IBM i Disaster Recovery Buyer's Guide

Start with the continuity plan, not the software

IBM i disaster recovery evaluations often go sideways when teams jump straight into product demos. Before software is compared, the business should define which applications matter most, how long each can be down, what data loss is acceptable, and who has authority to declare a disaster.

That continuity discussion usually reveals assumptions that were never documented. One team may be expecting near-zero downtime while another is thinking in days. Buyers need those conflicts surfaced early because every architecture, vendor, and budget decision depends on them.

Separate backup, high availability, and disaster recovery requirements

Backup, high availability, and disaster recovery overlap, but they are not interchangeable. Backup protects recoverability, high availability reduces downtime during certain failures, and disaster recovery addresses broader loss scenarios that can impact systems, facilities, connectivity, and staffing.

Buyers should be explicit about where each discipline begins and ends in their environment. Otherwise a vendor conversation can become confusing fast, especially when products that are excellent at local resilience are presented as complete disaster recovery answers.

• Document current backup restore capability and actual restore timing
• Identify whether local HA is already in place and what it does not cover
• List disaster scenarios that require a separate recovery environment

Choose a recovery site strategy before reviewing vendors

IBM i teams need a clear point of view on where recovery will happen. That may be a company-owned second site, a colocation environment, a hosted provider, a cloud-based target, or a blended model. Each choice carries different costs, staffing expectations, network requirements, and security responsibilities.

This decision should come before vendor selection because it immediately narrows the field. Some products assume infrastructure the buyer does not want to own, while others fit best when the provider manages both the software and the recovery environment.

Map dependencies beyond the partition itself

A recoverable IBM i partition is not the same thing as a recoverable business process. Buyers should catalog the surrounding dependencies that must also be available during a failover or rebuild scenario, including authentication, DNS, WAN connectivity, printers, file shares, integration endpoints, EDI flows, and user access methods.

This is one of the most common reasons recovery plans disappoint in live tests. The core server may be available, but the surrounding services that let the business actually work are still missing or not validated.

• Network routing and firewall changes required during failover
• Authentication and directory dependencies for user access
• Interfaces to outside systems, warehouses, banks, or trading partners

Demand runbooks and role clarity, not just replication claims

A strong disaster recovery platform should be accompanied by a clear operating model. Buyers should know who initiates failover, who validates application integrity, who communicates to leadership, and who owns the sequence for restoring dependent services.

That means asking vendors practical questions about documentation, automation, and role separation. The goal is to leave the evaluation with repeatable procedures, not just confidence that data can be copied somewhere else.

Testing discipline is what turns planning into real readiness

Disaster recovery programs earn trust through testing. Buyers should evaluate how frequently the environment can be rehearsed, how intrusive testing is to production, how quickly results are reviewed, and whether test outcomes produce concrete remediation work.

The strongest vendor conversations go beyond failover marketing and focus on proof. If a solution is difficult to test, it will usually be tested less often, and confidence in it will drift away over time.

• Schedule tabletop, technical, and full execution tests on a defined cadence
• Record actual recovery times and compare them to promised targets
• Track open issues after each rehearsal until they are resolved

Build the shortlist around governance as well as technology

The final buying decision should balance architecture, vendor support, service model, and long-term program ownership. Some organizations can run an advanced recovery platform internally, while others need a provider that supplies ongoing testing support, documentation help, and operational guidance.

A disaster recovery program succeeds when the business can sustain it year after year. Buyers should choose the model that will still be maintained seriously after the project team moves on.