You should use the built in windows Backup and Restore to backup to external drives, not the free datasafe. That's only for making Dell Recovery Disks, not backups. You have to buy the premium version to backup with local backup and it's not necessary. Windows version is free and does the same thing--system repair disk, and system image and full backups.

First, I apologize for not being more explicite.  First,  whether being an idiot or not, I did purchase the upgrade.  And I do use Windows back-up...since the DataSafe takes so long.  However, since I do have it, my question was does anyone know what the Dell DataSafe Local Back-up Software Support program does and what it is doing on computer?  It is installed with the DataSafe but I can find nothing explaining what it is and what it does.  Can it be deleted, since I did go ahead and purchase the Upgrade?  Cannot find it in 'all programs' and cannot find it in search.  So what is it?  And I did use the DataSafe to back-up once and it took 8-10 hours!!  Thanks...

I'm  running Win7 64 bit on an Inspiron 580.  I upgraded to Datasafe Local Premium yesterday and am doing a full system backup to an external Raid box ( Stardom SR3620-2S-SB2 ) via USB2. So far I'm at 70% of roughly 300GB after 18 hours. Seems pretty glacial to me.  If it ever comes to that, I hope restore is a bit faster.

Possibly!

See Hidden Start v2.1 issues that may be related to Datasafe backup file/software...latest forum post is today feb 3, 2013.  Other posts suggests that Hstart.exe is a a 3rd party sw that may be a partof datasafe backup...