Architecture Firm Restores Critical Data in Less Than 10 Minutes after Switching to Replay4

Sept. 5, 2011 - PRLog -- AppAssure Software, a leading developer of innovative backup and disaster recovery software products for mission-critical Windows application servers, today announced that Pryor & Morrow Architects, an architecture firm with more than 300 years of combined experience in the fields of architectural design, engineering, interior design, and construction, switched from Symantec Backup Exec to AppAssure’s award-winning Replay 4 backup and recovery solution. With Replay’s continuous data protection capabilities, Pryor & Morrow Architects is reported to have restored critical data in less than 10 minutes while making sure business emails and data are continuously updated.

With 30 staff members in the two locations, Pryor & Morrow’s data protection needs are as crucial as with any large company. “On our servers are mission critical job folders, marketing information, archived correspondence, and layered presentation boards,” notes Kevin Burchfield, landscape architect at Pryor & Morrow and sole IT staff. “Our work and data change literally from hour to hour, sometimes minute to minute.”

These data change needs left Pryor & Morrow extremely vulnerable because, as Burchfield experienced, its backup and disaster recovery software wasn’t doing the work he needed it to do. “We were using Backup Exec with a tape or Dell’s RD 1000,” he explains. “Every day, six days a week we’d do an incremental backup at the end of the day with new and changed information. Then on the seventh day, I’d do a full backup of everything. And each day I’d take the tapes home. If someone were working on a presentation board in Photoshop or something with lots of layers, and then accidentally saved over it, or if it had crashed, the entire data set would be impossible to get back.”

After nine years of struggling through this insufficient process, Burchfield began to research the key items that he needed for backup and disaster recovery, including continuous protection, fast item level recovery, email backup protection, and ease of use. “Initially we thought about updating our Backup Exec,” says Burchfield. “But I’ve not at all been impressed by Symantec products. Backup Exec is just huge and a robber, taking a lot of resources on the server. It’s also expensive.”

As Burchfield says, Pryor & Morrow needed something cost-effective, robust, and at the same time right-sized to its environment. They have found this in AppAssure’s Replay, says Burchfield.

“I did the research and I told the partners this is what I like and what we need,” explains Burchfield. “I told them that Replay doesn’t hog the resources that Backup Exec does on the server, and doesn’t give you lots of stuff you don’t need. I also told them the price, and they said, ‘Let’s go with it!’”

According to Burchfield, Replay has given him the ability to set the number of snapshots and the time interval according to Pryor & Morrow’s data needs. “We’ve set them at 15-minute intervals,” he says. “This way we can easily recover the changed data we need, or those emails that were accidentally deleted, if necessary. Just yesterday someone saved over a critical presentation board. Two minutes later I was able to retrieve it. This couldn’t have happened before Replay.”

“I can really rely on this software,” says Burchfield, summing up. “Backup Exec was just so complicated, but with Replay, everything is clear and easy. I don’t worry as much anymore.”

About Pryor & Morrow Architects

Founded in 1985, with two offices in Columbus and Tupelo, Mississippi, Pryor & Morrow Architects offers more than 300 years of combined experience in the fields of architectural design, engineering, interior design, and construction.

About AppAssure Replay 4

Replay 4 is the world’s fastest and easiest backup and disaster recovery software for Windows application servers, VMware and Hyper-V Virtual Servers. The only complete “all-in-one” backup and recovery solution, Replay 4 enables local recoveries from any type of failure in just minutes, with the added assurance of offsite application and image backup and bare metal recovery from a total site disaster.

About AppAssure Software

AppAssure Software is a leading provider of innovative backup and disaster recovery software for Windows application servers. AppAssure’s flagship product, Replay 4 is an application-aware, disk-based imaging solution that automatically and continuously snapshots entire Windows application servers delivering accelerated application backups and disaster recovery for in minutes. For more information about AppAssure Software, visit http://www.appassure.com.