Background
D&B Supply is a farm and ranch store founded in 1959, when a couple of fellows named Dutch and Bud set up a farming wholesale store in the rural town of Caldwell, Idaho. D&B supplies the country lifestyle to independent farmers, ranchers and owners of small acreage. D&B customers are tradesmen, pet owners, gardeners, rodeo fans and homemakers—just about anyone that loves the Western standard of living.
D&B Supply has 15 store locations throughout Idaho and eastern Oregon.
Telco Products To Point Of Sale (POS) Systems and Servers
D&B’s Information Technology Manager Jeremy Hall oversees the IT Department for the retail chain. This covers everything from telco products through Point of Sale (POS) systems and servers.
Jeremy started out with D&B as a technician in 2006. In 2011 he was promoted to a programming position, Assistant IT Manager in 2013, and to IT Manager in 2017.
Cloud400 Online Backup Virtual Tape Library Upgrade
Jeremy was recently involved with upgrading their Cloud400 Online Backup on- premise Virtual Tape Library (VTL).
Jeremy reflects, “D&B implemented Cloud400 Online Backup with an on-premise VTL in 2013, when we upgraded our IBM POWER5 9406-520 server to an IBM POWER7 8202-E4D server.
“We do backups in 17 minutes, down from 45 minutes – better than 250% performance improvement.”
Simple, Cost Effective
“As I recall, it has always been simple and cost-effective. Daily our VTL de-duplicates our backup, then replicates a copy to Cloud400’s VTL. That way, if we need to recover fast from unexpected downtime, Cloud400 can set up a virtual server with my system in less than 12 hours.
“Now I have an affordable DR plan as well as instant access to on premise backup.”
Cloud400 Online Backup – Set It And Forget It
“We have been very pleased with our Cloud400 Online Backup. It is basically set it and forget it. The online backup is faster and easier than tape. Restoring a file is simple and fast.”
Recent VTL Upgrade
“We recently upgraded our VTL for 2 reasons: First, our VTL was getting a little long-in the-tooth. We have had it for about 7-8 years. We had not had any hardware problems with it. Second, as time goes on there was a new GUI interface that our original VTL could not support.
“So we decided a combination of age and wanting to get to a more modern interface were the reasons to update our VTL.”
Original Java-Based GUI Screen
“The original VTL had a Java-based GUI screen for navigation. The original version was adequate, just not always easy to use. Over time, we had to update the Java upgrades. Then update security settings so the interface would work. As time went on and more Java upgrades evolved, the navigation had to be updated.”
New VTL Software Web-Based GUI Screen – Exponentially Easier To Use
“The new VTL software is a web-based GUI screen. It is not tied to any particular browser or Java version. Wow, this new interface is exponentially easier to use than the old one. No more Java software updates to deal with.”
Cloud400 Technical Team Stays A Step Ahead
“Periodically, I will check in to make sure the replication is taking place. IF there is a problem with replication, I get a call from the Cloud400 technical team to let me know what we need to do to fix it before I catch it on my own interface.
“Cloud400 monitors this for me and brings it to my attention when something needs to get fixed.”
VTL Recovery Easier Than Tape
“We have loaded virtual tapes from the VTL to retrieve older files or libraries. Like if we did a purge and purged too much, we have gone back and done some recovery to get what we needed. You know, nice to have old data back, but not critical for daily functions.
“This was incredibly easy since it was still on the VTL. It was really no different than retrieving it from a physical tape. We just had to mount that virtual tape in the library.
“As I think about it, it is actually easier than with a tape because we could do this recovery remotely rather than go visit the server closet.”
Great Technical Support
“VTL technical support is great. Any time we have had any issue with the hardware or the software, they have always been very quick to help. When we did the upgrade, they did a lot of the configuration for us. They did a remote desktop session and made sure everything went smoothly for the connection to the AS400. It was all very simple to do from my perspective. It was all fairly seamless.”
Jeremy Hall Recommends Cloud400 Online Backup
“I would definitely recommend Cloud400 Online Backup. If you are coming from physical tapes, it much more convenient with the automatic setup. It is also faster and more secure to transfer the data offsite to Cloud400 than it is to throw the tape in your backpack and take it home.
“If we could do this over again, we probably would have upgraded earlier rather than fight the old interface; the new modern interface is so much easier.”
