Digital Trends

Now part of the EMC family, storage vendor Iomega is working to help people back up their data, offering EMC's MozyHome online backup with EMC Retrospect backup software.

In the first announcement since its acquisition by EMC, storage vendor Iomega has announced a new downloadable software bundle that combines both the venerable EMC Retrospect backup program with the MozyHome online backup service, enabling customers to back up their media and data not online to local drives, but also to remote storage via the Internet…which can be very handy in the event a fire or other disaster takes out both your computer and your carefully-maintained local backups.

(You are carefully maintaining local backups, right?)

"The combination of Iomega external HDDs with Retrospect backup software integrated with Mozy online backup service means storing, protecting, and accessing digital files is now easier than ever before," said EMC's president for consumer and small business products Jonathan Huberman, in a statement. "Computer users now have a seamless backup system for local backup of every file, as well as backup to the cloud for files that warrant another copy. This bundled solution provides the versatility of any time, anywhere access."

The Iomega MoxyHome bundle enables users to back up as much as 2 GB of data via the Internet for free, or as much data as they like for $4.95 a month; data is stored in EMC data centers. Buyers of new Iomega drives will find details in the product box about how to download their Retrospect and MozyHome software; owners of Iomega drives still under warranty will receive email on how they can participate in the program, and user who have previously downloaded a version of Retrospect can update free of charge via the program's update feature.

MozyHome is a set-and-forget system that works with Windows 2000/XP/Vista and Mac OS 10.4 or newer. Retrospect Express HD 2.5 for Windows integrates with MozyHome to share information and manage both local and online backups; Retrospect Express 7.6 for Windows offers a way to launch into MozyHome directly, but not integrate it into a single backup scheme.

MozyHome has not been integrated into the Mac version of Retrospect Express in any way whatsoever, but the MozyHome software itself is available for the Mac. It's kind of a shame. Back in the day, we knew people who bought Macs just so they could use the then-world-class Retrospect to back up their Windows systems. Since EMC's acquisition of Retrospect's original developer Dantz, Retrospect for the Mac has seriously lagged behind Windows, doesn't support many recent Mac OS X features, and the long-promised Retrospect X has yet to materialize.

Details on Iomega's Retrospect/MozyHome downloadable software bundle should start appearing with Iomega drives at retailers this month.