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From:Smith Micro Software Inc.
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See Product Page
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User Rating: Amazon Sales Rank:#946 |
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2 of 2 customers found the following review helpful:
 Don't understand some of the reviews, 2008-01-11
You can definately choose to backup more that just the entire hd. You can choose individual folders if you want. My friend uses it to just back up one huge folder that has all his business files.
I must admit that I've never actually used it to restore anything yet so I can't testify how well it would do that, but it's been backing up my hd faithfully for over a year every Monday morning at 6am. Installation was a breeze. However, the documentation and user interface is poor. The explanations as to how the program works is also insufficient. I'd like to see more of a well written explanation as to what it's doing and how it works.
2 of 2 customers found the following review helpful:
 No matter what I do, I can't make it work!, 2007-11-16
This program came with a hard drive I purchased, and I thought, WOW, backup software. That is, until I tried to make it function. I never saw anything so user un-friendly. I spent probably 12 hours, and still can't get it to save a system restore and the documentation stinks.
Why can't somebody come up with a reliable, easy to use back up program that works??????
4 of 4 customers found the following review helpful:
Warning!! No tech support for this product!, 2007-10-23
When it works, it works great, but...
I've been successfully performing nightly automated backups of my C: D: and E: internal drives to my larger (750GB) F: internal drive... using EMC/Insignia/Dantz's Retrospect Express HD 2.0 purchased from Smith-Micro/Allume. Once a week I backup the F: internal drive to an external 750GB eSATA II drive using Memeo. All has been fine now since July (when Norton Ghost 10 hosed my C: drive so badly I couldn't boot without a reformat and re-install of XP Pro SP2). I have more than 800 good restore points on my destination drive.
Two weeks ago, Retrospect Express started generating an internal code error message every night while backing up my C: drive. I searched the EMC/Insignia/Dantz knowledge base, but the error is undocumented. No hints in the users forum.
Unfortunately, it seems EMC/Insignia/Dantz doesn't provide online tech support for this consumer product. I spent hours looking for a tech support question submission page, but instead found a circular link-to-link dead-end on the EMC/Insignia/Dantz web site. This lack of online tech support for this product was confirmed by what appears to be an EMC employee posting on the forum. You can purchase a commercial annual maintenance license, or pay $69.95 per incident for tech support, which is almost double what I paid for the original application. Although responsive, as the reseller, Smith-Micro/Allume's tech support is only capable of providing retail sales support or replacement of a defective install-CD.
Lesson learned: I need to do a LOT more research into an app's maker before purchasing, to figure out whether after-the-sale tech support is available and reasonably priced.
To its credit, during the period this app worked, it did everything promised: it saved me from my own stupidity several times (restoring individual files my fumble-fingers accidentally deleted). It also helped me reconstruct my entire hard drives' PC environ when my mobo toasted itself and I had to replace the mobo/cpu/DDR2 and re-install XP Pro SP2.
It appears EMC/Insignia/Dantz's main business is commercial backup/restore, and that's their focus. They've just created this stripped-down, simpler GUI version to then sell off to resellers like Smith-Micro/Allume to sell to consumers.
Buyer beware,... although, your mileage may vary. :)
EMC Retrospect, 2007-10-13
I don't understand all the negative reviews. This software won several awards from respected computer magazines. For me, it installed easily when following the documentation and it seems to be backing up the files and directories I selected. It's been running on my PC since April, 2007.
I just purchased and installed a network storage drive so I will be moving the backups to that drive.
4 of 5 customers found the following review helpful:
Are we talking about the same software?, 2007-08-15
I have this software installed on a PC at home and it works great! Easy to install, runs like clockwork. I have used it to restore and it works every time. I backup about 25GB of my 80GB hard drive
Contrary to what others say it IS possible to pick and choose only certain folders on a hard drive that you want to backup. When you set it up you can choose 1) Backup my entire computer, 2) Let me choose specific files, folders, and drives, 3)Let me choose files by type.
I can't comment on support (or lack thereof) because I haven't needed it.
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