Best of TechEd 2013 Finalist: UltraBac Warp 1.1 Offers Set-It-And-Forget-It Backup

UltraBac Software has added an intriguing new product to its line of backup and recovery software: UltraBac Warp is a finalist in the 2013 Best of TechEd awards. I spoke to Shelley Riley, enterprise sales manager for UltraBac, and her excitement about the product was contagious.

Perfect for this Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) age, the software provides a comprehensive form of Continuous Data Protection (CDP) for end users who have minimal technical experience. UltraBac Warp's CDP is distinctive in that it is image-based and has been uniquely identified as Continuous Image Protection (CIP). With CIP, all selected volumes are automatically protected as opposed to only certain files or folders. CIP uses changed block tracking where only changed blocks are saved, thereby protecting all files on partitions selected for backup. This greatly reduces the amount of backup storage space used by eliminating the need to save an entire file every time a change is made. Furthermore, UltraBac Warp also provides image-based bare metal disaster recovery capability, even to dissimilar hardware, which file-based backup products cannot do.

“It’s so easy,” said Riley. “With UltraBac Warp, anyone can be a backup administrator because you can truly set it and forget it. It’s just always running in the background, always providing that peace of mind.”

UltraBac Warp automatically monitors disk activity so that when an update on a disk block occurs, a backup of that block is written to a local disk or network UNC path. This activity is invisible to the user with no noticeable performance impact. If a catastrophic event takes place, a disaster recovery can be performed to quickly restore an unbootable machine to working order. This advanced feature even allows more technical users to restore to dissimilar hardware. UltraBac Warp not only lets users recover a Windows machine quickly after a major failure occurs, but it also provides the ability to simply revert to a prior point-in-time, and easily restore individual files or folders that may have been accidentally deleted. To perform a restore, simply access the UI, select a point-in-time (manually entered or selected from a graphical timeline showing backup activity), and then confirm the choice. This initiates the mount of a temporary partition from which to perform recoveries from. It’s that easy.

If the computer running UltraBac Warp is connected to a UNC path for backup and becomes disconnected, the backup will automatically resume operation and catch up when the machine is reconnected. This also occurs automatically when hibernating and rebooting a machine. This makes UltraBac Warp an ideal solution for business travelers using laptops. By simply plugging a laptop back into the network upon returning to the office, UltraBac Warp automatically resumes backing up to the UNC path and eventually the CIP catches up to real-time for seamless, hands-off, backup protection.