What are non-expensive alternatives to VDR for 5.1 backup solutions?
We are using simple and non-expensive yet working backups since ESX3. Starting from VCB scripts we moved to VDR. Now as VDR is being decommissioned in 5.1 (by the way will it work there?) we are looking to find something non-expensive yet working.
We have 3 hosts with Essentials+ running. Four Production VMs are being backed up every night; other VMs are being backed up weekly. VDR makes 2 TB from total of 15 TB VMs non-deduplicated data. Weekly we take OVAs of VDR VMs offsite. There is no offsite backup for VDP so it fails our requirements.
So far competitors are:
Veeam Backup Essentials: expensive, yet good
Acronis vmProtect: I love acronis products over the years but this product is priced as Veeam while Acronis support is awful
vRanger: non-expensive, ???
Symantec BackupExec: ???
thinware: ???
PHD Virtual: ???
Trilead: ???
Avamar Virtual Edition: ???
Any comments and experience?