Helios Software GmbH has announced the release of a free Intel-compatible Mac OS X version of Helios Xtar, its backup software based on the Unix “tar” utility.
Xtar — extended by Helios to include full Mac OS X compatibility — stores each HFS file as a double file in standard “tar” format. Unicode file names are preserved, along with metadata. Finder and resource information is written into a valid HFS file on restore.
Helios suggests that Xtar can be used to “clone” Mac OS X system drives and can migrate data from Mac OS X volumes elsewhere.