Norton GoBack (previously WildFile GoBack, Adaptec GoBack, and Roxio GoBack) is a disk utility for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

that can record up to 8 GB of disk changes. When the

filesystem In computing, file system or filesystem (often abbreviated to fs) is a method and data structure that the operating system uses to control how data is stored and retrieved. Without a file system, data placed in a storage medium would be one larg ...

is idle for a few seconds, it marks these as "safe points". The product allows the disk drive to be restored to any point within the available history. It also allows older versions of files to be restored, and previous versions of the whole disk to be browsed. Depending on disk activity, the typical history might cover a few hours to a few days.

Operation

GoBack replaces the

master boot record A master boot record (MBR) is a special type of boot sector at the very beginning of partitioned computer mass storage devices like fixed disks or removable drives intended for use with IBM PC-compatible systems and beyond. The concept of MBR ...

, and also replaces the

partition table Disk partitioning or disk slicing is the creation of one or more regions on secondary storage, so that each region can be managed separately. These regions are called partitions. It is typically the first step of preparing a newly installed disk, ...

with a single partition. This allows a hard drive to be changed back, even in the event that the

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems schedule tasks for efficient use of the system and may also in ...

is unable to boot, while also protecting the

from alteration so that the revert information remains correct. GoBack is compatible with hardware RAID drives.

Incompatible products

Due to the changes made to the partition table, this can cause problems when

dual booting Multi-booting is the act of installing multiple operating systems on a single computer, and being able to choose which one to boot. The term dual-booting refers to the common configuration of specifically two operating systems. Multi-booting may ...

other operating systems on the same

hard disk A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating platters coated with magnet ...

. It is possible to retain dual-boot compatibility, but can involve saving the partition table before enabling GoBack, and after enabling GoBack, re-writing the partition table back to the disk (after booting from a different device, such as a

Live CD A live CD (also live DVD, live disc, or live operating system) is a complete bootable computer installation including operating system which runs directly from a CD-ROM or similar storage device into a computer's memory, rather than loading fro ...

). It may also be necessary to disable GoBack prior to using certain low level disk utilities, such as formatting software. Such low level utilities which do not first check for the presence of GoBack can (in combination with GoBack) cause data to become corrupted. Another example of an incompatible program is the Windows version of True Image For Windows. GoBack is also incompatible with products such as Drive Vaccine PC Restore and RollBack Rx - as these products require access to the master boot record.

Usage precaution

* Several users at

CNET ''CNET'' (short for "Computer Network") is an American media website that publishes reviews, news, articles, blogs, podcasts, and videos on technology and consumer electronics globally. ''CNET'' originally produced content for radio and televi ...

Reviews have reported data loss after installing this product. CNET gave Norton GoBack 4.0 an editors' rating of 3.5 out of five stars, but the average user rating was only 1.5 stars. * Norton GoBack 4.0 does not support hard drive partitions of 1 TB or higher. * As per Symantec, Norton GoBack 4.0 is not compatible with

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, which was released five years before, at the time being the longest time span between successive releases of ...

Product history

* GoBack was designed by Wild File, Inc., a company located in

Plymouth, Minnesota Plymouth is a city in Hennepin County in the U.S. state of Minnesota. A suburb in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area, the city is about west of downtown Minneapolis.The population was 81,026 at the 2020 census, making it Minnesota's ...

. The software was shown at

COMDEX COMDEX (an abbreviation of COMputer Dealers' EXhibition) was a computer expo trade show held in the Las Vegas Valley of Nevada, United States, each November from 1979 to 2003. It was one of the largest computer trade shows in the world, usually ...

in November 1998 and released in December 1998. A patent for the technology was issued in January 2000. * March 2000:

Adaptec Adaptec was a computer storage company and remains a brand for computer storage products. The company was an independent firm from 1981 to 2010, at which point it was acquired by PMC-Sierra, which itself was later acquired by Microsemi, which itse ...

, Inc., acquires Wild File for approximately $29 million. * April 2001: Adaptec creates spin-off company,

Roxio Roxio is an American software company specializing in developing consumer digital media products. Its product line includes tools for setting up digital media projects, media conversion software and content distribution systems. The company formed ...

, Inc., which retains the GoBack product. * May 2001: Roxio GoBack 3 Deluxe is released, this time also supporting the

NTFS New Technology File System (NTFS) is a proprietary journaling file system developed by Microsoft. Starting with Windows NT 3.1, it is the default file system of the Windows NT family. It superseded File Allocation Table (FAT) as the preferred fil ...

filesystem, which by now was being used more widely since the release of

Windows XP Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct upgrade to its predecessors, Windows 2000 for high-end and ...

. * August 2001: Symantec Corp. announces

Norton SystemWorks Norton SystemWorks is a discontinued utility software suite by Symantec Corp. It integrates three of Symantec's most popular products – Norton Utilities, Norton CrashGuard and Norton AntiVirus – into one program designed to simplify solving c ...

2002 which includes GoBack 3 Personal Edition by Roxio. * April 2003: Roxio sells GoBack to Symantec for $13 million. * September 2004: Norton GoBack 4.0 is released by Symantec and included in Norton SystemWorks 2005. * November 2007: Symantec releases a Vista-compatible version of Norton SystemWorks for 2008 (11.0) which no longer contains GoBack, but the Premier Edition of SystemWorks now includes Norton Save & Restore 2.0. * March 2009: As per Symantec, Norton GoBack has been replaced by Norton Ghost 14 (Norton Ghost however is missing some functions that Norton Goback had).

Awards

* May 2000: Adaptec GoBack 2.1 receives

PC Magazine ''PC Magazine'' (shortened as ''PCMag'') is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and have continued to the present d ...

Editors' Choice Award. * June 2003: GoBack 3 Deluxe receives PC Magazine Editors' Choice Award. * June 2004: Norton GoBack 3.0 receives PC Magazine Editors' Choice Award. * August 2005: Norton GoBack 4.0 receives PC Magazine Editors' Choice Award.

Competing products

Windows SteadyState Windows SteadyState (formerly ''Shared Computer Toolkit'') is a discontinued freeware tool developed by Microsoft that gives administrators enhanced options for configuring shared computers, such as hard drive protection and advanced user manag ...

(discontinued)

References

{{Symantec Windows security software Utilities for Windows Windows-only software Gen Digital software Roxio software