Backup solutions

  • Thread starter Thread starter EA
  • Start date Start date
E

EA

I'm in the process of getting a new system that will have two hard
drives (identical size) and I'm looking for suggestions/recommendations
for a backup method. Up until now, I have been using a zip program to
back up to removable media (zip). On the new system, I prefer to use
the 2nd drive as a back up. What is the best method to do that with
existing freeware programs? Is there any advantage in using imaging
programs as opposed to simply making the 2nd drive bootable and using
xxcopy or other similar program to copy files to it? I'm thinking of
using the following system:

Master drive will have 2 partitions: The 1st partition will have just
the OS and the 2nd will have applications and data.

Slave drive will also have 2 partitions of the same size as the first.
The first partition will be bootable and have a copy of the OS. The
2nd partition will contain zipped copies of the applications and data.
The reason for the zipped copies is to conserve space and be able to
fit a couple of generations of backups.

The OS will be XP pro. Any suggestions for freeware that will help
with this backup system?

Emmanuel
 
EA said:
I'm in the process of getting a new system that will have two hard
drives (identical size) and I'm looking for
suggestions/recommendations for a backup method. Up until now, I have
been using a zip program to back up to removable media (zip). On the
new system, I prefer to use the 2nd drive as a back up. What is the
best method to do that with existing freeware programs? Is there any
advantage in using imaging programs as opposed to simply making the
2nd drive bootable and using xxcopy or other similar program to copy
files to it? I'm thinking of using the following system:

Master drive will have 2 partitions: The 1st partition will have just
the OS and the 2nd will have applications and data.

Slave drive will also have 2 partitions of the same size as the first.
The first partition will be bootable and have a copy of the OS. The
2nd partition will contain zipped copies of the applications and data.
The reason for the zipped copies is to conserve space and be able to
fit a couple of generations of backups.

The OS will be XP pro. Any suggestions for freeware that will help
with this backup system?

Emmanuel
Click to expand...

Depends on why you want to back-up:

to prevent your ystem from crashing if your harddisk breaksdown (hardware
failure)
This calls for a realtime back-up. Withc and be done with Windows XP itself,
at the cost of
disk acces/write speed, or with the help of a Raid controller like fasttrack
(http://www.promise.com/)
witch is way quicker

or

prevend files from being destroyed by viruses, trojans or accedential
deletion
in this case, I find Disc to disc copies not that ideal:
In this case it will only help against accedential deletion of a file. this
methode will neigher be usefull agians
fire, theft, pc-electrocution or other hardware hazards.
And regardign human interaction: it is only save if the dletions are realy
accedential. Someone who realy wants to, can also acces your second drive to
delet files (privides he can also access your first drive).

As for this, you could even use the Back-up software includes by xp (you
have to install it seperately if you use Windows XP home ed) to create a
back up on your second drive as one file.


other possibilities include:
SyncBack (http://www.syncback.com/)
Karen's Replicator (http://www.karenware.com/progs/ptreplicator-setup.exe)

Or go to nonags (http://download-ecke.de/nonags/index.html for one of the
mirrors)
slect 'Back-up tools' from the download categories (2nd half of the page,
colomn 2, row 2, item 1)
and select the one you like best. Nonags is often a good bet for downloading
quality freeware.

MightyKitten

--

http://www.it-hulp.nl/
http://fotoalbum.it-hulp.nl/

gmx.net is the mailserver of mightykitten
start subject with *ping* or the antispam monster will eat it.
 
"EA" <[email protected]> schreef in bericht

......

......


Depends on why you want to back-up:

to prevent your ystem from crashing if your harddisk breaksdown
(hardware failure)
This calls for a realtime back-up. Withc and be done with Windows
XP itself, at the cost of
disk acces/write speed, or with the help of a Raid controller like
fasttrack (http://www.promise.com/)
witch is way quicker

or

prevend files from being destroyed by viruses, trojans or
accedential deletion
in this case, I find Disc to disc copies not that ideal:
In this case it will only help against accedential deletion of a
file. this methode will neigher be usefull agians
fire, theft, pc-electrocution or other hardware hazards.
And regardign human interaction: it is only save if the dletions
are realy accedential. Someone who realy wants to, can also acces
your second drive to delet files (privides he can also access your
first drive).

As for this, you could even use the Back-up software includes by
xp (you have to install it seperately if you use Windows XP home
ed) to create a back up on your second drive as one file.


other possibilities include:
SyncBack (http://www.syncback.com/)
Karen's Replicator
(http://www.karenware.com/progs/ptreplicator-setup.exe)

Or go to nonags (http://download-ecke.de/nonags/index.html for one
of the mirrors)
slect 'Back-up tools' from the download categories (2nd half of
the page, colomn 2, row 2, item 1)
and select the one you like best. Nonags is often a good bet for
downloading quality freeware.

MightyKitten
Click to expand...

Hmmmm.....I see problems with the real time backup. It is more or less
useless in cases of virus infection. I prefer the disk to disk method
that I described, i.e., using zipped files (except for th OS) for
several reasons. First, I can keep several generations of backups
which is useful if the most recent one is also infected. Second,
although not impossible, it is unlikely that both physical drives with
fail. If that happens, I will be able to reinstall sooftware from
their CDs and I always keep an additional backup of data on removable
media. Finally, I prefer to back up to zip files because it is so
simple to extract specific files. In over 25 years, I only had to do a
complete restore once. Of course, that does not mean it will not be
necessary in the future and I do want to be prepared for it. However,
the most common reason I access my back up files is when I install a
new version of a program and discover that it does not work as well as
the previous version. Having zipped backups and a copy of the registry
before the installation makes it easy to undo the damage...
I will definitely check your other suggestions and teh files at
nonags....

emmanuel
 
EA,

There are probably as many back up strategies as there are users. I would
suggest you visit Fred Langa's web site (www.fredlanga.com) and do a search
on back-up. He has written >> extensively << about this and has some sage
advice that you will need to ponder. It's free - just register. No spam or
emails from him except for the newsletter which is usually an excellent
read.

After trying many programs, methods and getting less than 100% reliability
when I had to recover a system, I finally settled on a strategy that you are
considering - save some minor but important changes. I'm fortunate to have
a test system where I can play games and try things without risking loss of
data. The two drives, with the second being for backups only is what works
for me and one I've suggested (pushed on) to my clients as well.

You can find freeware that will make images or copy file for file like xcopy
Whether you do this from DOS or a window is program dependent but you will
be recovering at the DOS level if you need to restore the operating system.
That means you either need to have floppies or a bootable CD. It has been
my experience that the freeware programs I've tried over the past several
years were not all that reliable for my systems. More than one gotcha
jumped up and bit me. So even though I had good images or files - they were
not accessible for whatever reason. That frustration finally lead me to
commercial applications with Ghost being one and PowerQuest Drive Image
(versions for both XP and Win9x) being the second image maker programs.

Ghost worked most of the time but was not flawless and had a hard time
finding drives if they were on a Promise card and you could almost forget
finding anything on a USB port - especially v1.1. It works fine if you have
a fairly straight forward hardware setup and in all fairness, some of my
hardware is over 3 years old so your mileage may vary. Ghost is powerful
and flexible but not perfect for my setups (5 different hardware
configurations).

PowerQuest - which is now owned by Symantec, was the next to test with and
it requires that your system be able to boot from a CD. Some simple changes
to my hardware and everyone of them can now be backed-up (scheduled) while
still in Windows, partial recoveries possible while in Windows but full
recovery requires booting from the PQ CD and following the bouncing ball.
I've gone as far as changing the hardware configuration after making a full
system image, then going thru a recovery. PQ has not failed me once
(cross-fingers). I have purposely corrupted files and PQ recovers. So far,
I've had 100% success. It was only a week ago that I had to restore my main
system and that was a for-real panic situation. PQ worked and I was up and
running in less than an hour.

Now - while I use PQ for the full system images, I use another backup
program (BackUp MyPC) which looks exactly like the Windows backup
utility.... I schedule a backup everyday to backup files/folders (about
4Gb) of my "Can't loose" data and it's cross connected to two other systems,
so I have daily backups on several drives on my network. Call me paranoid.
I then copy selected files to CD monthly and out to a USB hd weekly that I
move from system to system.

As I said, there are freeware programs to do all this and more and you have
to decide what your level of comfort is with each scenario. After it's all
said and done, a second physical hard drive is no more costly than any other
method. Consider that it took me up to 12 hours to rebuild a system from
scratch which I can now do in about 45 mins tops - it was money well spent.
It's still not perfect.... but it's as close as I'm going to come for my
systems and I'm comfortable with it and that is what matters.

Now to all that want to jump on me about this not being freeware related - I
suggest you read the FAQ referenced on the Pricelessware site and read
paragraph 3 closely. Since John has me in his killfile, I don't have to
worry about his ranting. If anyone disagrees - I'll apologize
later....much, much later...;-)

Bob S.
 
I'm in the process of getting a new system that will have two hard
drives (identical size) and I'm looking for suggestions/recommendations
for a backup method. Up until now, I have been using a zip program to
back up to removable media (zip). On the new system, I prefer to use
the 2nd drive as a back up. What is the best method to do that with
existing freeware programs? Is there any advantage in using imaging
programs as opposed to simply making the 2nd drive bootable and using
xxcopy or other similar program to copy files to it? I'm thinking of
using the following system:

Master drive will have 2 partitions: The 1st partition will have just
the OS and the 2nd will have applications and data.

Slave drive will also have 2 partitions of the same size as the first.
The first partition will be bootable and have a copy of the OS. The
2nd partition will contain zipped copies of the applications and data.
The reason for the zipped copies is to conserve space and be able to
fit a couple of generations of backups.

The OS will be XP pro. Any suggestions for freeware that will help
with this backup system?
Click to expand...
www.fileback-pc.com
 
I believe you'll find PowerQuest for a few dollars less on the Symantec
site. If you use the site, you get one version (WinXP or Win9x) but if your
purchase it from say Staples (where I got mine) you get the CD with both
versions on it for the same price.

Just offering this up so you can make an informed decision.

Bob S.
 
EA,

There are probably as many back up strategies as there are users.
I would suggest you visit Fred Langa's web site
(www.fredlanga.com) and do a search on back-up. He has written >>
extensively << about this and has some sage advice that you will
need to ponder. It's free - just register. No spam or emails
from him except for the newsletter which is usually an excellent
read.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the link...I'll certaainly check it out....


[.....]
You can find freeware that will make images or copy file for file
like xcopy Whether you do this from DOS or a window is program
dependent but you will be recovering at the DOS level if you need
to restore the operating system. That means you either need to
have floppies or a bootable CD. It has been my experience that
Click to expand...

That's similar to what I have been doing until now but I don't think it
will work with the new (XP) system. Unless I'm missing something, you
cannot backup/restore an XP system from DOS....

the freeware programs I've tried over the past several years were
not all that reliable for my systems. More than one gotcha jumped
up and bit me. So even though I had good images or files - they
were not accessible for whatever reason. That frustration finally
lead me to commercial applications with Ghost being one and
PowerQuest Drive Image (versions for both XP and Win9x) being the
second image maker programs.
Click to expand...

Were those freeware programs for creating images or simply copying the
files? I'm not sure there is any value in using imaging programs with
a 2nd drive dedicated for backups. Here is what I have in mind for
backing up/restoring the OS:

Master drive has a bootable partition just for the OS. Applications
and data are on the extended partition. The slave drive has an
identical partition as the master drive and it is also bootable. The
OS is copied to that partition on the slave drive. To restore, I can
switch drives, boot, copy the OS to the original master drive, and
switch the drives again. Does that make sense? At least in my
experience, the need for a complete restore happens rarely so I don't
mind the extra hasle. I like that method because it will allow me to
backup applications and date to the extended partition, in zip files,
and it will be very easy to acceess and restore any of them as well as
keep several generations of back ups.

Thanks again for the suggestions...

emmanuel
 
EA said:
I'm in the process of getting a new system that will have two hard
drives (identical size) and I'm looking for suggestions/recommendations
for a backup method. Up until now, I have been using a zip program to
back up to removable media (zip). On the new system, I prefer to use
the 2nd drive as a back up. What is the best method to do that with
existing freeware programs? Is there any advantage in using imaging
programs as opposed to simply making the 2nd drive bootable and using
xxcopy or other similar program to copy files to it? I'm thinking of
using the following system:

Master drive will have 2 partitions: The 1st partition will have just
the OS and the 2nd will have applications and data.

Slave drive will also have 2 partitions of the same size as the first.
The first partition will be bootable and have a copy of the OS. The
2nd partition will contain zipped copies of the applications and data.
The reason for the zipped copies is to conserve space and be able to
fit a couple of generations of backups.

The OS will be XP pro. Any suggestions for freeware that will help
with this backup system?

Emmanuel
Click to expand...

I have no clue if I have a similar need as you, but after searching and
trying many backups solutions, the following seems to work the best for me
so far:

I have two win2k workstations that I've ghosted a newly installed OS with
all the drivers etc., and I burn that to CDrom (partition to image NOT disk
to image). That's not free (the ghost isn't but...), but I have another
partition that I keep the programs that don't require an install, so I can
redo the system partition, and those aps can still work. I also have
personal files on the 2nd partition.

On my PC I put all the files I couldn't stand to lose in one folder with
many sub folders for docs and pics etc.. When that main folder gets near
700MB I burn two copies to CDrom and remove the files from my PC. I put one
CDrom in my drawer, and one in a safety-deposit box at my bank.

I also have a FreeBSD 5.2.1 server running Samba on my lan with a few hard
drives on it.

Then I have infozip's Zip program (http://info-zip.org/ ) run from batch on
a scheduled task on my workstation like so:

zip -r -u \\server\backups\backed-up.zip D:\path\to\files\* >>D:\backup.log

repeat...

that goes on with all the folders I'd hate to lose and some I'd like to
save. The less I want to save something, the smaller the folder must
be...most applications don't be backed up - I can replace most of them.

Then I do the same with my mom's computer:

zip -r -u \\server\backups\mom-backed-up.zip \\moms\path\to\files\*
repeat...

etc.

Then I also backup selected server files on my server to my computer:

zip -r -u D:\server-backups\backed-up.zip \\server\c$\etc\* >>D:\backup.log

repeat...

and so on...

Then I have blat (http://blat.net/ ) e-mail me my backup.log file; then the
batch deletes the log and that is that till the next day.


I want to get two 250GB SATA hard drives and add it to my server's built in
raid controller mirroring each other. But that would be another ~$350 or
so...


Karen <-- girl who lost data and cried therefor all the effort to backup.
http://scootgirl.com/
 
That's similar to what I have been doing until now but I don't think it
will work with the new (XP) system. Unless I'm missing something, you
cannot backup/restore an XP system from DOS....
Click to expand...

That's true. This is the very best possible solution however.

I've been looking for a good freeware clone program that can be run at startup
that formats C: and copies the image from another drive, and then boots from C:

This is how they protect the computers in the lab. You can do anything you want
to these machines and it is impossible to screw them up (physical abuse not
withstanding).

Once setup, updates and with all programs installed an image is created. The
only thing copied daily to the image is the document, or working folder.

No matter what someone might delete, no matter how destructive a virus or worm
is, a simple reboot repairs everything!

Of course it takes awhile to reboot. Several gigs must be copied. But it is
bulletproof as far as software goes. Fires, sledge hammers, etc. require the
updated image be held in a safer place than on the same machine.

For my needs, copying the image from a different drive or partition is
sufficient, but I haven't found a freeware program capable of booting, copying
the image, and then rebooting to XP.

Hmmm. I'm wondering if it is possible to boot to DOS on a CD and use XXcopy16 to
copy the image file, not the operating system that is in use?
 
Please go back and read all the posts and then ask what your post
contributed to the thread.

Bob S.
 
Make that link www.langa.com

Bob S.
Click to expand...


Thanks Bob....useful information there. However, I should have made my
original question a little more clear. I'm familiar with the different
backup methods and programs. What I was looking for was people's
experiences with specific freeware programs that can be used to back up
the OS to another physical drive. There are several freeware programs
that can do this but I was wondering if anyone has used them
successfully, had problems with any of them, etc.

emmanuel
 
That's true. This is the very best possible solution however.

I've been looking for a good freeware clone program that can be
run at startup that formats C: and copies the image from another
drive, and then boots from C:
Click to expand...

Yes, that is what I would like to find too....


For my needs, copying the image from a different drive or
partition is sufficient, but I haven't found a freeware program
capable of booting, copying the image, and then rebooting to XP.
Click to expand...


Are you saying that you haven't found a program that can do all this
automatically (unattended)? That's ok because I do no plan to do
restores on regular basis...only in disaster cases. With the method
you use, if you copy the image to a different drive, how do you restore
on an XP system?

Hmmm. I'm wondering if it is possible to boot to DOS on a CD and
use XXcopy16 to copy the image file, not the operating system that
is in use?
Click to expand...


I don't think that will work on an XP system.....

emmanuel
 
I have no clue if I have a similar need as you, but after
searching and trying many backups solutions, the following seems
to work the best for me so far:

I have two win2k workstations that I've ghosted a newly installed
OS with all the drivers etc., and I burn that to CDrom (partition
to image NOT disk to image). That's not free (the ghost isn't
but...), but I have another partition that I keep the programs
that don't require an install, so I can redo the system partition,
and those aps can still work. I also have personal files on the
2nd partition.
Click to expand...

[....]

Thank you for your suggestions. Your method is similar to what I use
now (9x machines) and to what I plan to use on XP. My main concern is
backing up the OS partition. Like you said, Ghost is not free. I was
wondering if there is a freeware alternative and what people's
experience with such freeware is....

emmanuel
 
Emmanuel,

I think what you're finding out is what I was trying to convey - there is no
freeware I've found that works reliably and I think the general experience
level for this kind of software will be low for most individuals and
difficult to comment on unless the have a number of systems they support.
You can backup XP from DOS. Ghost uses PCDOS I believe and the PowerQuest
CD is bootable.

If this is just for your personal system - try the freeware and see how well
it works for you - several have been mentioned. If it's for a business
application I would suggest you look elsewhere.

Bob S.
 
Emmanuel,

I think what you're finding out is what I was trying to convey -
there is no freeware I've found that works reliably and I think
the general experience level for this kind of software will be low
for most individuals and difficult to comment on unless the have a
number of systems they support. You can backup XP from DOS. Ghost
uses PCDOS I believe and the PowerQuest CD is bootable.

If this is just for your personal system - try the freeware and
see how well it works for you - several have been mentioned. If
it's for a business application I would suggest you look
elsewhere.

Bob S.
Click to expand...

Thanks Bob.....

Emmanuel
 
----------------
Unless I'm missing something, you
cannot backup/restore an XP system from DOS....
---------------

You can actually, by using a FAT 2 NTFS driver, some of which are freeware:
You can back up win 2000 or SP system files onto a FAT 15 or 32 drive, even
put them in a zip file like you want to. If your backup disk is a bootable dos
or win 9x system, it can also load a driver that makes an NTFS driver look like
a FAT formatted drive, to the backup system. You can then simply copy 2000
or SP files back onto the NTFS drive, using dos xxcopy, pkunzip or whatever.

Some of these drivers cost money, some are free.
 
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