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No. CrashPlan can't back up when the source or destination computer is asleep or off. Backup will resume after the computer wakes up or is powered on.

CrashPlan prevents a computer from going to sleep if a backup is in progress.

If a computer has not connected to our servers to report progress, you'll receive an alert, even if you are successfully backing up to local folders or destinations.

Yes! Read about how you can be a destination here.

CrashPlan backs up once daily to your destinations or once per hour to CrashPlan Central. The daily backup to your destinations runs 24 hours after the previous backup completed. Hourly Backups to CrashPlan Central take place one hour after your previous backup.

CrashPlan+ backs up continuously.

CrashPlan always backs up automatically. The problem with traditional, manual backup is that it is, well… manual. That means people forget to do it and inevitably lose data. Not happy with relying on busy people remembering to back up, we designed our software for automatic backup ensuring greater data protection.

We designed CrashPlan so that it uses very few system resources. It knows to get out of the users way when users are active, but really gets crackin' when their computer is not. Typically, users find that they can leave CrashPlan always running without detecting any noticeable effect on their computer.

The data savings can vary wildly based on the type of files, etc. being backed up but as a general rule, you'll see a 10-30% savings in disk space. For example, text documents compress extremely well but movies do not.

After initital backup on the file is complete, only new or changed information is sent when the file is backed up.

When CrashPlan scans a file, it knows that the file changed and the progress bar runs through the file as if the information is new. But as it goes, it discovers the information hasn't actually changed and only transmits the new information to the backup destination.

For the technically savvy: CrashPlan does incremental deltas by block within the file.

CrashPlan users can keep more of their recent versions and less of the older ones. CrashPlan+ customers can further refine the rules for keeping versions over a specific periods of time or even keep an unlimited number of versions.

Note: If you are using the free version of CrashPlan you will use the default settings. Only CrashPlan+ customers can adjust the frequency and version retention settings.

Read more about version retention options

If something happens to your file, you can go back to the version you need and restore it.

CrashPlan uses advanced data de-duplication and block level incremental backup. At a very basic level, this means that once a file is backed up, only subsequent changes are sent to your backup destination. For example, CrashPlan is smart enough to know that only paragraph 2 in your letter to Grandma has changed and will only send the data from paragraph 2 to your backup destination, not the whole file. You're able to recover either version of the file.

Versions in excess of your specified number to retain are pruned during the regular archive maintenance routine, which runs weekly by default (Settings > Backup > Inbound backup from other computers) or when you push the Compact button from the destination.

CrashPlan has two ways of verifying your files are backed up: the real-time file watcher and the file verification scan (Verify backup file selection every X days). So if, for some reason, the real-time watcher didn't flag a file for backup, the filesystem scan would still catch and back up that file.

The scheduled file verification scan also checks your system for deleted files. A file will show up as deleted only after the automatic scan has run.

The raw speed depends almost entirely on the machine doing the backing up and the type of data being covered. The source machine is handling all of the data de-duplication, compression and encryption… and it's doing that all at a very low priority setting so the computer is still usable while it's backing up.

During backup CrashPlan provides a best estimate of how much time remains before the backup is complete. This estimate is constantly revised based on what CrashPlan encounters and what part of the process is taking place, so it is normal for the “time remaining” to fluctuate.

CrashPlan is designed to be transparent so we limit how much of your system resources it can consume. It de-duplicates, compresses and encrypts your data before sending and is not a straight copy of files. You can make backup go faster by increasing the resources CrashPlan can use.

• Settings > General: Increase the amount of CPU CrashPlan is allowed to use.
• Settings > Network: Increase the bandwidth CrashPlan is allowed to use.
• Settings > Backup > Advanced Backup Settings: Increase the outbound message buffer size. (Advanced users only)

Yes! Once your friend has started backing up, you can go to Friends > Friend's name and set the allotted space.

CrashPlan will not completely fill up a drive. CrashPlan stops backup to a drive if the minimum free space is 1% of the total drive size or 1 GB (whichever is smaller). After backup has stopped, CrashPlan runs archive maintenance in an attempt to free up space by removing deleted files, extra versions or files no longer selected for backup (based on your settings). Backup resumes once there is adequate space on the drive.

No. The backup archive must reside on a single drive at the destination computer.

Yes. On Mac and Linux, you can back up any open file. On Windows, CrashPlan uses Microsoft's Volume Shadow Copy Service to VSS. However if you are backing up larger database file(s) you will want to read the following FAQ on the topic.

Just choose the data store location to be backed up.

On Mac & Linux, CrashPlan can back them up in place and it works great.

For Windows, CrashPlan uses VSS to back up open files, so if your database program has VSS support, CrashPlan can back up your database in place. If your database program does not support VSS, CrashPlan retries until the file is not busy.

Yes. There are two ways you could do this:

1. Dump your database regularly and back up the location where the dump files are stored (recommended, especially for production systems). You can give the dump files different names and we'll only transmit and store the blocks that are different in the new file. Of course, you can also overwrite the old dump file with the new dump and it'll just create a new version in our archive using the same block-level de-duplication.
2. Back up the database's data store location in place.

Note: It is important to note, that when backing up open files in place, there is always a risk of getting a corrupted backup on Mac, Linux and Solaris platforms, especially with large, random-access databases that change a lot, such as Entourage.

On Windows with VSS, this is not a risk as long as the application writing the files supports the VSS contract. Your database application must support VSS in order to back up open database files.

When backing up large, active database files make sure you increase the backup interval to a few hours or more.

No. At this time, CrashPlan must be installed and running on the destination. We may support FTP at some point, but it would be far slower and less of a guaranteed store than running CrashPlan.

With CrashPlan running at both ends, the destination software simulates restores and validates files when the destination is idle and not in use. This is a big deal - something you cannot do with FTP efficiently - and ensures that your files are in good shape when you need them.

On the Backup tab, click the i icon below the progress bar to view number of files completed, number of files TO DO and disk used for any incoming or outgoing backup.

CrashPlan breaks down the files into their component parts in order to transmit and store them efficiently, which means they are not stored in a readable format. The component parts are stored inside a folder named after the source computer's ID in chunks of 4 GB. By default, all files are compressed and encrypted before leaving the source computer.

CrashPlan is designed for live backup of files, and not for archiving files.

• Think of backup as providing the ability to restore information you have lost. “I'll back up to there in case something happens here.”
• Think of archiving simply as an extension of the storage options on your computer. “I'll store some things there, because I am running out of space here.” Or “These things belong together here; and these other things belong together there.”

If you delete files from your system, they remain backed up and in your backup archive forever, as long as:

1. The files remain selected in your backup file selection

2. Your “Remove deleted files after” setting is set to “never”

If you remove files from your backup selection, you're telling CrashPlan “I don't want these files backed up anymore” meaning that these files are no longer needed for restoring. As a result, any and all versions are flagged for removal from the backup archive.

• When you delete a file (for example, you drag a file to the Trash), CrashPlan retains the deleted file according the “Remove Deleted Files After” setting. If you specified that deleted files will be retained for 30 days, you will be able to restore that file for 30 days after it's been deleted.

• When you deselect a file from the backup set (remove its check mark from the Backup File Selection list), all versions of that file are removed from the backup archive as part of the archive maintenance operation or when you click the Compact button. After the file is removed from the backup archive you will not be able to restore the file.

De-select the file from your backup selection. The file will be removed the next time the regularly scheduled archive maintenance job runs or when you click the Compact button for that destination.

No. CrashPlan excludes its own backup archives from the file selection. This is hardcoded and cannot be changed.

If you'd like your backup data stored at multiple locations, simply back up your files to multiple destinations.

CrashPlan automatically selects which location to back up to based on which location will complete first. So if you are doing your initial backup to a local folder and a friend's computer across the Internet, CrashPlan will complete backup to the local folder and then complete backup to the friend's computer. This ensures you'll have a full backup at one location as soon as possible.

There are times when CrashPlan does not allow you to manually start backup by clicking the play button on the Backup tab:

• When backup is complete and there are no items in the TO DO list
• During synchronization
• When CrashPlan is not scheduled to run (source or destination)
• If the destination is not available

CrashPlan won't be able to back up to the server using the WebDAV protocol if that's solely how you use the server. If you fully control the server and can install a CrashPlan client onto it in user space, then you could back up to the server.

Yes, you can back up your Entourage files.

Yes. We currently support the following package file types:

.oo3, .rtfd, .app, .pages, .service, .pkg, .mpkg, .bundle, .component, .kext, .clr, .slideSaver, .bnz, .svxSite, .graffle

You can still back up and restore packages we do not yet support. They'll just appear as folders.

The best way to back up your Aperture library is to back up your project files.

“Aperture projects typically contain between a few to a few thousand master images, depending on how they are used….Alongside the masters, projects also contain albums (groups of versions), metadata, light tables, web sites, books, previews and thumbnails.”

(from http://maczealots.com/articles/aperture-backup/ )

Project files are smaller and more manageable pieces of the Aperture library and you'll be able to take advantage of CrashPlan's data de-duplication and incremental backups.

Currently, we do not support backing up mapped drives. A full technical explanation and (unsupported) workaround can be found here.

We do not support Windows encrypted folders (EFS).

On Windows, CrashPlan uses the Volume Shadow Service (VSS) to negotiate with other applications over backing up files that are locked open. A primary example of this would be the Outlook pst file.

Make sure the Volume Shadow Service is enabled Automatically. If you've turned it on, reboot your computer to ensure all programs are using VSS properly. After VSS is enabled, the backup files log should reveal that files that were previously locked open and unavailable should be getting backed up.

If your data is in files or volumes where VSS does not work, consider using an application-specific dump/export tool and let CrashPlan keep versions of the export. For example, Outlook has tools for automatically dumping it's data on a regular basis.