Buying new tape drive - what software is required for Veeam

[McKITGuys]

Hi,

We have been using Veeam for some time but only backing up to offsite. Considering now backing up also to LTO7 for archival purposes. Does the Veeam software include backing up to tape inherently or do we need to purchase software from the tape vendor as well? I am guessing we don't need additional software but wanted to check. Will probably be an HP Ultrium LTO7 or Quantum drive.

Thanks.

[tommyo]

You won't need software from another vendor (other than drivers possibly) but if you run the Standard version of Veeam it's only partially supported for tape.

[McKITGuys]

We have B&R 9.0 Enterprise Plus - where does that put us?

[csydas]

You'll get the full functionality with Enterprise Plus.

I'd suggest read up on the documentation for Veeam's tape, cause it's mostly a custom tailored solution that specifically accommodates Veeam's synthetic operations and tracking, and it's a completely different world from stuff like BackupExec. A few of our plans had to be adjusted for the Veeam tape archiving.

But the set up is pretty seamless, mostly cause Veeam doesn't do any special integration with the tape hardware/vendor software. Just point it at a tape server that's all set up and it does the rest automatically.