Backup Solutions are supposed to be used rarely but when the day comes, they are ones to save years of efforts. MiniTool ShadowMaker is one of those solutions for the Windows Users.
Backup solutions need to provide enough flexibility to be able to recover from any disaster. There can be many different problems like a deleted folder, crashed hard disk or corrupted partition. Your backup solution should be able to recover from all those situations and restore to the previous state.
MiniTool ShadowMaker Pro Features
MiniTool ShadowMaker allows you to backup your Windows 10/8/7 machines and restore in case you need it. It allows you to make a full, incremental or differential backup for your system.
You can define the backup schedule to make sure that you have the backup ready when you need it. Here are some of the useful features of the ShadowMaker.
It supports all kind of storage solutions which can be used with Windows laptops and can use them as your backup storage media.
Why Backup Software?
My last machine ran for almost 6 years and had all kind of software install on it. Now, when you use a machine for that long time, you don’t notice how much data gets generated and stored on it.
For example, I have so many e-books locally stored on the machine and forgot to move them to my new laptop. Luckily, I had the access to my old hard disk and was able to recover it. But if I have reformatted the hard disk or the hard disk was crashed, I would have lost it all.
Backup Software can save us from these kinds of disasters. By taking regular backups of our machine, we can make sure that we will not lose any information in long run.
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System Level Backup With Version
MiniTool ShadowMaker provides multiple backup options. You can take a backup of the whole hard disk, partition, folder, files etc.
Before taking any backup, you need to look at how you use your laptop and define your backup strategy.
For Example, I usually create a single folder under my C drive and store all my work there. In my case, if I have a backup of that folder, my 99% work is recovered. If you have a habit of using a lot of different folders and doesn’t want to lose anything, a full backup is for you.
To take a new backup, you can go into the MiniTool ShadowMaker and select the source to decide what kind of backup you want.
If you select the files and folders, you will be given a browse-window and you can select all the folders you want to backup.
Once you select the source, select the target disk to backup now or schedule a backup. There are some other advanced options which you can set before taking the backup.
Advanced Settings
There are some useful advanced setting which can help in reducing time and space for your backups. For example, you can select the schema to only backup used sector from the hard disk. This can save a lot of space on your backup media and you should be able to keep few extra backups.
There are some more additional settings like Compression, Encryption, Exclusion etc to customize your backup as needed.
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Bootable Backup Disk
Another good feature is available under Tools section – Add Boot Menu. It adds a MiniTool ShadowMaker bootable menu to your backup disk.
One of the major issue at the time of hard disk crash is no availability of boot media. So you can’t boot and restore your backup. With this option, you can boot directly into ShadowMaker interface and restore your backup.
Restore Files and Partition
MiniTool ShadowMaker makes restore process as easy as the backup process. You can easily restore the partition/disk from the tool interface. Just select the backup and target disk to restore.
You can also use backup image file easily with this software. It can mount and unmount your backup image files and add them as a drive in your windows explorer. Once you have access to that drive, you can browse it like any other normal drive and restore any file or folder.
Clone Hard Disk
This is one of the good features in case you are planning to upgrade your hard disk. You can easily clone your existing hard disk and replace it in your laptop.
I have just upgraded my hard disk and bought a new SSD for my laptop. Setting up a new hard disk is a big work if you plan to do it from scratch. You need to install OS, all the software, drivers etc. to make sure it’s in the shape as your current laptop.
The easiest approach is to clone your existing hard disk. This will make sure all your data is automatically transferred on your new hard disk and ready to go. Just replace the hard disk and you won’t be able to tell the difference.
You can start the cloning operation from Tools -> Disk Clone Menu. Select the source and Target Disk to start the cloning. If your source disk is a bootable disk, the target disk will also be a bootable after cloning.
Price
MiniTool ShadowMaker comes in Free, Pro and Business version. If you need basic functions, the free version is sufficient. Pro version adds more control and flexibility on your backup solution.
Pro version will cost you around $30 per year for a full-fledged backup solution for 1 machine. Business version is useful in case you have some servers and want to back up those.
Conclusion
MiniTool ShadowMaker is a very capable tool which has enough functionality to recover from most of the disasters. Some of it also depends on your backup strategy but the tool can support almost everything.
If you are looking for a good backup solution for your machines, go ahead and take a look at MiniTool ShadowMaker.
