$49.99 for stand-alone client I $59.99/yr for software subscription and online storage, 5 PCs
There are lots of good options for local and online backup, but Arq 7 Backup (both an online service and client) stands out from the crowd thanks to its ability to back up to myriad third-party online storage services as well as its own. Direct-attached and network storage are supported as well.
Arq even sells a perpetual license version of the client if you don’t want to leverage its own service.
The Arq 7 backup program on its own (single-seat, perpetual license, no Arq 7 storage) is a tad pricey at $49.99. But the alternative Arq 7 Premium subscription plan covers five seats, along with 1TB of storage, for $59.99 yearly.
That’s significantly less than Microsoft’s OneDrive, which is now $120 (formerly $70) for 1TB annually, though that includes the full Office 365. Microsoft’s apps are essential for some, but I’ve broken the chains and moved on to alternatives.
Against other comparable storage services, Arq 7 is right on target price-wise.
Note that the client software provided with the online storage plan becomes restore-only if you cancel the service — the industry norm. The one-time purchase is yours to keep using. Additional online storage is available at $6 per TB per month.
The lengthy list of storage destinations and protocols that Arq 7 supports includes: Amazon Drive AWS S3, S3-compatible services, Glacier, Google Cloud Storage, Backblaze B2, Dropbox, Google Drive, Minio, OneDrive, SharePoint, Storj, Wasabi, SFTP, Network volume (SMB or AFP), and direct-attached storage. New since our last review are pCloud and Mega. Whew!
Arq 7 supports multiple jobs (backup plans in Arq-speak) that you can tailor to each particular service or device — e.g. you can back up your vital documents to a free cloud service, and all your files to a more capacious account, a local hard drive, NAS box, etc.
The list of options supported by Arq 7 Backup is extensive: granular scheduling, network transfer throttling and interface selection, extensive retention rules, email reporting, encryption settings, immutable files (object locking), and a host of power/alert/performance options.
One minor nit I have with Arq 7 (as with nearly every other backup program…) is that you can’t assign multiple storage locations to a single backup job/plan. Most users have a single data set that they want to back up to multiple locations. There is, however, a workable alternative provided—exporting of your data selections as .json (Java Script Object Notation) data files that you can import into subsequently defined jobs/plans.
Another minor quibble about Arq 7 Backup is that there’s no plain file backup option, i.e. simply copying files to another location. You need Arq 7 to restore your files from their proprietary containers (which do make many tasks easier and faster); you can’t simply browse the destination using your OS and pull them off as you please.
Arq 7 is a bit of a one-trick (straight backup) pony, but it does that super-handy trick extremely well. Still, there are no goodies such as partition or drive-image backups, cloning, disaster recovery via boot media, sync, etc. That’s not a dig, just an FYI — though it is why I consider the standalone client price to be just a bit on the high side.
If you want something more versatile for local backup chores, try the top-ranked Easeus ToDo Backup Home.
One of Arq 7’s best attributes is its clean, concise interface. The backup chore can be intimidating to new users, so a logical, intuitive interface is an important consideration. That said, it’s plain-Jane with a vengeance. Personally, I like no-nonsense, but if you’re a colorful-icon fan you might not love it. Still… How often will you use it? Boring in backup is a good thing!
Arq 7 steps you through the destination and data selection, then leaves you on your own for advanced settings, offering a series of tabs with the related options. Hint: You’re likely fine without adjusting the advanced settings. If not…
Just pretend you’re the wizard, click on each logically arranged tab in turn, and you’ll be okay. I promise. If you’re a backup neophyte, you might want to bone up a bit on concepts such as file retention and immutable data, before messing with them.
Various information is displayed in a tree to the left of the main window (shown below). This includes defined jobs (plans), dates of the backups, etc. There’s a separate restore section with entries for each storage destination, though you’ll need to drill down to the actual backup and date for the restore option to appear.
While it may take you a while to get up to speed on Arq 7’s workflow, once you are, it’s extremely efficient. I’ll take that any day over the kind of hand-holding that slows you down in the long run.
Arq 7 performed flawlessly in my tests. Specifically, I used Arq 7 to back up data sets to OneDrive, Dropbox, and the company’s own storage service. I also backed up to a local SSD and my main NAS box, and again, OneDrive. All proceeded quickly, without failure, and without impacting my overall system performance unduly on either Windows PC or Mac.
Backup is a task with no room for failure and there were no glitches by Arq 7 of any type, minor or major, to shake my confidence in the program.
Note that while I found Arq 7 particularly speedy, online backup durations always depend on the speed of your connection to the remote server.
I can’t emphasize enough how important flawless performance is when choosing a backup solution. Data safety isn’t something to play around with, as anyone who’s tried to restore a bad backup will tell you.
I rank Arq Premium top-tier as a storage service and program, and the support for all the other online storage services is a very, very useful feature.
Author: Jon Jacobi
Source: PCWorld
Reviewed By: Editorial Team
