Arkeia Delivers File-level Restore to VMware vStorage Customers

SAN DIEGO, March 22, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Arkeia Software, a leading provider of fast, easy-to-use, and affordable network backup solutions, today announced the release of a new version of its VMware vStorage agent featuring the ability to restore a single file or a directory from the backup of a complete Windows or Linux virtual machine performed through VMware vStorage API.

Granular Restore from Image Backups

The Arkeia Network Backup Agent for vSphere uses VMware's latest vStorage APIs for Data Protection (VADP).  Support for VMware's Changed Block Tracking (CBT), essential for fast, incremental image backups, was delivered in June 2010.  This upgrade to Arkeia's Backup Agent for vSphere now allows authorized users to use Arkeia's web user interface to select the file or directories to be restored and to save them either to the original virtual machine, to an alternate virtual machine, or to a physical server.

Unlike other vStorage solutions, Arkeia offers file-grain restore for both Windows and Linux virtual machines.  Further, Arkeia supports both native file systems and file systems layered on a Linux logical volume manager (LVM).  Administrators specify file or directory paths and the files or directories are restored in a single-pass.  The upgraded agent is backwards-compatible with image-backups made with earlier versions of Arkeia's backup agent for vStorage.

Enterprise-class—without paying a premium

DCIG's 2011 Virtual Server Backup Software Buyer's Guide ranked Arkeia Software 3rd among 24 vendors for data protection of virtual server environments.  "Arkeia Network Backup possesses many of the same features that backup software solutions that are normally classified as 'enterprise class,'" reports Jerome Wendt, DCIG analyst and author of the 2011 Buyer's Guide.  "This is notable in that Arkeia primarily targets midsized companies with its solution.  So, midsized companies get much of the same functionality to protect their physical and virtual machines as larger organizations--without paying a premium."

"Arkeia's new agent for vStorage lets us further improve the service levels that we offer our customers," reports Guido Dolci, CTO at Sfera Networks, a regional MSP in Italy.  "Arkeia's leverage of VMware's Change Block Tracking already shortened backup windows with block-level incremental backup.  Now, we can reduce time required for granular file restores on both Linux and Windows guest operating systems."  Sfera Networks has protected customer data with Arkeia Network Backup since 1999.

Arkeia vStorage Agent Details

Arkeia's vStorage agent offers comprehensive backup and recovery support for ESX(i) 3.5 and VMware vSphere 4.0/4.1 (including vCenter) platforms.  Capabilities, all managed through Arkeia's Web user interface, include:

• Block-grain incremental image-level backups using VMware Changed Block Tracking (CBT) for reduced storage needs and faster backups due to reduced network traffic
• vCenter integration for simplified management of backup and recovery operations for environments with multiple physical hosts
• vApp support to backup and restore groups of VMs working together, as well as granular restore on a per-VM basis
• Multiple transport methods allowing the Arkeia Agent to perform LAN-free backups via SCSI hot-add or over the virtual LAN for accelerated performance
• Raw Device Mapping (RDM) support for backups of remote block storage devices, including incremental backups using CBT when in virtual compatibility mode
• Differential backups, as well as full and incremental backups, for the flexibility to define an efficient backup process
• Flexible restores including hypervisor redirection, as well as options to choose datacenter/folder, cluster/host, resource pool, or datastore destinations to simplify the restore process
• File-grain and directory-grain restores from image backups of both Linux and Windows guest operating systems; a VMware hypervisor is not required for the restore

Availability and Pricing

This Arkeia vStorage Backup Agent is available now. This agent is available as a software package installed on any VMware-supported Linux or Windows platforms, including Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Novell's SuSE Enterprise Server and Windows Server 2003 and 2008.  The agent is also available as a convenient virtual appliance, ready for deployment on any VMware ESX or ESXi hypervisor.

Pricing starts at $1,000 per VMware vSphere server for large vCenter deployments.  For Arkeia customers with current maintenance agreements, agent upgrades are provided at no charge.  

All products include one year of maintenance for free license updates/upgrades as well as access to Arkeia technical support.  See www.arkeia.com/vstorage for more information and a free-trial download.

About Arkeia Software

Arkeia Software delivers fast, easy-to-use, and affordable solutions for data backup and disaster recovery.  The award-winning Arkeia Network Backup Suite is designed for mid-sized organizations and safeguards more than 100,000 networks for 7,000 customers in 70 countries.  Arkeia's integrated solution is ideal for the consolidation of disparate backup products.  We protect all major virtual platforms including VMware, Hyper-V, and XenServer—and over 200 physical platforms including AIX, BSD, HP-UX, Linux, Mac OS, Netware, Solaris, and Windows.  Arkeia delivers software and both virtual and hardware appliances, backing up data to disk, tape, and the cloud.  We provide bare-metal disaster recovery, LAN/WAN replication of backup sets, and numerous hot backup agents.  Arkeia's unique source-side progressive deduplication technology reduces storage requirements and accelerates backups, especially of virtual environments.  Arkeia shipped the industry's first network backup solution for Linux in 1999 and is headquartered in San Diego, California.

Arkeia and Arkeia Network Backup are trademarks or registered trademarks of Arkeia Software, Inc.  All other trademarks or registered trademarks are the properties of their respective owners.

Arkeia Software Contact
Jody Scheldt
Communications Manager
+1.760.431.1319

SOURCE Arkeia Software