Red Gate SQL Backup vs. Quest Lite Speed backup

  • Sr SQL developer (10/29/2008)


    I also had tested restoring individual tables using LiteSpeed. The original client database was 1.2 TB and the process required nearly as much time as restoring the complete database.

    I used Idera's SQLSafe at my previous job, and running object level recovery on a 275 Gig database took just a minute or 2, compared with the 2 hours to restore.

  • I tested Quest, Idera, and Red Gate products a few years ago. The main feature I wanted was compression, although runtime was very important, too. I found the 3 products to be very similar in comparing these two criteria. I purchased the Red Gate product because it was significantly less expensive. Since then, I've purchased several addition copies of Red Gate's SQL Backup.

    Red Gate is licensed per server - not per instance. I think both the Idera and Quest products are priced per instance. We have several servers with multiple instances, so this was an important consideration for us.

    I've also been very happy with Red Gate's customer support. They're located in Great Briton, but I've always been able to talk to someone when I call. We have a different Idera product, and my limited experience with their customer support has not been stellar. I don't have any CS experience with Quest.

    Although I haven't done this, my understanding is that you can do table level restores, with the Red Gate product, if you purchase both SQL Backup and SQL Compare. I think that would still be considerably less expensive than either the Idera or Quest products.

    One other thing to note is that compression will vary greatly depending upon what's in your tables. This is true for all of these products. I suggest you download trial copies and test them against your data sets.

    Good luck!

  • Just my 2 cents - either the Idera or RedGate product (I want to say Idera but the memory isn't what it used to be!) did not require a license for servers where only restores were being done (a dev/stage server). You simply deployed the restore agent from a full install server.

    -- You can't be late until you show up.

  • tosscrosby (10/31/2008)


    Just my 2 cents - either the Idera or RedGate product (I want to say Idera but the memory isn't what it used to be!) did not require a license for servers where only restores were being done (a dev/stage server). You simply deployed the restore agent from a full install server.

    Red Gate SQL Backup gives you an executable and a GUI tool that you can place onto a server that does not have the SQL Backup software. The executable and the GUI are used to convert the compressed backup file to a native SQL format - either .bak or .mtf.

  • I knew it was one of them. I've used all three products at various points of my career. All good products where the decision was usually made based on costs (aren't they always?).

    -- You can't be late until you show up.

  • tosscrosby (10/31/2008)


    Just my 2 cents - either the Idera or RedGate product (I want to say Idera but the memory isn't what it used to be!) did not require a license for servers where only restores were being done (a dev/stage server). You simply deployed the restore agent from a full install server.

    Idera lets you restore to another server that doesn't have a license.

  • WooHoo - maybe I'm not as far gone as, she - what was her name again? - oh yeah, the wife, thinks I am. Thanks for the reminder.

    Edit - In case you couldn't tell, it's been a stress-free friday morning (so far).

    -- You can't be late until you show up.

  • Disclaimer: I work at Quest as the PM fro LiteSpeed so you probably have a good idea about what I might recommend.;)

    That being said, LiteSpeed's Object Level Recovery provides not only table level recovery, but also allows you to extarct the DDL from the backup for every object in the database (views, stored procs, tables, indexs, constraints, etc...Comes in handy for databases that might not be version controlled. Plus you can actually query a backup from the LiteSpeed 5.0 UI and throw the results into a csv or a new table in any database. Cool stuff.

    LiteSpeed also has a log reader, advanced log shipping monitoring and a backup analyzer that lets you select the best options regarding backup destinations and parameters.

    But in the end I agree with everyone on this thread that said test them all and make the decision that suits you. The proof is in the pudding.

    -Dave

  • David Swanson (10/31/2008)


    Disclaimer: I work at Quest as the PM fro LiteSpeed so you probably have a good idea about what I might recommend.;)

    That being said, LiteSpeed's Object Level Recovery provides not only table level recovery, but also allows you to extarct the DDL from the backup for every object in the database (views, stored procs, tables, indexs, constraints, etc...Comes in handy for databases that might not be version controlled. Plus you can actually query a backup from the LiteSpeed 5.0 UI and throw the results into a csv or a new table in any database. Cool stuff.

    LiteSpeed also has a log reader, advanced log shipping monitoring and a backup analyzer that lets you select the best options regarding backup destinations and parameters.

    But in the end I agree with everyone on this thread that said test them all and make the decision that suits you. The proof is in the pudding.

    -Dave

    Does your Object Level Recovery work with DIFFs and T-Log backups as well ?? We have a big database and take a full every couple of weeks, with DIFFs and T-logs in the meantime. Could we recover a table more recent than the last FULL ?

  • Not yet, but we are working on it.

  • David Swanson (10/31/2008)


    Disclaimer: I work at Quest as the PM fro LiteSpeed so you probably have a good idea about what I might recommend.;)

    That being said, LiteSpeed's Object Level Recovery provides not only table level recovery, but also allows you to extarct the DDL from the backup for every object in the database (views, stored procs, tables, indexs, constraints, etc...Comes in handy for databases that might not be version controlled. Plus you can actually query a backup from the LiteSpeed 5.0 UI and throw the results into a csv or a new table in any database. Cool stuff.

    LiteSpeed also has a log reader, advanced log shipping monitoring and a backup analyzer that lets you select the best options regarding backup destinations and parameters.

    But in the end I agree with everyone on this thread that said test them all and make the decision that suits you. The proof is in the pudding.

    -Dave

    You might want to mention that Object Level Recovery is only available in the Enterprise Edition. I believe it cost more then 3 times as much as the standard edition when I looked into it.

    Without getting into a lot of specifics, I have found Quest sales and licensing renewals to be very difficult to deal with. Based on this experience, I probably would go with a more user friendly vendor if I had it to do over again. I would also recommend buying through a third party, instead of directly from Quest.

  • I have switched over to recommending HyperBac to all of my clients for quite a number of reasons including no memtoleave issues, native backup commands, object recovery, select capability, ssis compression, COST, etc, etc.

    Disclaimer: I have a referral arrangement with them. If you like I can get you a discount (and pick up a small fee myself) if you would like.

    Best,
    Kevin G. Boles
    SQL Server Consultant
    SQL MVP 2007-2012
    TheSQLGuru on googles mail service

  • Hi there,

    First of all, a quick confession: I'm the product manager at Red Gate for SQL Backup. RML51 is right, you can perform object and even row level restore by using a combination of our tools: SQL Compare Pro and SQL Data Compare Pro with SQL Backup. The downside of this is that you need to use more than one tool, but the upside is that these tools can also be used for other tasks in addition to object level restore, e.g. comparing and synchronizing database schema and contents.

    A number of posts mention pricing as a concern, and we address this at Red Gate in a number of ways: our pricing is transparent and on our website, and we have several bundle options (with some nice, chunky discounts on the individual tool pricing :-). Slawomir mentions buying all our tools in one bundle – I think the SQL Toolbelt would fit the bill here.

    Thought it's also worth adding to Slawomir's post that SQL Backup Pro offers command line support too.

    Cheers, and thanks to all for posting their feedback.

    Colin.

  • Jason Williams (10/9/2008)


    As our SQL server environment continues to grow, we are starting to look at 3rd party backup solutions. The two I keep seeing are:

    Red Gate SQL backup

    and

    Quest Lite Speed backup

    Does anyone have experience using both?

    Is one better than the other?

    What are the main differences between the two? Does one stand out?

    Things I am looking for are:

    -Better backups

    -Faster backups

    -fast restores, easy restores

    -maybe restore a table.

    -restore database into another database on different server

    Lots of flexibility and options.

    Also, this would probably integrate into our NetBackup solution.

    I appreciate the help and feedback.

    Cheers.

    Jason

    Jason,

    I have used Both Red-Gate and Lite Speed over the past 2 yrs, the only problem I had with Red-Gate is restoring a database larger then 3 TB, but there newest release I have been able to restore using red-gate.

    Red Gate and Lite Speed are great products. in Production I only use Lite speed and in all other environments i use Red-Gate, as far as object restores i haven't had to use it in production yet *knock on wood* but it works fine.

  • Hey everyone. Thought I would follow up with my testing.

    Right now, I really like the Red Gate solution. Very simple, effective and pretty inexpensive which fits nicely into my budget.

    The others were also nice, but Red Gate just seemed to do exactly what we needed. We were able to buy a couple of SQL Toolbelts for the DBA team here and add SQL Backup licenses as needed

    For those that use the Red Gate products, how did you do your setup? Did you install the SQL Toolbelt (Specifically backup and response) on a dedicated server? I wasn't quite sure how to go about that and wanted to know how other people did that.

    Thanks,

    Jason

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