Frequently Asked Questions

Backup

Winback is a combination of an M2 TLC 3D NAND SSD drive SATA/NVME with a corresponding SATA/NVME USB converter and a metal enclosure. It comes loaded with Winback’s software which enables you to: 

  • Back up your laptop, PC or notebook including partition tables.
  • Restore your laptop, PC or notebook safely back to working state.
  • Clone your hard drive safely with automatic shrinkage/expansion to fit a smaller/larger target drive.
  • Virtualize your laptop, notebook or desktop by running your backup on another laptop virtually.

One of Winback’s unique features is its speed. Its NVME models are fast enough to enable you to make backups of your entire NVME master drive within a few minutes (provided you have a USB 3.1 Gen 2 port). For example, if you have a 1TB NVME master drive and you have used only 100 GB, Winback NVME using USB 3.1 gen 2 mode can back up your entire drive in just 2-3 minutes.

You don’t have to install anything. All you need to do is plug in the Winback USB  in your computer and boot from it to start using it. For more information on how to use it, see Guide.

 

Because booting:

  • ensures there is no data loss while making the backup and that it actually works once it’s finished. Normally, when you back up your drive with the operating system running, nothing stops it from writing to the drive while we are reading from it . This could result in an image which is halfway modified which, in turn, could cause data loss or even a non-working backup.
  • protects against the transfer of any viruses.

Winback works independently of your Operating system and is able to boot even when your Operating system won’t.Booting from it is quick and easy. It can boot your PC (with a decent CPU) in just over a second.

Simply because with Winback you can do so much more that you can’t with a normal USB drive. In addition to making backups, you can:

  • Make your unbootable computer boot again.
  • Revert your operating system to a functional state.
  • Get rid of viruses.
  • Get rid of malwares.
  • Recover encrypted files by ransomware.
  • Restore permanently deleted files or folders.
  • Recover the contents of an overwritten file.
  • Clone your data to a new drive and use your cloned drive without having to reinstall your operating system and apps.

With Winback you can do all of the above and more!

By simply just copying files to a USB for backup you will not be able to enjoy any of these additional features that can save you time, effort and money in the long run.

No. Normally, when you copy your files for a backup, you overwrite existing files, losing any previous versions of them.With Winback, however, you get to keep them all. Every time you make a new backup of your drive, you create what’s called a checkpoint. Winback allows you to keep all your old checkpoints along with any new ones that you may have made while backing up.

Theoretically there is no limit to the number of checkpoints you can make. However, the factors listed below ultimately determine how many you can actually make  :

a) The amount of data you have changed before making each backup

b) How compressible your data is

c) How much empty space your drive contains

You could possibly make hundreds of checkpoints on a single Winback USB drive or just a few depending on the above factors.

Yes, you can. The maximum storage size Winback offers is 2TB but you may still be able to backup data that’s larger than that. 

WinBack compresses data which can save up to 50% of your space. It can also easily store empty spaces in your drive virtually consuming no space. Furthermore, for supported file systems such as NTFS, FAT, EXT, Winback copies only part of the drive that has the data and stores the rest of the drive as empty space.

Yes, you can. It may sound impossible to fit multiple copies of your entire drive in a USB that has a limited storage capacity but Winback is able to do this by using differential back up, copy on write, deduplication, compression, sparse files and hole punching.

No. You can back up only one drive on a single Winback USB.

 

Winback lets you make and keep multiple backups of your data by making their corresponding checkpoints.This means that any time your computer is infected with a virus,  you can simply roll back to an earlier virus-free checkpoint from where you can restore your data and continue using your computer without getting anything fixed.

 For example, your laptop gets a virus and you have no choice but to stop doing your work. If you’ve made  a backup of your data with Winback, you can now simply just plug in your USB, boot from it and restore your backup. Within a few minutes your laptop will be up and running again.

For more information on how to use Backup and Restore, see Guide.  

 

Simply by running one of your backups on it as a virtual machine using any modern 64-bit x86 computer. Because it copies the entire image of your drive, you can access not only your data but also run your OS and apps virtually from one of your backups.

If you run your backup on the computer with your original drive, you can also copy files across from your backup to your original drive and vice versa using your familiar setup.

It’s as simple as plugging in the USB, booting from it and then running one of the backups of your original computer on a different computer. 

For more information on how to use this feature, see Run in Guide. 

 

Winback copies the entire image of your drive and uses it to run your backup as a virtual machine on the same or a different computer. You can virtually run your computer from one of your backup checkpoints on any computer that has a modern 64-bit x86 CPU.

For more information on how to run your backups, see Run in Guide. 

If you feel nostalgic using Winback or think it looks vintage, it’s because we haven’t yet included a modern GUI in it. We chose to keep things simple for now so we would not have to compromise on speed and compatibility. 

Restore

The undo restore feature takes your drive back to its original state that it was in prior to its restoration. This feature comes in handy when you want to copy any new files that you may have made in the time between you last backed up your data and the time you restored it.

For example, your laptop gets infected with a virus and you restore your data normally using your Winback USB. Your last backup, however, was made a couple of months ago. By restoring it, all the work that you may have done between the time you last made it and when your laptop got the virus will be lost because it wasn’t backed up. To recover these missing files you should now choose Undo Restore instead of Restore. By doing this your drive will be brought back to its original state with all the missing files. You now have an opportunity to copy all those missing files from your drive to your backup by running it. Once you’ve copied the files, you can now choose to normally restore again and recover all your data including those missing files.

Undo Restore provides a safety net in case you normally restore and lose some of your data. It essentially ensures restoration is made as safe as possible for you so that you never have to worry about losing any data which you may not have been able to back up.

Not really.It takes about the same time it normally takes to restore using Winback’s unique two-way differential copy-on-write. The benefits of being able to use undo restore outweigh any small–if any–loss of time there may be .

Clone

Yes you can. If your original drive fails, you can clone any of your backup images to a new drive and use it like your old drive. The new drive must be at least the same size as your original drive or bigger.

When the target clone drive is smaller than your original drive, Winback  automatically shrinks the partitions without causing any data loss. Shrinking is done on Winback  media and the target drive so your original drive is left untampered with. The resulting target drive will have smaller partitions than the original but it will still be able to boot(provided the original drive was a bootable one).

When the target clone drive is larger than your original drive, Winback  gives you the option of either copying the partitions as is (default) or to copy and expand partitions.  The resulting target drive will have larger partitions than the original but it will still be able to boot(provided the original drive was a bootable one).

Virtualize

You can:

  • Verify instantly that your backup is working.
  • Virtually run all your applications available on your original computer.
  •  Use the Internet using a wired network .
  •  Access CD/DVD drive if any.
  •  Copy files from a Winback backup to your master drive using your familiar setup. For example Windows users may use Windows file explorer to copy individual files from Winback backup to their original C drive.v

You can :

  • Instantly access not only your data but also all your applications with all your favorite settings intact if and when your laptop breaks down. You can virtually run everything the same way you do on your original laptop
  • Keep your old and dying laptop’s data without having to keep all of its hardware. 
  • Travel light: Winback USB M2 drive weighs less than 100 grams and fits in your pocket. You can run it as a virtual machine using any 64 bit x86_64 computer on your travels.
  • Keep your original laptop/notebook safe from any harm during your travels.

Most virtualizations require you to setup a new virtual machine with a fresh Operating System and fresh application installation. Winback converts your existing computer and setup into a virtual machine that you can run just like your original computer( within the limitations of using a virtual machine). You don’t need to install anything and all your apps, environment settings and data are automatically available to you for use without making any extra effort. All the user is required to do is to ensure the licensing requirements are met.

Winback copies the entire image of your drive and uses it to run your backup as a virtual machine on the same or a different computer. This means that even if you don’t have your original computer with you, you can still access all your data and run your apps virtually from one of the backup checkpoints on any computer that has a modern 64-bit x86 CPU.

Simply by running one of your backups on it as a virtual machine using any modern 64-bit x86 computer. If you run it on the computer with your original drive you can also copy files across from your backup to your original drive and vice versa using your familiar setup.

Hardware

We offer SSD M2 USB storage with the following capacity:

  • 128 GB
  • 256 GB
  • 512 GB
  • 1 TB
  • 2 TB

We recommend choosing the same size as your drive’s but you can also choose a smaller size than that. First find out the space you have used up on your hard drive and then choose a size that is bigger than that.  For example, if you have a 500GB  drive and you have used 60 GB on it, then a 120 GB Winback USB drive or anything larger than that should suffice.

 

 

Winback is an M2 drive converted into a USB flash drive and therefore its performance is not only excellent but also has consistent extended write speeds. Winback SATA USB 3.0  drives can typically read sequentially up to 450 MB/s and write sequentially up to 350 MB/s. Winback NVME USB3.1 gen 2 drives in super speed mode (5gb/s) yield up to 680 MB/s and 530 MB/s writes sequentially. Winback NVME USB3.1 gen 2 drives in super speed plus mode  (10gb/s) yield upto 1000 MB/s and 1100 MB/s writes sequentially. The sequential writes are slightly faster than reads in gen 2 mode.

If you use a USB 2.0 port you should expect much slower speed(with USB 2.0 ports the read/write speeds are limited to no more than 60 MB/s and in real practice expect 40-50 MB/s ). Winback compensates for slower USB2 ports by  increasing the level of compression which works well with the slower USB2 ports. This decreases the amount of reads and writes required of the slower USB2 ports virtually making it faster.

You don’t have to install anything. All you need to do is plug in the Winback USB drive in your computer and boot from it to start backing up your data. You can then choose your desired action from a simple menu that appears on your screen.

For more information on how to use the USB, head over to the Guide section.

 

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