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EMC Buying Dantz 46

Posted by pudge from the mmm-backups dept.
Bug-Y2K writes "Looks like storage giant EMC, is buying longtime Mac software company Dantz Develpment. Dantz, makers of Retrospect have been the leader in backup technology for the Mac OS since dinosaurs roamed the earth. Mindshare has been slipping of late but the product is known for being better at restores than anything out there. I wonder what lies in store for Retrospect now?"
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EMC Buying Dantz More

EMC Buying Dantz

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  • Headline slightly misleading (Score:5, Informative)

    by Gogo Dodo ( 129808 ) on Thursday October 07, 2004 @07:35PM (#10466021)
    EMC is in talks to buy Dantz, but nothing has been finalized yet.

    However, usually somebody reporting that these types of discussions are going on means that it will happen, but as the article says "it's never done until it's done"

  • I find this funny. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Ayanami Rei ( 621112 ) * <rayanami@@@gmail...com> on Thursday October 07, 2004 @08:29PM (#10466349) Journal
    While Dantz is _the_ Mac backup software company, the reason why EMC is interested is because Retrospect for Windows is the only software with the exception of Veritas that can back up live NTFS filesystems, with or without Volume Shadow Copy support.

    • Re:I find this funny. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by hype7 ( 239530 ) <u3295110@noSPam.anu.edu.au> on Thursday October 07, 2004 @10:24PM (#10466684) Journal
      While Dantz is _the_ Mac backup software company, the reason why EMC is interested is because Retrospect for Windows is the only software with the exception of Veritas that can back up live NTFS filesystems, with or without Volume Shadow Copy support.


      Well that's concerning, because if they're buying it for Windows features... well, the Mac stuff may be "de-prioritised" (or insert suitable euphemism here), leaving us without forward development of the main backup software for the platform...

      -- james
      • Well that's concerning, because if they're buying it for Windows features... well, the Mac stuff may be "de-prioritised"

        Doesn't always have to be that way. Don't forget that Dantz was already developing it for both platforms. The good thing about Retrospect is that it worked pretty much the same way on both platforms. Also another reason for Retrospect's success on Windows is it's ease of use compared to Windows Backup (at least the one that came with NT4)

        • Re:Retrospect for Windows (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Gogo Dodo ( 129808 ) on Friday October 08, 2004 @12:21AM (#10467336)
          Unfortunately, for a long time, the Mac Server was de-prioritized. The Windows Server got a lot of development for a long time and after a lot of complaints on the Retro-Talk list, development of the Mac Server finally started up again. The Retro-Talk list was plain nasty for awhile.
      • I bought Retrospect about a year and a half ago to do incremental backups of non-system and non-media files to cd-r's. It was a massive pile of steaming crap. It does not want to do anything but full drive backups. Ever time I did a backup, it would just keep asking for more disks to write on (a backup that was estimated at 6 disks ended up at 14). It was constantly making coasters (about 65% success rate with my Pioneer DVR-104 on good brand name media, which has never made a coaster in any program but

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) *
          Comment removed based on user account deletion
          • I had loads of problems with Retrospect burning coasters, too. DVD Studio Pro has never once burned a bad disc on the same drive (except once where the content itself was largely missing), nor has iTunes burned a single coaster for audio on that drive. I do music recording in my spare time, so I have burned 100+ test CDs as the project has evolved. I've also burned a couple of dozen DVDs with DVD SP (1 and 2).

            My failure rate with Retrospect, at something on the order of 80% disc failure rate (i.e. a di

    • Re:I find this funny. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by MarcQuadra ( 129430 ) on Friday October 08, 2004 @06:07AM (#10468387)
      There's more to it than that.

      Apple's xSan (real soon now) and the xServe RAID are actually generating interest in the enterprise market. Lots of net admins KNOW that they need something more 'beefy' than Windows to run their SANs, and Apple is making what looks like drop-dead easy and super-cheap SANs a reality.

      Trust me, the admin at my work came to my desk yesterday and asked if I could prepare a report for consolidating storage on Apple metal instead of Dell. Dell wants to sell us more SCSI equipment, which is total overkill for our needs. We don't need the throughput of 36 SCSI drives in a RAID5, it's not worth the cost compared to something like the xServe RAID.

      Also, our CIO has been pushing for OpenDirectory instead of AD, to make it easier for our databases, vendors, and appliances to tie-in. And I can make OD and SAMBA work together and perform better than AD. All this is probably gonna happen on Apple metal, at least until the admins are comfy enough with *NIX to move to straight-BSD.

      EMC's purchase of Dantz is part of EMC's long-term plan to become a software vendor. I bet they license retrospect to Apple in the xSan, and other vendors in their NAS and SAN projects.
      • Dell has been promising for about 3 months now (I've seen "beta" sales presentations) to come out with a line of fiber-channel and SCSI-attached S-ATA arrays. But they keep pushing it back, probably because they know the margins are higher on the SATA-based NAS and full SCSI arrays.

        We gave up and bought about 14 nStors. Never been happier.
        • We've got a SCSI-based Dell NAS here trying hard to be a file server. I tell you, I've never seen a crappier implementation in my life. x86 servers seem so cheesy compared to the real metal, and Dell's hardware is sub-par at best.
          • 1) Obvious they are just reprovisioning their PowerEdge servers.
            2) Powering it with Windows NT 5.2 with some bullshit Microsoft-supplied NAS configuration patches.
            I mean, how retarded is that? All the loveliness of a full-blown windows install with half the ability to configure it properly... it's the worst of both worlds.
            3) NOBODY USES WINDOWS FOR FILE-SERVING. I mean, I suspect even Microsoft knows that. They call DFS a filesystem, but it's nothing like that. It's implemented by just storing UNC paths in
    • Actually, it is my snapshot software that Dantz is using. It is also used by PowerQuest/Symantec and several other backup vendors.

      It works with most backup applications, but ISV/OEM integration is better than running it standalone. Anyone can download the standalone version from BetaNews (search for "Volume Snapshot"). It support NT 4.0 all the way up to Server 2003.

  • If you're looking at Retrospect, do you know about Acronis? link [acronis.com]

    I did a eval of backup solutions, and Acronis won hands-down for ease of use; it's saved me big time several times this year. I'm a very satisfied customer.

  • Dantz -- getting arrogant in its old age? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 07, 2004 @11:12PM (#10467008)
    I've used Retrospect since the mid-nineties, and it's an OK but slightly limited product (also a bit slow), but the company has slowly started to piss me off. Dantz is starting to seem a bit arrogant, although aside from a couple unfortunate run-ins with "support," I can't quite put my finger on it.

    Version 5 was advertised as supporting Windows and Macintosh servers and workstations, which was great because I still had an old AppleShare IP file server to backup, plus a couple windows and OS X boxes. Unfortunately version 5, despite being advertised as compatible with AppleShare IP, was not. Period. There was a known bug that Dantz said was Apple's fault (maybe it was, but version 4 didn't have the same problem...) that crashed the server every half hour or so. The workaround: use version 4. Dantz didn't give a flying &*#% that it didn't work once they had my money, and I was stuck with a few hundred dollars of unusable software. Plus they were jerks in the smuggly arrogant way they told me I was SOL.

    Well, finally the Appleshare IP server was gone so I optimistically thought I might be able to finally use version 5. No dice. It's basically not compatible with OS X, and definitely not compatible with OS X 10.3, and really definitely not at all compatible with 10.3 Server.

    Unfortunately at this point due to circumstances beyond my control I had to get X 10.3 Server integrated with the rest of the backups in a hurry, so I grudingly purchase version 6. But when I go to install it I'm told I don't have a valid software key. The key included with the product doesn't work, neither does the key from the old version, nor anything else remotely key-like that I can find. A gruff dude at Dantz tells me definitively and mockingly that I don't need a key to install the upgrade. Except the upgrade won't launch without a key. Ok. Call back Dantz. They make an enormous fuss about it being an upgrade and how I didn't register the previous version, and how could I possibly have an upgrade if I hadn't registered by previous copy? I told them that the previous copy didn't work, I never used it, and that there was no clearly apparent reason to fill out the registration card anyway (do people actually register retail software?). Then I was told to use my old registration key (the one that didn't work). "Are you sure it doesn't work?" Yes. I was told I'd be sent a new registration key by email in a couple minutes. Carefully verified email address. Waited...next day no key. Call back Dantz. Explain the situation again. The customer service rep is shocked and amazed that it's possible to buy an upgrade to their product from a retailer. I eventually convince her I did not download the upgrade and that I did not receive a key in an email with the software that I did not download. I explain that I was told I'd receive a key in an email that should have been sent the day before. Then I'm told, there's no record of a key being sent. (Eureka! I think we were starting to communicate.) She promises to send a key...and against all odds it finally arrived.

    Now I'm successfully using the product, but the company exudes a smelly fog of bumbling arrogance. So far it doesn't seem to have hit their programming team, but I'm not impressed. Especially with so many other backup solutions out there, of varying price & capability, I hesitate to recommend the product to others.
    • Yes possibly, market dominance can do that...
      I've had two experiences with Dantz- one positive and the other negative.
      In 1996 our 8mm Exabyte drive came bundled with an OEM version of Retrospect, and to activate it we had to make an international phone call (I'm in Australia) to receive an unlock code. No problems. Jump forward to 1999 and I have a hard-drive failure- my system drive with all applications on it. I replace the drive and go to re-install Retrospect so I can restore everything else from my
    • I used to use reptrspect for my personal backup, Not a distributed systetm. I used it on tapes. then I switched to DVD-Ram. One day I tried to restore from DVD ram and found restrospect could not recover. on of the DVDs it had written was unreadable. because this was a differential series of backups that one dvd corrupted meant all dvds after that could not be used.

      so far this is not retropects fault as any differential backup syste has this weak link. But what pissed me off was that I could not get

    • I've both sold AND used Retrospect... because ti was the only thing that did what was needed. So sorry that was the case... horrible borrible. Just happy to confirm that your account is absolutely the same as mine, as recently as a couple of months ago when I paid for a substantial multiuser/server upgrade license for a client, and then could not install it due to this madness of license keys, broken online authorizations, and rather unaccommodating people in their customer service. never again will I send

  • Dantz Patents (Score:5, Interesting)

    by wchin ( 6284 ) on Thursday October 07, 2004 @11:52PM (#10467226)
    Dantz owns a patent, 5,150,473 Data storage format for addressable or sequential memory media [uspto.gov] which essentially covers the use of a on-disk catalog to record what is written to tape for faster retrieval and creating incrementals. This patent can be very cumbersome for companies trying to enter the Mac OS X backup market. With that said, there are quite a few backup solutions available or coming to Mac OS X - BakBone, Avail, SGL, Tolis Group, and more. I know that the Tolis Group doesn't use a catalog the same way and doesn't do point-in-time incremental snapshots like Retrospect does. I don't know if anyone else coming to Mac OS X does. It is rumored that OmniGroup's OmniBackup was killed over this patent issue. Too bad, since that was the only tape backup application for Mac OS X Server at the time.

    • Re:Dantz Patents (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 08, 2004 @01:36AM (#10467621)
      It is rumored that OmniGroup's OmniBackup was killed over this patent issue.

      That's no rumor: Dantz came right out and said it at the time.

      Put this in your file of "patents that should be invalidated, because what they cover is obvious to one skilled in the art." Keeping a catalog of what you backed up? Give me a break.

  • EMC^2 also bought Legato last year, aother Backup Company, and Legato NetWorker has also (somewhat limited) backup support ... coincidence?
  • After reading this, and generally being a little let down by MacOS backup solutions, I'm very glad 10.4 will give proper support for rsync.

    • After reading this, and generally being a little let down by MacOS backup solutions, I'm very glad 10.4 will give proper support for rsync.

      Rsync is not a proper backup solution. Yes, you can make a back-up with it, and yes, it will only backup the modified files, but it won't give you a history, you will just have the latest snapshot of your drive. Good for disaster recovery (crash, fire, you name it), but that's about it.

      At my work we have Retrospect doing daily incremental backups, and we keep all

  • I never bothered upgrading from version 5. I was very irritated with v.5's inability to run scheduled backups, which is why I bought the software in the first place. I had to run a cron job just to launch the program. There was no support, no fix. Just a new version which required new money. As OSX has aged, v.5 hasn't aged well with it. Now the operation log frequently locks because Retrospect doesn't exit cleanly and I need to cold boot in order to free it (Haven't figured out how to do that any ot
  • until "The Great Hard Drive Crash of 1999". Which was followed by "The Great Failure of Retrospect To Restore My Data."

    I'd done several backup/restore tests to ensure everything worked fine, and it did. But when the sh*t hit the fan and I REALLY needed it to come through for me, it failed to do the job it was designed to do. I've never used it since, nor will I ever consider trying it again.

    For you Star Trek fans: Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice...

    I don't even bother with traditional backups
  • Retrospect is and has been crap for years and years and years. it is impossibly naive about how networks work, just for starters. does unnecessary prep work before beginning that makes backups run ridiculously long... and on my machine, it just loops and loops ad infinitum after the backup is done, with no indication of what it's doing. Tech support and customer service have been dismal, insulting, rude. All in all, this is a very privileged, pretty rich company that thinks it's on top of the world. EMC wou
  • Has anyone had direct experience using Amanda [amanda.org] under OS X? I know of windows support & assume that, at the very least, samba could be a work-around. I'm particularly interested in a native approach, as discussed here, [brandeis.edu] but wanted to know whether more people had tried (and succeeded!).

    I am looking for a cross-platform backup solution, but the per-seat charges on all proprietary solutions are a bit prohibitive (the hardware was hard enough to obtain!).
  • This should actually be a good thing. EMC bought Legato [legato.com] a while back. Legato is the big competitor to Veritas in the enterprise backup market. Merging the two opens up many possibilities... not the least of which would be better support for Mac OS X in Networker.

    Hopefully we'll see a 'consumer' version of Networker, which is way overpriced for at home. [I was priced almost $2k for the OS X support pak. For three machines? No thanks.]

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