Backup software recommendations

[Anonymous]

I'm looking for recommendations for backup software for my home computer.

The software must work in Windows XP, provide scheduling and incremental
backups, and support a USB external drive. I don't need network support. I
want well supported software, not shareware or freeware.

Thanks



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[Anonymous]

ntbackup.exe does all of this and doesn't cost a penny.

Matt
matt@stachoni.com

On Sun, 21 Feb 2010 22:03:15 -0800, neilw wrote:

>I'm looking for recommendations for backup software for my home computer.
>
>The software must work in Windows XP, provide scheduling and incremental
>backups, and support a USB external drive. I don't need network support. I
>want well supported software, not shareware or freeware.
>
>Thanks
>
>
>
>__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 4885 (20100221) __________
>
>The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.
>
>http://www.eset.com

[Charles_Shade]

I've been using APBackup: http://avpsoft.com/products/apbackup/
There is a cost but it is worth it after the great meltdown of '07!
Regards, Charles Shade

[Anonymous]

I've been using Cobian Backup: http://www.educ.umu.se/~cobian/cobianbackup.htm

It's 100% free

Regards, Stefan Kirsch

[Anonymous]

Offsite backup with features, since relying on one USB drive alone is never
a good enough:
www.sugrasync.com

--
Dean Saadallah
http://LTisACAD.blogspot.com
--

[Anonymous]

After using 4 different backup programs and media, I just use DVD's. They're cheap, and the data can be recovered with any modern OS. I have tape data I can't recover because the software that created it is no longer supported. And every time an OS changes, you've lost the ability to recover data from the previous version.

Reid

[Anonymous]

I don't want to feed DVD's into my machine. I have a 1 TB USB drive and want
to set up automated backups. I'd prefer to use industry standard compression
format in case for some reason I cannot access the backup software to
restore data.

[Anonymous]

but I'm sure he doesn't have a fast upload speed like most at work. I mean
I've got gigs and gigs(I think around 300 gigs) of home photos, home movies
that would takes hours to upload if not days with a 1meg upload speed at
home!

"Dean Saadallah" wrote in message
news:6341413@discussion.autodesk.com...
Offsite backup with features, since relying on one USB drive alone is never
a good enough:
www.sugrasync.com

--
Dean Saadallah
http://LTisACAD.blogspot.com
--

[Anonymous]

ntbackup appears to do everything I need Matt. Are there any issues you have
had that I should watch for?

A few of my goals are:

Scheduled automatic backups of my data files (Docs. and settings, movies,
pictures, application generated data files, etc.)
Transfer my drive images to a new computer

I have a 150 GB and 500 GB drive in my machine with an HP recovery partion
for Vista on the 500 GB drive. I was dual booting to XP on the 150 GB drive
and to Vista on the 500 GB drive but I had to install a new main board. I
was told that the boot loader for Vista is tied to my old main board so I
can no longer boot to Vista unless I reformat the 500 GB drive. Since the
main board failue I have been booting to the XP drive and installing my apps
and stroing my data on the 500 GB Vista drive. It would be nice to get VISTA
running again but I don't know if I can at this stage of the game.

[Anonymous]

cd's and dvd's have problems just like floppy disk and tapes media. Overtime
15+ years the media may be unreadable because degrading like floppies. This
can be all factored by heat and how you store the cd's and dvd's. Remember
DVd's that you create with a burner are not like those you buy in a store
with movies and games on them. Those are more of a stamped image and less
prone to heat and scratches.
The best solution for backing up today's digital photos and movies is not to
rely on just one backup source. Use a main hard drive, backup to another and
maybe another or dvd's. Using 1 or 2 raid 1 system also helps. If you have
the money you can step up the raid system with even more disk. Just don't
rely on one backup system, hard drives fail, DVd's get corrupted and you
never know when you may need the data it could be 5 years or 40 years from
now.

wrote in message news:6341464@discussion.autodesk.com...
After using 4 different backup programs and media, I just use DVD's.
They're cheap, and the data can be recovered with any modern OS. I have
tape data I can't recover because the software that created it is no longer
supported. And every time an OS changes, you've lost the ability to recover
data from the previous version.

Reid

[Anonymous]

Why offsite storage has it's merits I am comfortable with using an external
drive. It is more economical and practical for me.

[Anonymous]

That should have said "While offsite storage.." not "Why offsite storage.."

[Anonymous]

On 2/22/2010 7:51 AM, neilw wrote:
> I don't want to feed DVD's into my machine. I have a 1 TB USB drive and want
> to set up automated backups. I'd prefer to use industry standard compression
> format in case for some reason I cannot access the backup software to
> restore data.

My onsite backups I do with Second Copy. It's cheap, I've been using it
for some time and have restored data with ith without any problems, it
supports simple copy, exact copy, compressed copy, archival copies
(keeps up to IIRC 25 older backups), or syncs files etc. I back up my
.dwg and .rvt files with it every two hours and everything else every
night. I backup a copy of everything to a 1.5TB remote hard drive and to
another computer on the network. Simple to use. When I bought it it was
$19.95US but I think it's up to $29.95US now.

www.secondcopy.com
--
Dave - DDP
Acad and Revit 2010 64 bit
Win 7 Pro
Intel I7-860 @2.8GHz
8GB DDR3 RAM
GeForce GTX260

[Anonymous]

Be advised that ntbackup and so many other backup programs store backed up
files in a proprietary file format. This means you have to have a fully
installed and functional instance of an OS --and-- netbackup to get to your
files.

I only use backup software that backups the files in their native file
format. Very easy to read from a hard drive from any computer with any OS at
any time to drag and drop or whatever. Think about it. You've already
learned what it is like to be locked in to a proprietary control schema. Why
do it again in a different context?



"neilw" wrote in message
news:6341547@discussion.autodesk.com...
ntbackup appears to do everything I need Matt. Are there any issues you have
had that I should watch for?

A few of my goals are:

Scheduled automatic backups of my data files (Docs. and settings, movies,
pictures, application generated data files, etc.)
Transfer my drive images to a new computer

I have a 150 GB and 500 GB drive in my machine with an HP recovery partion
for Vista on the 500 GB drive. I was dual booting to XP on the 150 GB drive
and to Vista on the 500 GB drive but I had to install a new main board. I
was told that the boot loader for Vista is tied to my old main board so I
can no longer boot to Vista unless I reformat the 500 GB drive. Since the
main board failue I have been booting to the XP drive and installing my apps
and stroing my data on the 500 GB Vista drive. It would be nice to get VISTA
running again but I don't know if I can at this stage of the game.

[Anonymous]

On Mon, 22 Feb 2010 08:09:23 -0800, neilw wrote:

>ntbackup appears to do everything I need Matt. Are there any issues you have
>had that I should watch for?

IMO the trick to using ntbackup easily is to create robust backup DOS-like batch
files which launch ntbackup with all of the proper options.

Way back in Windows Server 2000, I used this as a design guide for creating
batch files to backup files to external drives and tape drives:

http://windowsitpro.com/article/articleid/73586/jsi-tip-2265-how-do-i-perform-an-ntbackup-in-windows-2000-without-having-to-manually-manage-the-media.html

ntbackup is slightly different in the latest release of Windows 2008, but I
think the basics still apply.

Windows Vista backup already includes pretty good tools for backing up user data
to other machines or devices.

BTW, I would forget Vista completely and move to Windows 7.

Matt
matt@stachoni.com

>A few of my goals are:
>
>Scheduled automatic backups of my data files (Docs. and settings, movies,
>pictures, application generated data files, etc.)
>Transfer my drive images to a new computer
>
>I have a 150 GB and 500 GB drive in my machine with an HP recovery partion
>for Vista on the 500 GB drive. I was dual booting to XP on the 150 GB drive
>and to Vista on the 500 GB drive but I had to install a new main board. I
>was told that the boot loader for Vista is tied to my old main board so I
>can no longer boot to Vista unless I reformat the 500 GB drive. Since the
>main board failue I have been booting to the XP drive and installing my apps
>and stroing my data on the 500 GB Vista drive. It would be nice to get VISTA
>running again but I don't know if I can at this stage of the game.

[Anonymous]

I'm with you on the proprietary format issue Clinton. There is an Open
Source utility called AMANDA that uses TAR for compression but I am leery
about using Open Source software. Since ntbackup is a native windows app, I
would think it would be supported via Windows Setup disks and on into the
future for at least a few releases, but I have never used it so I don't know
what would happen if I had a drive crash and needed to restore from the USB
backup drive.

[Anonymous]

Second Copy looks like it does what I need for the most part. Basically it
creates copies of the files without proprietary compression formats while
providing automated synchronization.

Thanks for the tip.

[Anonymous]

Even if I do upgrade to Win 7, wouldn't I still need to get Vista
functioning first? Also there are some VISTA apps that I would like to run
(some of the media utilities).

[Anonymous]

I back up to my off-site web servers. They have a staff that handles all
backups on the web server. In 16 years, I've never accidentally lost a
file. Had one meltdown in 2004 when I switched off-site servers.
--
Dennis Jeffrey, Autodesk Inventor Certified Expert
Attend the "It's a Duesy II " Manufacturing Revival Conference
March 17th, 2010 More Information at:
http://teknigroup.com/2010/Duesy/dennis1.html

Subscribe to the free "The Creative Inventor Magazine now available at:
http://teknigroup.com

[Anonymous]

In this day and age, if you are still using dial-up or slow DSL you probably
can only backup to floppy disks too... :))
After initial setup, speed of uploads is no issue since they tend to be
incremental.

I believe in second copies of backups, at a place/method/location that is no
where near or resembling the first backup.

A thief, or accident or a fire/water/natural disaster will affect your
backup drive sitting on top or next to your computer as well as your PC.

--
Dean Saadallah
http://LTisACAD.blogspot.com
--