Abstract: An apparatus, system, and method are disclosed for efficient creation of point-in-time versions of data using differencing in a read-before-write environment. Included in an embodiment of the invention are a receive module that receives a data block sent from a primary data storage system, a read module that reads a data block from a secondary data storage device into random access memory, the data block corresponding to the data block sent from the primary data storage system, a comparison module that compares the data block sent from the primary data storage system to the data block from the secondary data storage device and creates a differencing data file, a compression module that compresses the differencing data file and to create a compressed differencing data file, and a differencing storage module stores the compressed differencing data file in a differencing storage device.