Backup software?

JWD

United States12607 Posts

March 12 2009 22:10 GMT

Hey guys, I'm looking for a reliable, lightweight, safe automated incremental backup program for Windows XP. Any recommendations?

Freeware, shareware, or professional grade software is all ok (it's for an office where I work part time, and we have a budget for this kind of stuff). All I really need to do is mirror the hard drives of several computers to connected external drives, on a nightly basis.

Thanks in advance for any tips, I really appreciate it!

LTT

Shakuras1095 Posts

March 12 2009 22:16 GMT

I'd highly recommend SyncBackSE. It's very customizable and I've relied on if for a while now. I can't speak for the freeware version as I haven't used it.

http://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/compare.html

haduken

Australia8267 Posts

March 12 2009 22:17 GMT

Drive XML

or the commerical acronis true image

if this is for corporate then use EMC backup etc...

depending on the size and criteria relevance of your company, you want want to consider going to the proper acquisition sales channels and speak to one of the sales consultants.

JWD

United States12607 Posts

March 12 2009 22:21 GMT

On March 13 2009 07:17 haduken wrote:
Drive XML

or the commerical acronis true image

if this is for corporate then use EMC backup etc...

depending on the size and criteria relevance of your company, you want want to consider going to the proper acquisition sales channels and speak to one of the sales consultants.

This isn't a large-scale operation, just a few PCs in one particular office. So I'm more looking for things that your average savvy PC user would use to back up his HD than corporate-scale backup solutions.

Thanks for the tips, I'll check them out!

One more thing - I'm considering going with an online backup service like Mozy ( http://mozy.com/ )...do you guys have experience with / recommend any such service?

Sunhay

Canada303 Posts

March 12 2009 22:22 GMT

ive heard good things about second copy, http://www.centered.com/ .
id try the trial first and see how it works before you buy though.

Doso

Germany769 Posts

March 12 2009 23:43 GMT

I've been using Mozy for some time now. Only needed it once to restore a file. Works like a charm. Too bad i have such a crappy upload speed here. Outlook backups alone are usually a coupled hundred megs

Sirakor

Great Britain455 Posts

March 13 2009 01:08 GMT

The various tools building on rsync are very good, most notably rdiff-backup and rBackup. Although these tools are from the *nix world, a quick google search says they are available/tweakable under windope, so I'd say they're definitely worth a shot.

Archaic

United States4024 Posts

August 05 2009 20:38 GMT

I'm bumping this because I think that what I need is somewhat related to this.

Just so you know, I am dual booting Mac + PC, but I never thought I would need more than 15 GB for the PC side. My reasoning was I would only play SC, and use some other rudimentary programs. Then I decided to install some software, download Steam + a few games, Camtasia, etc. and before I knew it, I ran out of space. Seeing as the partition is set in stone, I'd have to completely remove the partition, and recreate one, most likely with 30-40 GB set aside
.
Now here is the issue: I am looking for backup software, but I am questioning a specific part of how XP backups work.

What I want is to back up the entire operating system files, meaning when I have a blank copy of XP, I want to be able to simply "restore" the past partition and everything goes back to normal, just as I was using it. I want this primarily because I don't want to re-download everything, or find downloads. It just takes too much time.

Note: I don't have any sensitive information, I just want the applications (Antivirus, programs, games) to be restored back onto the fresh copy of XP, pre-installed. Is there anyone that can either explain the characteristics of how XP back ups and restores, or anyone that knows of a program that will do what I request?

mahnini

United States6862 Posts

August 05 2009 20:41 GMT

i think gparted can resize partitions without deleting stuff.

if not you can try ghosting. i'm not sure of any free third party ghosting tools but im sure they exist.

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