Why I Didn’t Buy Genie Backup Manager
In my ongoing quest to find a decent backup solution for Windows XP, I evaluated Genie Backup Manager Home 7.0. Although it worked better than Norton Save and Restore, it had one major problem: speed. I expected the initial backup of my 23,000 files or so to be slow, and it was (about 8 hours). But I didn’t expect the incremental backups to be so excruciatingly slow. The first incremental backup, one day after the initial backup, ran for seven hours before I gave up and aborted it. And this run was to backup only the six files that had been modified since the initial backup! On to the next option: NTI Shadow.
Posted by Sean O'Neill on April 20, 2007 at 12:01 PM MDT #
Posted by Alain on April 23, 2007 at 09:46 AM MDT #
Posted by Alain on April 23, 2007 at 09:49 AM MDT #
(PS: I currently use Lacie's SilverKeeper program for my backup routine on various Macs, and I love it.)
Posted by Loraine on April 28, 2007 at 12:43 AM MDT #
Posted by Axe on May 21, 2007 at 03:52 AM MDT #
I just purchased GBM version 8.0, its working perfectly and it contains Disaster recovery for my Vista Home Edition
Posted by John on September 10, 2007 at 01:36 AM MDT #
I just upgraded to GBM Pro8 as well. And its working like a charm! Theyve changed the compression engine and its much faster.. And I now use it for my DR solution as well
Posted by Keri Essig on September 10, 2007 at 03:20 AM MDT #
Backup4all ( http://www.backup4all.com ) is a very good alternative too.
Posted by Claud on November 07, 2007 at 02:37 AM MST #
I tried this annoying piece of backup software out. Talk about convoluted, I almost never got the program to send me a notification that the backup went ok. And I really do know how to set that up, the test went fine, but the program would never send out a real notification whether I had Outlook Up or Down. It kept forgetting my settings no matter what. Further, just finding where they bury the email notification settings and remembering that was a real pain. Eventually I did get the email verification to work, but the resulting message is full of text about registering for an account and stuff I don't want my clients or even my wife to see.
the Incremental backups are really "full backups" of changes, not replacements of files that have changed since the last time you backed up. If anyone wants to argue that some of what I am saying isn't right, then the question is, why aren't these things obvious? I use several other backup programs that don't have these issues. Really annoyed and removing this crap. Also, shut up with the dunning messages every few minutes telling me to buy the full version. I finally figured out where to turn that crap off. Jeez.
This program may have a lot of features, but several of them don't work right and are not fool proof. Backups must be fool proof to protect against us fools who are setting them up. Backing up by FTP told me over and over that things went fine, when in fact they didn't go at all. Eventually I got the right formula.
Posted by computer friend on March 25, 2008 at 01:48 PM MDT #
A few more comments. Even though I turned off the Nagging message popping up from the bottom of the screen, Genie Backup Manager has continued to annoy the heck out of me with popup messages about how many days I have left to register.
Also, when an archive is saved as a "zip" file, well it isn't a zip file at all, It has the extension of .gbp regardless of what the instructions say.
All in all, Genie Backup Manager is a DOG in my opinion and it has so many rough edges that I am thinking that all of the positive reviews out here on the Internet are just either plain simple lies and/or hype.
As a systems administrator it is my job to make sure my clients and networks run correctly and confidently. I see so many issues here . . .
I think it is unfair to the consumer to present a piece of software as being "the perfect thing" when it certainly isn't. The people who make Genie Backup Manager need to sit down with a number of people not experienced with their software and see what the issues really are.
Posted by computer friend on March 25, 2008 at 04:53 PM MDT #
I have to totally agree with your comments, computer friend.
I'm using Genie Backup Manager Pro 8.0
This program is crap.
Forget about being annoying, it just does not restore files properly.
It will change the time stamp on the files but will not replace the file itself.
I thought it was a problem with Vista but I tried it on XP Pro with the same results.
It cannot be trusted to restore the files properly. I don't know if the problem is with the backup part or the restore part.
The strange thing is that it will restore some files ok, specially if they don't exist, but not others. It will change the time stamp in all of them.
I also bought it because of the good reviews, but I'm dumpping it and looking for something else.
I have to trust a backup program to work correctly, espacially when restoring files.
Posted by George Simon on July 08, 2008 at 06:54 PM MDT #
dude this info was really useful to me
acronis sucks
shadow protect is good but boot cd didn't work and shedules didn't run
shadow protect had problems with acronis if it had been istalles
try macruium reflect
Posted by 86.21.36.114 on January 07, 2009 at 03:13 PM MST #
http://www.macrium.com
Posted by 86.21.36.114 on January 07, 2009 at 03:13 PM MST #
I have been a very happy customer of GBM V8 for some time now... And have never had problems with restoring my files.. although it would be nice to have support for Imaging so I can completely restore my system..
Nonetheless, Genie-soft is currently working on a new solution; something similar to Apples Time Machine which Im very excited about and cant wait to get my hands on!
From the site, it seems to be the most promising backup tool in the Home Office Small Office in a LONG time. Time Machine is invaluable to Mac based Home offices and Genie Timeline looks great and an amazing tool for Windows based machines.
It seems to be the only real Time Machine for Windows equivalent and also provides the user with a hassle free backup experience.
You can sign up for BETA when released here:
http://www.genie-soft.com/products/genie_timeline/download.aspx
Posted by Salam on May 26, 2009 at 12:48 AM MDT #
Genie Timeline; Windows Time Machine:
http://www.genietimeline.com
Posted by Salam on May 26, 2009 at 12:50 AM MDT #
Full Disclosure : I work at Altaro Software.
Hi - Just saw these posts.
We are a new software company (Altaro Software – www.altaro.com) and we are developing a backup / version control product called 'Oops! Backup'. Oops! Backup is a hybrid between a traditional backup product and a lightweight version control system. Oops! Backup automatically tracks changes to documents, photos and other files and allows you to backtrack to any point in time. To a certain extent it is similar to Apple Time Machine but for Windows.
You can see product screenshots at http://www.altaro.com/screenshots.php
Features at http://www.altaro.com/time_machine_for_windows.php
We will be going into BETA soon and are looking for BETA testers - anyone willing to give it a try check out http://www.altaro.com/download.php
Your opinions and constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated:) (would love to hear the bad stuff ... more than the good stuff)
Sorry for the plug!!
David Vella
http://www.altaro.com/
Posted by David Vella on August 30, 2009 at 12:59 PM MDT #
I tried Genie Timeline. It took almost 24 hours to backup 30 GB of data. I have about 400 GB of data in my HD, and frequently add about 1 GB of data daily (lots of medical images). it seems that Genie TimeLine is not good for some who has large amount of data or needs frequent backup of large data. Now I am waiting for Oops backup. I signed up for the beta version, but did not even get an acknowledgment from the company. Not a good sign. Hmmm.
Posted by Mansur on September 28, 2009 at 07:28 PM MDT #
Mansur
I am sorry for not acknowledging your email. We are collecting all BETA testers but we are still working on the system of email notifications - hence why no notification - I apologize for that.
I look forward for your feedback on BETA release.
David Vella
http://www.altaro.com
Posted by David Vella on September 28, 2009 at 11:30 PM MDT #
Mansur what build of genie timeline did you use? genie-soft has released many new build enhancements since the release and the speed is pretty decent.. i recently installed and purchase genie timeline and i use it to backup a few gig of image and music files.. i have had no problems with speed or else and its perfect...
im very clumsy on computers and the fact that when i delete files by mistake that i can simply use a slider and go back to the time before that and quickly retrieve it is amazing! a life saver...
Posted by Candice Manning on October 12, 2009 at 06:32 AM MDT #
Candice:
I had downloaded the latest version that was available at the genie timeline website. My external backup drives are USB. I am willing to spend money to get a firewire or eSATA drive if that makes it faster.
Still waiting for oops backup. I did get an email from altaro since my last post.
Posted by Mansur on November 09, 2009 at 05:06 PM MST #