ronin94
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 p.1 #9 · Decent FREE backup program Windows | |
Just had my first total disk crash ever. So now I've been looking at D & R solutions.
I replaced the crashed disk and in the process upgraded to Win7/64/Pro. So far the best free solution I've found is.
1. Free version of Acronis Trueimage called Maxblast 5 that you can get at the Seagate/Maxtor website if you have a Maxtor or Seagate disk in your box. I use this to duplicate the systemdisk to another disk and also make an image of the current system and put it on the same HD. I have bought an external HD (SATA) adaptor that connects to the PC with eihter USB 2.0 or ESATA. I use the second option. this gives me the ability to be up and running in a matter of minutes, if the systemdisk crashes or get corrupted. I just have to insert the backup systemdisk and change boot disk in bios. There is some cost involved to buy an extra disk and the adaptor though. But very low.
2. Then I downloaded Synctoy 2.1 64bit from Microsoft (Free). That will sync your files to another location (read disk) in a number of ways. You can choose method by preference. The pro of this approach is that you don't need a dedicated backup software to read back your files. With the above mentioned adapter I'll phase out my external HD's and replace them with "regular" SATA HD's. Cheaper to buy and probably more durable plus no extra poweradaptors, no cords to attach and smaller formfactor for storage/transport. And the transferspeeds will be better with ESATA than the FW400 I used for the old external disks. The graphical interface is fairly simple to understand and works well and you can schedule backupjobs by windows scheduler. (I guess the same could be accomplished by a robocopy script if you are into windows scripting. But there you don't get any fancy graphical interface.) This will cover my needs for the immediate future.
Off topic:
I've also started to look into buying a small NAS as well, for offsite storage. LG has released an interesting product. A small NAS with a Blueray recorder built in. The unit doesn't cost much more than what you would normally pay for a blurayburner. The version I checked can support two disks, have a blurayburner and a cardreader plus the ability to connect additional usb storage. The thing with a bluray burner is that you could actually do a fullbackup on a relatively small amount of discs as opposed to DVD. A dual layer BD will take approx 50GB. And you can use rewritable disks for monthlybackups.
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