18 September 2007 11:00 GMT / By Stephen Patrick

There are quite a few different ways to backup your personal folders and files and we’ve grown accustomed to doing so.

Yosemite may not be a name we’re used to as their main target audience is providing backup solutions for big businesses. However, the latest version comes with a number of tools that are aimed at the small business, so potentially of interest to the home user, so we thought we’d take a look.

The interface is clean but from the start we found it a little awkward to use. Designed with having a system administrator to control the setup and deployment, you’ll find the interface can be tweaked to suit your needs.

This may sound like great news but with near endless choices, such as whether to configure solely for one machine or for a network, you can soon find yourself opting for the default settings.

With four modes to choose from, you can either go for a full backup, or as with most tools you can opt for a faster incremental backup routine.

Gripes about the appearance to one side, we found the speed and reliability of the software to be excellent. Our test machine has a 40GB hard drive and it managed to create a fresh backup in little over 20 minutes, which is impressive in itself.

A tool called Bare Metal handles system recovery by allowing you to burn a system recovery disc either to DVD or an external drive.

What’s more, because it also backs up all your files and folders too, it’s possible to locate that one file you accidentally deleted. However, remote recovery isn’t supported, so isn’t so good a choice for mobile users.

Yosemite has acquired Filekeeper and as such you’ll find that to add a little more value for money to the package, you’ll also find a copy of Filekeeper 2.7 has been bundled with Backup.

This is a new addition to the Yosemite offering and hasn’t been incorporated into the main interface. Instead, it runs alongside the main program. While this may be a problem for a few users, especially those with low system resources, the programs work well together.

Verdict

It’s easy to see why corporate users would opt for Yosemite, as it’s powerful and endlessly configurable. So, regardless of your company’s needs, you can set the right backup solution in place.

However, at the lower end of the scale, we don’t really need this level of complexity and Yosemite needs to limit the abilities of its tools if it’s to compete.

We liked the speed but getting the most from this program takes time and that’s something we just don’t have.

Score

Review Recap

Made by

Yosemite

Price as reviewed

£70

The good

Fast and reliable

The bad

Tricky to use

Quick verdict

If you’re the experience there is a lot to be gained from Backup 8.5 but casual users will find it a little too frustrating to use

Score

• Link - Yosemite

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