It seemed that even though the Lion is not even in the alpha-stage, there are already a number of huge improvements, or probably changes, to the operating system and its features. As we lurk more into Apple’s latest Mac OS X, the Lion, here’s another new feature found in it, called ‘Local Snapshots’.

Local Snapshots allows you to use the helpful Time Machine backup feature without an external hard drive and instead makes a local snapshot of all file changes. Your Mac will take these local snapshots every hour and store them on your Mac’s internal hard disk. We learned during IT Security 101 that backups should not be stored locally, but this will probably do the trick for simpler backups, like how Windows save your Restore Point hourly.

Apple warns that Time Machine should really be used with an external hard drive, as its true purpose is to protect your files when your local disk malfunctions. I mean, that’s the whole point of backing up your system right? This local snapshots feature is important if you lose a file while on the go, and we presume it works hand-in-hand with the new “Versions” feature in Lion, which allows you to view the evolution of your documents.

If you go for a certain time without being connected to your external hard drive, once you connect your computer will auto-sync and copy all of the local snapshots as backups onto that external drive.