Getting started
The whole evaluation is: install the agent on one machine, let it back up overnight, and restore something the next morning. Restoring is the only part worth testing, so test that.
1. Sign in
The console lives at backup.comsky.in. One workspace holds your devices, policies and recovery points.
2. Install the agent
Download the agent from the console and run it on a Windows server or laptop. There is no macOS or Linux agent.
The agent registers itself with your workspace and then checks in on a 60 second heartbeat, so a device that stops reporting becomes visible quickly rather than at the next missed backup.
3. Create a policy
A policy says what to back up, when, and how long to keep it. It is applied to one or more devices.
- Sources — the drives and folders to include.
- Schedule — when runs happen.
- Retention — how long recovery points are kept. Retention is expressed as both an age in days and a number of points; a point is removed only once it falls outside both.
4. Watch the first run
The first run reads everything and will take longer than subsequent runs, which only move what changed. Follow it on the Activity screen — see Job statuses for what each outcome means.
Open files are read through a Windows shadow copy. If the shadow-copy service cannot start, the run continues without one, locked files are skipped, and the job is flagged rather than reported clean.
5. Restore something
This is the step that matters. From the Restore screen, pick a device, pick a recovery point, browse to a file or folder, and choose where it goes:
- back in place
- into a new folder
- onto another machine
- downloaded through your browser
When restoring in place you choose how existing files are treated —
overwrite, skip, or mirror.
Do this once before you depend on it. A backup you have never restored from is a hypothesis, not a backup.