Oracle RMAN (Recovery Manager) has been a core utility for Oracle database backup and recovery for decades. While powerful and deeply integrated into the Oracle ecosystem, RMAN still presents significant operational and architectural limitations—especially at enterprise scale.
In this post, we explore five common pain points of RMAN and show how Clonetab—a modern Oracle cloning and backup platform—eliminates these challenges with speed, automation, and storage efficiency.
Problem 1: Long Backup and Restore Times
Large Oracle databases can take hours or days to backup with RMAN. The restore process is often even longer—especially when full image restores are needed before applying logs.
✅ Clonetab Fixes This:
Clonetab leverages block-level change tracking and snapshot-based backups, allowing sub-minute clones and near-instant restores—even for multi-terabyte Oracle databases.
Problem 2: Rapid Cloning is a Nightmare
RMAN is tightly bound to the platform and database version. Cloning a production database to a test environment on a different OS or DB version can require manual workarounds, custom scripting, and lots of DBA hours.
✅ Clonetab Fixes This:
Clonetab enables automated rapid cloning with no need for manual intervention. You can clone from RAC-NONRAC,RAC-RAC, have capability to upgrade from Oracle 12c to 19c, or any supported combo—fully automated and repeatable.
Problem 3: Limited Granular Recovery Options
Recovering individual objects or datasets using RMAN (like a single table or schema) is not straightforward. It often involves full tablespace recovery, and exporting/importing data manually.
✅ Clonetab Fixes This:
With Clonetab, you can perform fine-grained clones and backups—by schema, tablespace, or even specific datasets—without touching the production database or dealing with RMAN export/import tasks.
Problem 4: Difficult to Automate at Scale
RMAN scripting works, but it doesn’t scale well. Automation across 100s of databases requires complex cron jobs, custom monitoring, and tedious maintenance.
✅ Clonetab Fixes This:
Clonetab offers a centralized automation engine that manages backups, refreshes, and scheduling—all through a clean UI or API. You can set up policy-driven automation across environments with zero custom code.
Problem 5: High Storage Costs from Full RMAN Backups
RMAN full backups and even incrementals consume massive amounts of disk—especially when multiple clones (QA, dev, staging) are needed.
✅ Clonetab Fixes This:
Clonetab creates deduplicated, space-efficient clones using snapshots and smart metadata tracking. Multiple environments can run on a single source copy, reducing storage costs by up to 80%.
Conclusion
RMAN will always have its place in Oracle data protection, but as database environments grow in size and complexity, it’s clear that a modern, efficient solution is needed.
Clonetab delivers:
- Faster backups and instant clones
- One-click test/dev refreshes
- Dramatic storage savings
- Centralized automation and management
- Smart, granular recovery capabilities
If you’re ready to reduce backup windows, speed up dev/test refreshes, and simplify your Oracle landscape, it’s time to look at Clonetab.
