General FAQs
What are the benefits of upgrading SoftThinks Backup and Recovery?
By upgrading SoftThinks Backup and Recovery, you acquire an impressive array of tools for protecting and restoring your device. These additional features allow you to back up your entire device, continuously protect your personal files.
Get the ultimate protection for your applications, files, and system settings with Premium Edition.
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Basic Edition |
Premium Edition |
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Restore your device to the original factory state |
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Manually back up and restore your user data |
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Back up your applications and settings (system backup) |
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Merge backups and archive old backups |
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Continuously back up data locally (to a disk) |
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Back up and restore files based on type |
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SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium - System Backups
Backing up your personal data with SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Basic is a good start toward protecting your valuable personal data. However, if your device is corrupted by a virus, system crash, or hardware failure, having a system backup can restore your entire device including applications, settings and personal data back to a previous point in time. If you’ve upgraded to SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium, you will be able to create system backups for the most complete data protection.
SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium - Continuous Data Protection
If you've upgraded to SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium, you now have additional flexibility for scheduling your Data Backups or even protecting your most important data continuously. The Continuous Data Protection feature allows you to protect your working documents in real time and to roll back to any version you’ve previously saved whether it was minutes or weeks ago.
SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium - Additional Features
In addition to system backups and continuous data protection, SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium enables the following features:
- Manage and Merge backups together without duplicating your files to save space.
- Scheduled backups of your data files based on libraries, just like in Windows. Local Scheduled Backups will run at the date and time that you define. There are four default libraries (Documents, Music, Pictures, and Videos) for which you can schedule backup. You can also select specific files or folders and add them to your backup profile.
Purchasing SoftThinks Backup and Recovery Premium
Please click on the appropriate upgrade link on the Home page to guide you through the benefits and purchase process.
We can accept most payment types, such as Credit Card (Visa, Visa Dankort, Visa Carte Bleue, MasterCard, Amex, JCB), Paypal, Wire Transfer (Local Bank accounts in: Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France), IPS (Chinese Debit Cards, 33 options) as well as many other regional options. Please see our checkout page for all options in your area.
What is a System Backup?
A System Backup is an incremental backup of all data, applications, system settings and operating system files on the C: drive. System Backups should be performed regularly to maintain good system security. Each System Backup records only the changes from the previously made System Backup.
What is a Data Backup?
A Data Backup is a backup of files and/or folders specifically selected to be backed up. When creating a Data Backup, you may select libraries of files such as "Pictures", "Videos", "Documents", etc., to back up, or you may select specific folders on the device to back up. A Data Backup may be scheduled or run manually.
What is a Factory Recovery Media and why is it important?
SoftThinks Backup and Recovery provides you with the tools to create a bootable backup containing a complete copy of all software originally installed on your SoftThinks device. You can create your Factory Recovery Media on either USB or disc media. By creating these Recovery Discs, you are making a backup of all the software that was installed on your device at the factory. This allows you to reinstall all applications, drivers and the Windows operating system that came with your device. While there is a similar copy of the software in the recovery partition, creating recovery discs provides additional protection for the factory-installed software.
What is a Recovery Partition and why do I have a Recovery Partition on my device?
SoftThinks Backup and Recovery provides the latest recovery technology to SoftThinks consumers with a recovery partition. This protected partition on your device contains a copy all of the factory-installed software and will boot even when Windows does not run. With SoftThinks's factory recovery software you can easily reinstall all of the software that came with your SoftThinks device.
Windows FAQs
What type of discs can be used to create Recovery Discs?
Recovery discs should be single-layer or dual-layer DVDs. Blu-ray™ support may be available on devices with Blu-ray™ drives. Rewritable media can be used, but is not recommended as it may cause write failures if the media has been heavily used or scratched.
Where can I store System Backups?
System Backups may be stored on any connected hard disk (internal HDD, USB, or Firewire hard drive, etc). They can also be saved on your Factory Recovery Media, which is recommended.
Where can I store Data Backups?
Data Backups may be stored on any connected hard disk (internal HDD, USB, or Firewire hard drive, etc), on mapped network share, on optical media and online. You can also save data to an SD card if you have that option on your device.
When I delete a System Backup, why does it delete all System Backups made after the one I selected?
System Backups are incremental backups, meaning that the latest System Backup is a record only of the files that have changed since the previous backup. Each System Backup is dependent on all the previous System Backups when recovering your device. To properly recover your device, you cannot delete a System Backup in the middle of the chain, so the software forces you to delete all System Backups created after the selected System Backup.
How can I move System Backups to another storage location?
System Backups can be moved to another storage location if you desire. Simply open SoftThinks Backup and Recovery and edit the Backup Profile for your System Backups. When you select the new location, choose where you would like all System Backups to be created. The application will automatically move all your System Backups to this new location. Note: Make sure you have enough free space available on the new drive to cover all of the existing System Backups.
What is the best way to configure SoftThinks Backup and Recovery to protect my system and data?
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Create your Recovery Media on a USB hard drive with enough space to hold several system backups.
Note: a hard drive that is several times larger than the total size of files you have on your device is the best choice.
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Configure your device to perform system backups to the external USB hard drive.
Note: this will require upgrading to the Premium Edition of the product.
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Schedule your system backups.
Note: the frequency you choose for the backups depends upon how often you change the system configuration and the data you want to protect.
Recovery WinRE FAQs
How do I access my System Backups from an Archive Disc?
Recovering your device to an archived System Backup is possible either through Windows or through the recovery environment. From Windows, choose any System Backup from the list provided under the "System Recovery" option.
After the device reboots into the recovery environment, insert the optical media containing the archived System Backups and they will appear in the list of the System Backups.
Can I back up my data before recovery?
Yes, provided that the C: drive is accessible, you may always back up your personal data before performing a recovery. This backup option is offered before any recovery takes place. If the C: drive is inaccessible, then the recovery environment will not be able to back up any files.
Errors FAQs
What are the common error codes for SoftThinks Backup and Recovery?
SoftThinks Backup and Recovery handles all errors with dialogs and options provided to the end-user along with directions on how to manage the error.