Customer Reviews

Internet Security Barrier X Backup Edition (Mac)

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I bought this thinking I recalled hearing good things about it - must have been dreaming. In reality this is more like a nightmare. It is labeled as Mac OS x 10.3 Panther compatible. Installed directly from the CD it isn't even ready for Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar! You are given a choice of installing the component features from the CD and then downloading and installing the current versions via a "NetUpdate" feature (which itself needs updating). Or, you can choose to download and install directly from their website.
Let me point out here that I am connected via high-speed cable service and routinely download 30MB+ files in a matter of minutes. The aforementioned updates are all shown as 1MB+ or - , and after a total of nearly 4 HOURS of waiting for the updated versions to download, both via direct download and after installing from the CD, I trashed this turkey and signed up for a .Mac account.
With .Mac I was able to downlaod, install, and update anti-virus and backup programs in less than 5 minutes.
So my advice is to save yourself a lot of aggravation ( and money) and buy .Mac in the first place.

This review pertains to the back up component of the suite (which seems to be the distinguishing feature for this bundle as opposed to others), Personal Backup X.

Intego Personal Backup X is a poor choice for someone looking for simple, robust backups without additional hardware. Contrary to Intego's marketing, it cannot back up to multiple CDs/DVDs. It's also confusing, and doesn't include a manual.

DIFFICULTY OF USE:
On launch, PBX displays a window asking for a source and destination, and whether to "backup," "restore," "archive," or "clone." It doesn't explain the difference between these actions. There's no "Help" feature. It's a bad sign when even experienced users must read the manual cover to cover. Worse, the manual is not installed by default and must be downloaded from Intego's web site. Advanced features are accessed through a confusing "New Script..." menu item. Having a minimalist interface is NOT `ease of use.'

NO SUPPORT FOR MULTIPLE CDs/DVDs:
Intego claims, "Intego Personal Backup X backs up your data, either automatically or manually, to removable media (such as recordable CD-Roms or Zip cartridges), to partitions on your hard disk, to network volumes, to an iDisk, to external hard drives (USB, Firewire or SCSI) or to disk image files." But as an Intego representative later explained, "Personal Backup X does not have a method or procedure to backup across multiple disks. It can not 'span' CDs or DVDs." All recent computers have hard drives too large for one DVD or CD. Consumers expect any backup program claiming to support CD/DVD to support multiple discs. So it is NOT practical to back up to CD, DVD, Zip disk, etc. with Personal Backup. PBX may work for those with external hard drives or tape drives, but most of them probably use Dantz Retrospect. Since most computers now come with CD/DVD burners, most home users looking for a cheap solution probably want to back up to CD/DVDs, but they'll get no help from Personal Backup.

I regret that I had not read other's reviews before purchasing this software. I have spent more than a week trying to back up to multiple disks (as described on p 37 of the pdf manual which came on my installation disk. I now gather that others have had the same problem. Elswhere manual appears to contradict itself: on p. 47 it says that "you cannot clone a volume over a network, but on the following page it appears to tell you how to do so.

But my main concern what appears to be non-existent support. There is evidently no telephone support. The Intego web site has provision for requesting on-line support. Problems written in the space provided receive acknowlegement by return, with a ticket reference number, but my 3 requests so far - the earliest 7 days ago - have not yet resulted in any help.