Quantum calls its backups “protection plans,” as it expects them to run on a regular basis. The software is very easy to use, but the backup is performed differently than on the Iomega REV 120. Quantum utilizes a technology that is called de-duplication. It is meant to avoid storing files redundantly, hence increasing the available backup capacity by only saving changes to files it recognizes, and storing a reference to the original file. Different from incremental backups, this technology doesn’t save the changed files, but just the changed blocks.
Since the software has to be able to work with various backups, it stores the files in individual folders rather than in archives, which lead to a longer backup processing time for the initial backup, although the GoVault offers better throughput than the Iomega REV 120. The backup took 21 minutes while Iomega completed it in 15 minutes. And you still need the Quantum software to search and restore files. A second backup run with some modified files was indeed executed in seconds.
Restoration took 19 minutes where Iomega completed the task in less than seven minutes. However, you will see drastically improved backup performance if you regularly create backups of data sets that are not modified that much. Should your backup data vary more, Iomega might provide the better backup performance.
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