A year after returning to private ownership, venerable Mac backup software Retrospect is back with version 10, which utilizes "instant scan" technology to improve backup and restore times.
Retrospect has announced the availability of Retrospect 10 for Mac as well as Retrospect 8 for Windows on Tuesday. With a renewed focus on the small and medium-sized businesses that have historically made up the bulk of its customer base, the latest versions aim to improve the speed and reliability of the backups it creates.
"Instant Scan" promises a significant performance boost for both Mac and Windows by determining in advance which files may need to be copied during any particular activity. This scan is handled as a background task rather than part of the backup process, allowing Retrospect to "shave valuable minutes or hours off the time needed to complete backup and restore operations."
“Since returning Retrospect to private ownership in November 2011, we’ve refocused on our traditional core markets: small and midsize businesses,” said company cofounder Eric Ullman. “One challenge faced by smaller organizations that lack dedicated IT staff is restoring applications and user data to a brand new computer. The new hardware is often different enough from the old that a simple restore becomes a complex migration project. Retrospect 8’s Dissimilar Hardware Restore add-on completely eliminates that pain point by automating the restore process and adjusting for the new hardware.”
Retrospect 10 for Mac is available now as an electronic download, with boxed product available in late November. Pricing starts at $119 for Retrospect Desktop, which protects a single non-server computer and up to five additional networked PCs, with upgrades starting at $49.
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