01/22/2007, 10:35am, EST

Monday, January 22nd

EMC Retrospect 8.0 on chopping block?

EMC has reportedly halted plans to release its Retrospect 8.0 backup software as part of a larger plan to cut costs across the Insignia small- and medium-sized business group. While EMC spokespeople deny the claims, they admit that significant cuts were recently made at the company's Walnut Creek offices where most of the Insignia group worked, according to The Register. Last week the firm said it dismissed 40 people in marketing, sales, and other positions, but said many of those employees found work at VMware -- a part of EMC. The report claims that a skeleton crew still remains to ensure the release of Retrospect 7.5 some time during this quarter, which will include updates for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard and Microsoft Windows Vista.

"There are dedicated engineering resources focused on advancing Retrospect," an EMC spokesman said. "You will see enhancements coming this quarter."

The company dodged direct questions about whether it will release Retrospect 8.0, but reiterated that its small- and medium-sized business group remains a priority for the company. "You will see more hardware and software products for the SMB space at this time next year than you see now," a spokesman said.

Workers at the Walnut Creek office said they are pushed into a corner, and that EMC is planning to rent out their old cubicles. "They closed three quarters of the office and even the kitchen to EMC workers," said one source cited by The Register. "They put up walls and moved everyone out." Current EMC vice-president and former Dantz CEO Larry Zulch informed the Insignia staff of the planned changes in December. "The engineers were halfway through 8.0 in December and then all work ceased," said one source. "From what I understand, the new version will not even be released," another source said. "Everyone had such high hopes for the product. It had a polished interface, and I think it would have been a success."

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Rosyna

Was 7.x released?

01/22, 10:55am, EST

Was Retrospect 7.x released at all for Mac users?

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Gary Palter

Re: was 7.x released?

01/22, 12:04pm, EST

No, the mac is still on version 6.1.

Version 7.5 has been out for Windows for some time. Sounds like they're just going to issue a maintenance release to 7.5 to support Vista. And maybe one to 6.1 to support Leopard. Doesn't look like there'll ever be a Universal Binary or feature parity.

Sigh. Just might be time to find another backup solution.

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Philip J. Fry

good riddance

01/22, 12:28pm, EST

I've never had any luck or good experience with this software so I'm definitely not saddened by this news.

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diamondsw

Good riddance

01/22, 12:30pm, EST

Retrospect has been crap for years. It's incredibly slow, difficult to use by today's standards, has poor support; about the only feature I can think of that has any real worth is its tape support (which is probably the critical feature to those who use it).

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doctor9

ditto good riddance

01/22, 1:30pm, EST

I agree. The deterioration of Retrospect as a Mac solution for backup has been ongoing for about 4-5 years. Ever since Dantz made the move to a Windows solution, the Mac version has wallowed in minor tweaks, inconsistent bug fixes, and fluff UI updates...all in the name of paid upgrades.

Good Riddance Retrospect, indeed!

/

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Tofino

Adobe disease

01/22, 1:54pm, EST

couldn't agree more with the 'good riddance' crowd. another perfect example of what happens when developers forget who made them who they are in the first place. let's hope apple gets it right with time machine.

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ebernet

Pity

01/22, 2:31pm, EST

While I lament the loss, this is another example of a great product being swallowed up by another company and then slowly killed by inaction and poor management. Can you say pretty much anything Symantec ever touched? I think with Apple Backup, and now with Time Machine on the horizon, the writing was on the wall... Time for Apple to sell backup as a stand alone solution or bundle it alongside Leopard.

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bigpoppa206

Have to agree...

01/22, 8:53pm, EST

I use Retrospect on the PC side (as well as my Mac) and it continues to be the most consistent backup answer for my machine. I've had problems with Norton and Acronis backups failing, but never a problem with Retrospect. Too bad about the current state of affairs however.

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John Lockwood

Retrospect alternative

01/23, 6:31am, EST

The only realistic alternative on the Mac to Retrospect which also has tape support (at least that I am aware of) is Tolis Group's BRU.

For home users (and even in some cases business users) Time Machine looks interesting.

Various PC backup programs claim to support Mac clients but without exception they all suck (from a Mac point of view).

It would be interesting if some more enlightened company were to buy (rescue) Retrospect from the cold dead hand of EMC, unfortunately I don't see that as likely.

Due to the lengthy neglect of Retrospect I have not trusted it to restore full bootable systems (I only rely on it for data backups), and I also stopped paying annual maintenance as that had obviously become a waste of time.

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