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1994-12-22
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Back Again/2
Professional Edition
*** Evaluation Copy ***
Program Copyright (C) 1994 by Box Turtle Software
All Rights Reserved.
Published by Computer Data Strategies
Back Again/2 is a trademark of Computer Data Strategies
Welcome
-------
Thank you for evaluating Back Again/2 Professional Edition.
Back Again/2 is a 32-bit backup utility for OS/2 2.1 that fully
supports HPFS, long filenames, and extended attributes as well as
processing files which are currently in use.
In addition to most SCSI-1 and SCSI-2 tape devices, OS/2 logical
devices are supported for backup, including but not limited to
Novell Netware, LAN Server, and NFS network drives, floppy diskette
drives, Bernoulli boxes, magneto optical devices, and more.
For floppy diskettes, Back Again/2 can use a special skewed-sector
format which, when combined with data compression, can backup 3-4MB
per minute on 1.44MB drives, making it ideal for use with laptop
and home machines.
This special evaluation version is limited to backing up 5MB.
After backing up 5MB, the software will display a warning message
and will abort the backup. This software is identical to the full
version in every other aspect, including the standalone restore
utility.
Ordering Information
--------------------
Back Again/2 Professional Edition can be purchased directly from
Computer Data Strategies for $149.00. We also have a competitive
upgrade offer of $49.00 when you send in the first diskette of
any competing tape backup software. We accept Visa, Mastercard,
C.O.D, and prepayment as well as corporate purchase orders. We
also offer a full thirty day money back guarentee.
Back Again/2 Professional Edition is also available through leading
OS/2 distributors such as Indelible Blue and OS/2 Express.
Back Again/2 Professional Edition may also be purchased on-line
through the OS/2 Shareware BBS using your Visa or Mastercard. In
addition, when you purchase through OS/2 Shareware, you can call
us here at C.D.S. and we can fully enable your demo version
to use until your full package arrives. OS/2 Shareware can be
reached at (703)385-8450.
System Requirements
-------------------
Back Again/2 is designed to operate on machines running IBM OS/2
v2.1 or later.
Back Again/2 does not require anything more than the minimum OS/2
system configuration, although it will run better (faster) when used
on an greater-than-minimum system. This generally means the
following :
Intel 386/25 CPU or greater
6MB memory
VGA display
One 360KB, 1.2MB, 720KB, 1.44MB, or 2.88MB floppy diskette
drive.
Installing Back Again/2
-----------------------
If you received this software on diskette, simply open the Drive A
object (there is usually a shadow on your OS/2 desktop) and then
double-click on the install icon.
If you received this software in compressed (.ZIP, .ARJ, etc.) form,
simply run the INSTALL.EXE program from the directory where the
file was uncompressed.
Installation is straight forward. The default installation path
is on the system's OS/2 boot drive in a directory called "\BA2PRO".
You may change this to your liking; we recommend that the software
be installed on your OS/2 system partition but it does not have to
be.
You can also have the installation program create a folder with the
Back Again/2 user's guide, this read.me file, and the Back Again/2
program object on the desktop. Additionally, the installation
program can create a shadow of the Back Again/2 program on your
desktop.
By default, the LIBPATH, PATH, and HELP environment variables set
in CONFIG.SYS are updated to include the Back Again/2 directory. You
may uncheck the option if you wish. If the CONFIG.SYS file is
updated, the old CONFIG.SYS file will be renamed CONFIG.BA2.
Configuring Back Again/2
------------------------
You may begin to use Back Again/2 once the installation is
completed. However, for optimal performance, you may want to alter
the default settings in the preferences notebook. For further
information about advanced configuration of Back Again/2, please see
the online user's guide.
Note that in the case of SCSI tape drives, Back Again/2 will overwrite
data from other applications as it uses a special file-system like
format. We recommend using a blank tape to evaluate Back Again/2
Professional for this reason.
Questions and Answers
---------------------
Q) Does Back Again/2 Professional support command line
operation for backups?
A) Yes! Unfortunately, this feature was added after the
documentation was printed. The command line format
for invoking a backup is as follows :
backup [options] <backup set name>
...where options is one or more of the following :
/U - run in unattended mode i.e. no prompts.
Any errors or messages are placed in the
log file.
/H - Hide the Back Again/2 Professional window
during backup.
Q) What kind of compression ratios can I expect from
Back Again/2 Professional?
A) The answer depends on what kind of data you are
backing up, but a general rule of thumb is that the
'compress faster' will result in a rough average
of 1.7-1.8:1, while 'compress smaller' will result
in 1.9-2.2:1. Again, this is dependant on the type
of data you are backing up. Note that .ZIP, .ARC,
and other compressed files are not compressed by
Back Again/2 - it knows they are compressed and so
does not even try.
Q) Is Back Again/2 Professional Edition compatible with
disk compression utilities?
A) Yes.
Q) Back Again/2 lists tape devices SCSITAPE:1 through
SCSITAPE:4. How do I tell which tape drive correlates
to which device?
A) If your system has more than one SCSI tape drive,
SCSITAPE:1 correlates to the first tape (highest SCSI
ID) on the first adapter, SCSITAPE:2 to the second
highest ID, and so on. If you have only one tape drive,
SCSITAPE:1 will specify that drive.
Q) Which SCSI adapters are supported by Back Again/2?
A) Back Again/2 doesn't explicitly support any single brand
of adapter. Instead it uses the OS/2 SCSI interface
provided by OS2SCSI.DMD. In theory, this should allow
Back Again/2 to work with any SCSI adapter that provides
a functional .ADD (adapter device driver) driver file.
Q) What kind of performance can I expect from Back Again/2?
A) Performance depends on your system. Listed below are some
relative speeds measured on a PS/2 Model 77 486SX/33
with Wangtek 5525ES QIC and Archive 4320NT DAT drives
backing up a popular DOS game (around 12MB of data).
,------------------------------------------------.
| Tape type | 150MB QIC | 525MB QIC | 1.3GB DAT |
|Compression | DC6150 | DC6525 | 60m DDS-1 |
|------------+-----------+-----------+-----------|
| None | 5.6 | 11.9 | 10.8 |
| | | | |
| Fast | 9.9 | 8.9 | 10.3 |
| | | | |
| Small | 4.2 | 4.3 | 4.2 |
`------------+-----------+-----------+-----------'
Note: All figures are megabytes per minute
Note that faster systems will perform faster when used
with data compression. For example, a 486/66 should
compress data roughly 80% faster.
Also, if your tape drive features built-in compression,
disabling Back Again/2's compression should allow you
to achieve the full capacity of the drive (typically
15-25MB per minute - your milage may vary).
Q) What is "QFA", and does Back Again/2 support it?
A) QFA, or Quick File Access, is a method of positioning the
tape media to a specified location without the need to
read all previous data. Not all tape units support QFA,
and there are two popular 'flavors' of QFA - SCSI-1 and
SCSI-2. Back Again/2 can accomodate all three varieties.
If a specific drive uses a variety of QFA other than the
above listed variations, Back Again/2 ignores the QFA
ability of that drive. Note that very few drives with
QFA do not support either the SCSI-1 or SCSI-2 variety.
Q) Does Back Again/2 work with SCSI-2 devices?
A) Yes - SCSI-2 is a superset of SCSI-1, so there should
be no problem. If you do encounter a problem with a
SCSI-2 tape device, try setting the device for SCSI-1
operation.
Q) Does Back Again/2 use any form of Error Correction
Code (ECC) to recover data even if the media is
damaged?
A) Back Again/2 will enable the on-board ECC capabilities
of the SCSI tape drive, if they exist, to provide the
fastest possible ECC data. Most popular tape units
available today feature built in error correction.
Q) What are the *.IDX files created by Back Again/2 for?
A) They are the tape directory index files. Whenever
a new tape is used, Back Again/2 assigns it a unique
ID and keeps a copy of the tape index on the local
hard drive. This allows you to quickly select backup
sets to verify, recover, etc. without having to do a
full scan of the tape.
Q) What happens if I accidentally delete a tape index
file?
A) Back Again/2 will automatically recover the index
from the tape when that tape is next used. Note
that the time needed to do this can range from under
30 seconds on a DAT unit to several minutes on older
QIC devices.
Q) My tape drive functions normally when I do not
select any data compression, but with compression
selected, the tape drive runs erratically.
A) The CPU is having a difficult time keeping up with
the tape drive. You can adjust the 'optimize
compression' setting on the Options page of the
notebook - the compression ratio may not be as
high but the backup should run at a better pace.
Q) I have an Archive Viper SCSI tape drive that supports
Quick File Access (QFA), but Back Again/2 doesn't seem to
take advantage of it.
A) Although the Archive Vipers generally support QFA, the
drive firmware is such that querying the current tape
position causes the tape buffer to be flushed and tape
motion to stop. This degrades performance, reducing the
throughput to less than 2MB per minute. We are
investigating possible alternatives, but it appears that
the drive firmware needs to be changed.
Upgrading from Back Again/2 v1.10 - *** IMPORTANT ***
------------------------------------------------------
If you are upgrading from Back Again/2 v1.x, please note that
Back Again/2 Professional is not compatible with any of the
backup sets or catalog files and as such cannot restore data
backed up with that version of Back Again/2. We apologize for
any inconvienience this may cause - the change was neccesary
in order to add support for SCSI tape devices.
If you have already installed Back Again/2 Professional
over your copy of Back Again/2 v1.x, you can still recover
any saved data using the demo version of Back Again/2 v1.x.
Technical support
-----------------
Technical support for Back Again/2 is available via several
means. Our preferred support avenue is our bulletin board system (BBS)
which can be reached at (612)730-4157, 2400-14.4K bps. On this BBS
you may leave messages for the technical support and programming staff
as well as obtain the latest information, demos, and fixes for
Back Again/2
We will also provide technical support for Back Again/2 by
telephone at (612)730-4156 Monday through Friday, from 8:00am to
5:00pm CST.
Before calling, please have the version numbers of both the OS/2
operating system and Back Again/2 ready. If the technical support
request involves an error message, please have the error message number
along with the result codes handy.
We can also accept technical support requests via Compuserve. Address
the message to 73662,3011. Please note that items submitted to us
via Compuserve e-mail may require one or two days time for a reply.
Disclaimer
---------
In no event, unless agreed to in writing, will Computer Data
Strategies (CDS) or Box Turtle Software (BTS) be held liable for
damages, including any general, special, incidental, or
consequential damages arising from the use of or the inability
to use the software generally known as Back Again/2 Professional
Edition, even if advised of such potential loss. This includes
but is not limited to loss or corruption of data, the inability
of this software to operate with other software programs.
Back Again/2 is provided "as is", with a thirty day money back
guarentee. In the event of dissatisfaction on the part of the
purchaser, the sole responsibility of CDS and BTS will be to refund
payment to the original purchaser so long as the original
Back Again/2 software and packaging is received by CDS within
thirty days of the order shipment date.
Notices
-------
Back Again/2 is a trademark of Computer Data Strategies.
Program code is property of and Copyright (C) 1994 by Box
Turtle Software. All Rights Reserved.
OS/2 and LAN Server are trademarks of the IBM Corporation.
Bernoulli Box is a trademark of Iomega Corp.
Novell and Netware are trademarks of Novell Corp.