Blobbackup Review

In this first section of my review I will be signing-up for and installing the Blobbackup software for myself, I will then be looking at the process of backing-up and restoring data before checking out any advanced settings which might be found within the application a little later on. This all begins at the official Blobbackup website where a 15 day free trial is available, best of all, this free trial doesn’t require any personal or payment details be provided upfront, great!

Sign-up & Installation

Getting started with Blobbackup begins at the official Blobbackup website, it is from here we can sign-up for a free 15 day trial with nothing more than a working email and a strong password.

NB – When singing up to Blobbackup, be aware that the account password (entered whilst creating the account) also forms the encryption password used by the software to protect any backed-up data. With this in mind, be sure to create a strong and unique password when signing-up for the Blobbackup service!

Once signed-up to the service, one of the first things to do (via the user dashboard) is to downland the Blobbackup desktop software, in my case this download came in at just over 37MB and was running just a few moments later.

After just a few moments the installation of Blobbackup in my case was complete, one of the first things the desktop software will ask us to do is login to the service, this is done using the same email and password as was used when signing-up for the service earlier on. With sign-in complete, all that is then required is to click on “Start Backing Up” to reach the main app homepage and begin the process of protecting the device in use.

At this point we now have Blobbackup installed and ready to start backing-up our device, in the next section of this review I will be looking at this cloud backup process in a little more detail before moving on the restore process and app settings later on in the review.

Backing-up

In the previous section I looked at the sign-up and installation process for Blobbackup, this cumulated in the installation of the desktop software and the automatic starting of the initial backup of the device straight afterwards!

As can be seen in the screenshot above, as soon as we reach the main application homepage, we can see that the software is already configured for and running the initial backup of the device. By default, Blobbackup will automatically select our entire system drive (minus some sensible exclusions) for inclusion within the backup and run itself automatically (once per hour) thereafter on the automatic scheduling option.

NB – Remember, when using Blobbackup, all data is automatically encrypted using the main account password before it ever leaves the device which is been backed-up. This means we don’t need to worry about setting encryption options at any point during this process!

At this point, in many cases, it would be permissible to simply leave Blobbackup to run in the background and let it continue to protect files as and when they are changed. We do, however, have access to a small settings section where we can fine tune some of the app settings and also further refine what is backed-up and what is excluded from the main backup set.

NB – Blobbackup only provides support for a single backup set and only supports storing data upon their own cloud storage service (2TB of which is, of course, included with the subscription).

As can be seen above, when entering the settings window, the first two things we can change here are the device name (if necessary) as well as the option to run the backup manually or on the automatic scheduling option (which is the default option). The automatic scheduling option sees backups take place once per hour, unfortunately, we cannot alter this interval meaning if you do want a more frequent backup (say, every 15 minutes) then this is simply not possible as of time of writing within Blobbackup!

Moving on and the next two tabs concern the files which are included and excluded from within the backup set. As can be seen in the above screenshot, whilst we can specify specific regions of our device to be included (e.g. an external hard drive), Blobbackup will by default include everything on our default system drive (this will be everything on the “C” drive for the typical Windows user).

NB – Whilst including everything on the C drive within Windows is a good default approach, Blobbackup will not automatically pickup any additional, external or network drives which might be connected to the device, these must be added separately if and when required!

With this inclusions section system in mind, it means if we do have any external hard drives or network drives (e.g. from a NAS system) which need backing-up then we must be sure to add them into this inclusions section ourselves!

NB – Some cloud backup providers enforce limitations on backing up external hard drives and network drives, for example, insisting external drives be plugged-in at least once every 30days to remain a part of the backup. Thankfully, Blobbackup do not enforce such restrictions on external devices or network shares beyond the 2TB storage limit for the account as a whole, a great approach as far as I am concerned!

Moving on and the exclusions screen (seen above) works in much he same way as the inclusions screen, here we can specify any files and or folders to be excluded as well as specific file types to exclude thanks to the wildcard file name entries (e.g. “*.exe” will exclude all EXE files universally). Finally, under the advanced settings tab, we see just two additional options allowing us to set the number of backup threads and also limit the upload bandwidth in use when applicable to do so (both potentially useful for older PCs or for those with slow internet connections).

With any app settings adjusted, we can now simply leave the software to carry on backing-up our device automatically or click on the “Backup Now” button to manually start a backup at any time it is required. Progress of the current backup is always easy to check via the app homepage as is the current usage of the 2TB of cloud storage included with the account.

And with that we have covered backing-up within Blobbackup, a simplistic and straightforward approach but one which seems to cover the basics well and does everything it is expected to do. I would like to have seen more frequent scheduling options available given that 1 hour is still quite a long time in some respects, but this is otherwise a very streamlined process which helps to get a device backed-up safely and with the minimal of fuss!

Remember, if you want to try out Blobbackup for yourself, there is a full 15 day free trial of the service available via the official Blobbackup website (and no payment details are required upfront).

Restoring Files

Now we have a device fully backed-up by Blobbackup, we can start looking at the restore process, a process which begins in the Restore section of the desktop application and is accessible via the “Restore” button found there.

NB – We must re-enter our master password before accessing the restore page!

Once in the restore section of the app we see a file tree in the main part of the screen for selecting any files which are to be restored alongside a date picking drop-down box just above it. The date picking box is the first thing to focus on here as it will allow us to select the correct version of any backed-up files to be recovered before going on the selecting the files themselves.

Blobbackup generously offer all of their customers unlimited historic file versioning (within the 2TB cloud storage quota) as a part of the standard subscription fee, this means whenever a file is altered (or even deleted) its previous state can still be accessible and recovered from, potentially even years after any changes were made!

NB – Having access to previous versions of files can be one of the best forms of protection against ransomware and malware! Click here to read our full article explaining how backup software, such as Blobbackup in this case, can help you boost your own device’s protection against malware!

With the correct version (date) of the restored files selected, the next step in resorting data is the selecting of the one or more files to be recovered, this is done via the file picking box in the middle of the restore screen (this can be seen below).

With the correct files now selected, the next step is selecting the restore location via the “Restore to” button seen towards the bottom left of the screen. When using Blobbackup we must pick the restore location for each and every restore operation as there are no shortcuts here, for example, electing to restore files to their original location as might be found within some other backup software solutions.

Once all files to be restored have been selected, plus the restore location, the process of restoring data itself can begin. Remember, Blobbackup is 100% cloud based backup software, as such the time taken here can be dependant upon several factors including your own internet download speeds, in my particular case the restore appeared to work quickly and the recovered files were available just a few moments later!

And with this the restore process within Blobbackup has been covered! Whilst this process does work well overall, it needs to be pointed out that it also require that the desktop software be installed for a restore to take place at all (there are no web-based restores). Additionally, Blobbackup do not feature any other restore options such as the restore been mailed on a physical external hard drive as might be fund with some other cloud backup providers (usually at an additional cost, but potentially very useful when wanting to perform a large restore).