Retrospect for Mac

By Retrospect Free to try Editors' Rating
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Editors' Review

Download.com Staff Feb 8, 2015

Retrospect for Mac automatically creates backups, not only of your local Mac, but of networked computers as well. The multiplatform product comes with a 45-day trial but is unfortunately outdated and suffers from a few bugs.

Pros

A multitude of backup features: Retrospect for Mac is bursting with backup options. We completed a password-protected backup of 58GB over Wi-Fi from a MacBook Air to an external hard drive connected to a MacBook Pro in a little over two hours.

Email notifications: You can set the software to email you whenever a predefined scenario occurs. The available scenarios are a successful backup, an interruption due to an error, media requests, and server startups and shutdowns.

Sophisticated rules: Similar to Finder's advanced search function, you can set up rules about which types of files and directories should or should not be backed up. We created a few rules, such as excluding all files older than a certain date and including all files of a given format.

Cons

Cumbersome setup: From the long registration form that you're required to pull up to the product key that you need even for the trial version of the software, it takes quite a bit of effort and time until you're able to start configuring your backups.

Buggy backups: We were unsuccessful in backing up a few specified folders while using the software's backup assistant under Mac OS X Yosemite. The application defaulted to backing up our entire hard drive.

Missing tag support: While we were testing the rules the app is able to create, we were disappointed to discover that there is no support for the tagging feature introduced in OS X Mavericks. The software is still using labels, which are completely separate from tags and are available only on machines running OS X Mountain Lion and prior.

Bottom Line

If you're looking for a Time Machine-like app that will let you back up what you want where you want without any hassles, we do not recommend that you use Retrospect for Mac since it takes a lot of effort to set up something that should be very straightforward. The only scenario where we would cautiously recommend the application is if you have a server and several computers that you want backed up to it.

Editors' note: This is a review of the trial version of Retrospect for Mac 11.5.3.103.

Full Specifications

What's new in version 17.0.2.101

  • Backup and recovery, data archiving, and data duplication
  • Last updated on 05/21/20
  • There have been 1 updates within the past 6 months

General

Release May 21, 2020
Date Added May 21, 2020
Version 17.0.2.101

Operating Systems

Operating Systems Macintosh
Additional Requirements
  • macOS Mojave
  • macOS High Sierra
  • macOS Sierra
  • OS X El Capitan
  • OS X Yosemite
  • OS X Mavericks
  • OS X Mountain Lion
  • OS X Lion
  • OS X Snow Leopard

Popularity

Total Downloads 464
Downloads Last Week 0
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Developer's Description

Retrospect backup and recovery software provides medical offices, law firms, banks, auto repair shops, restaurants, departments in large corporations, universities, government offices and so many others with the peace of mind knowing that their digital assets are safe. Retrospect's enterprise level features provide local and offsite backups, precise point-in-time restores, file-level deduplication, VMware integration, iOS remote management of multiple backup servers, end-user-initiated restores, and industry-leading customer support - all with no dedicated IT staff required to manage it.
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