CrashPlan for Small Business Review

Having axed their cheaper “home” version back in 2018 Crashplan for little Business has become Code42’s main cloud backup solution. Aimed more towards the business and professional user it combines continuous backup, unlimited file revisions plus unlimited cloud space for storing in one application for £10 per PC, per month.

The main focus for Crashplan is clearly on file-level backup and intrinsically this is often something they are doing alright . Not only does a subscription provide unlimited storage for your device but also unlimited file versioning which is becoming more of a rarity within the could backup world these days!

Another thing to notice is that Crashplan also includes external drives in you backup quota at no additional cost, simply connect your drive and it are often optionally included in your backup set and if its permanently plugged in are going to be backup up when it’s next used instead. (NB – as per Code42’s own help files confirm you’ve got the appliance set to never remove deleted files if you’ll have an drive removed for long periods of your time to avoid complications!).

If you’re trying to find disk or partition imaging then look else ware as this is often not a field Crashplan even attempts to venture into, instead the main target is on providing a solid and reliable file-level backup service with options to backup to the Crashplan cloud and / or optionally on a connected drive .

The backups themselves are often scheduled to run the maximum amount or as little as is required and therefore the default , which most users will stick with is to go away the program on the continual backup setting (which is really every 15 mins).

There are 3 levels of security available for you backup including leaving everything to Crashplan, setting an “archive password” which again leaves the encryption partially to Crashplan inn addition to managing your own encryption keys which many advanced users will cash in of.

Once everything is setup Crashplan really may be a “set and forget” backup solution due to the unlimited space for storing and file revisions which suggests no active management of a limited storage quota is required. Also, I even have used the appliance myself since 2015 and may attest that it simply does everything that’s asked of it and always runs smoothly with no noticeable slowdown, even during an outsized backup!

Restoring:
Restoring with Crashplan may be a very simple experience and works from within the Crashplan desktop application itself, simply select the file(s) you would like to recover and therefore the date to retrieve them from and let Crashplan do the remainder . If set you’ll be asked for you password or encryption key and therefore the recovered files are often downloaded to any location (including the original) with the choice to take care of the file permissions if necessary (again this is often the tiny business version so file permissions are more of a problem here!).

Should you not have access the desktop application for whatever reason you’ll also recover files via the Code42 website by logging in together with your Crashplan account. to try to to this simply login and choose the date / files you would like from the online based recovery tool and therefore the files are going to be downloaded to you as a zipper archive.

Also noticeable by its absence is any sort of mobile app for Crashplan for little Business, before discontinuing the house version of the service their was an app but this seems to possess been retired. Whilst this probably wont be an enormous issue (especially given the online based recovery console) I feel it’s still a pleasant addition to increase such a service to mobile within the age of the app store!

Other Features:
Although we don’t have any disk imaging options Crashplan quite makes up for this with a powerful set of options, flexibility and stability for your everyday file-level backup. to start with not only can we have the cloud to backup to but also the choice to make multiple backup sets and potentially have data stored on an area or drive for quick backups and restores whenever required.

Another useful feature do you have to ever replace your PC is that the replace device feature which has clearly been through of very carefully by Crashplan. If you are doing change your PC simply install Crashplan, login to the software and choose the choice to “replace device” and choose the old and new devices. it’ll take a while to synchronise itself but I even have used this a few of times myself and located it does a really good job of doing so and that i haven’t any concerns about anything going amiss.

The application itself does generally run smoothly although do you have to end up wanting to pause the backup Crashplan makes this very easy by simply right-clicking the icon within the system tray and selecting to pause for a group time or until UN-paused. additionally to pausing a backup we will have Crashplan monitor our backup and specify it email us should the PC in question haven’t been protected for a particular number of days, very useful for those that are conscious that their backups are always up to date!

Security
Crashplan for little business has several options to secure your data, these include allowing Code42 to manage your encryption keys for you, setting an area archive password and eventually setting your own private keys of which Code42 haven’t any knowledge of.

Support
Support from Code42 is usually excellent and additionally to measure chat they even have a really informative support website and FAQ section which provides answers to commonest issues found using the software.

Pricing
Crashplan for little Business is priced at £10 per PC per month.

Summary
Crashplan are clearly targeting the more professional / business users with their latest offering and have successfully delivered a superb backup solution to satisfy the requirements of both of those groups. the most selling points of unlimited storage, file versioning and no restrictions on backing up external drives also will appeal to those within the IT and artistic industries who have large amounts of content to stay protected and secured.

For the more professional PC user Crashplan represents a solid backup solution however at $10 per PC per month it’s towards the highest end of the per-PC pricing scale. home users who have more simplified backup requirements should consider looking elsewhere if pricing is a problem when selecting a backup solution.

The CrashPlan architecture allows continuous backup on OS X, Windows, and Linux desktop clients, and Code42 offers private cloud servers for every of those platforms also . I’ve used CrashPlan PROe (private cloud server with standard CrashPlan client) for 3 years, in multiple small business settings. it is a five star product, with five star support.