OT - Recommended Backup Software ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Magnusfarce
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M

Magnusfarce

Sorry to go so far off topic, but this group has always been able to provide
great help. I've bought several different external drives lately for
various reasons, and it seems like each brand offers its own version of an
automated backup program for data files. For the first time, I'm interested
in setting up something like that and am wondering if any of these are
particularly good, or perhaps there might be a simple freeware program that
can do automatic backups (copies, really) of specific data-file directories
to a USB- or wirelessly connected external drive on, say, a weekly basis?
I'm looking for something very simple and very clean.

- Magnusfarce
 
In alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt "Magnusfarce"
Sorry to go so far off topic, but this group has always been able to provide
great help. I've bought several different external drives lately for
various reasons, and it seems like each brand offers its own version of an
automated backup program for data files. For the first time, I'm interested
in setting up something like that and am wondering if any of these are
particularly good, or perhaps there might be a simple freeware program that
can do automatic backups (copies, really) of specific data-file directories
to a USB- or wirelessly connected external drive on, say, a weekly basis?
I'm looking for something very simple and very clean.

- Magnusfarce
Click to expand...
You might try Microsoft's SyncToy.
It has a nice set of options; and in their help-file they tell how to
schedule automatic backups.

(I hate to say anything NICE about M$; but that works better than my
previously-used automatic batch-files using XCOPY.)
 
Sorry to go so far off topic, but this group has always been able to provide
great help. I've bought several different external drives lately for
various reasons, and it seems like each brand offers its own version of an
automated backup program for data files. For the first time, I'm interested
in setting up something like that and am wondering if any of these are
particularly good, or perhaps there might be a simple freeware program that
can do automatic backups (copies, really) of specific data-file directories
to a USB- or wirelessly connected external drive on, say, a weekly basis?
I'm looking for something very simple and very clean.

- Magnusfarce
Click to expand...

First I delete the contents of a backup folder. The OS scheduler
launches a batch file where I have my own copy commands in batch file
to copy folders and contents to the backup folder. From there, I burn
a DVD using Nero. A "reminder" in Outlook tells me to delete the
backup folder contents (I prefer a manual delete) and insert a DVD
into the drive. I label the DVD, date-stamp it, and store it in a
safe place. It's a good idea to keep a copy off site. This method
is fairly automated and easy to do, plus restoring a single file from
the backup is quick and easy from any machine. If you are on a
network, you could copy the backup file to another PC, although I like
DVDs because they are "permanent." No special program is needed, just
the discipline to do it.

I found Microsoft's backup program (in 2000 and XP) to be a complete
joke as I had issues with restoring. Not sure if Vista is better or
not. Ghost claims it will quickly restore, although I found this
utility confusing. You can also use Partition Magic to copy a
bootable partition.
 
Sorry to go so far off topic, but this group has always been able to provide
great help. I've bought several different external drives lately for
various reasons, and it seems like each brand offers its own version of an
automated backup program for data files. For the first time, I'm interested
in setting up something like that and am wondering if any of these are
particularly good, or perhaps there might be a simple freeware program that
can do automatic backups (copies, really) of specific data-file directories
to a USB- or wirelessly connected external drive on, say, a weekly basis?
I'm looking for something very simple and very clean.
Click to expand...

Acronis True Image:
http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/

You install it, you configure it, and that's it, you can forget about it
untill "THE BAD THING" happens. I've used Disk Image and Ghost
and TI does everything they do, plus much more.

DK
 
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