jobs;
- Virtual and physical support (P2V, P2P, V2P, V2V);
- Remote monitoring and policy-based management from a common management console –StorageCraft ShadowControl 3.0;
- A new job scheduler;
- Extended and integrated StorageCraft VirtualBoot technology support;
- Simplified system migration of any SPX backup image to new physical or virtual systems; and
- Cloud replication support for onsite and offsite protection with StorageCraft ImageManager.
SPX was not the only introduction by StorageCraft at the WPC 15. StorageCraft announced the release of ShadowControl 3.0 for IT administrators to help them monitor and manage every ShadowProtect, SPX and StorageCraft ImageManager endpoint through a single, Web-based console. ShadowControl also offers policy-based backup job management.
As for ShadowControl 3.0, Urmston said has a dashboard for a quick view of what’s going and can provide newly created backup policies for each end-point along with one-to-many policies.
“The way it works is ShadowControl’s Web-based control has a backup scheduler and all end-points subscribe to the appliance and from there it pulls down the policy so it’s a one-time move,” he said.
“This is a huge time savings. Businesses shifted about three years-ago to MSPs. That channel for us is about 8,000 partners and we still do standard VAR perpetual licenses, but those traditional VARs have also shifted to the MSP model. Now we are providing them the tools so that they can do this remotely and not go to a customer site, which saves them even more time,” Urmston added.
For the channel, SPX and ShadowControl 3.0 provide them with the opportunity to design policies specifically for customers even having separate backup policy designs for the line of business.
“This provides our channel with new revenue opportunities to expand into larger environments in Windows servers and Linux systems. Before they could not have had those types of conversations. Customers want a single vendor for backup these days.”
SPX is available at distributors Synnex, LifeBoat Distribution and LabTec.