back up

[Baz]

Any one use this

Im thinking of trying it as i'm having a bit bother with Acronis so was looking for an alternative

[psp83]

Nope, I use Robocopy command line.

Its a bit geeky but I like it.

[Technical Ben]

If only there was a /sudo get me a Linux expert command. 
I'll get around to learning it one day.

[Glenn]

ODIN is another one.

[Rik]

Wotan earth would you use that for? 

[Glenn]

I came across it the other day, when looking at installing Linux on my Pogoplug.

[Rik]

My father wouldn't have understood that sentence.

[Glenn]

Neither would mine.

[Rik]

It pulls you up with a jolt, when you realise that life has changed so much in a very short period, doesn't it.

[Glenn]

Yep. My grandfather, he saw the first horseless carriages, through to man on the moon, along with computers taking the world by storm.

[tehidyman]

I use EASEUS to do regular incremental back ups of documents, photos and statistics.  Satisfactory for me (6 months use), simple to use and so far no problems.

[psp83]

If you want to try robocopy out then just follow the following.

Copy and paste the following & change the bits in bold to where your files are and where you want them to be backed up to.

@ECHO OFF
SETLOCAL

SET _source=\\FileServ1\e$\users

SET _dest=\\FileServ2\e$\BackupUsers

SET _what=/COPYALL /B /SEC /MIR
:: /COPYALL :: COPY ALL file info
:: /B :: copy files in Backup mode.
:: /SEC :: copy files with SECurity
:: /MIR :: MIRror a directory tree

SET _options=/R:0 /W:0 /LOG:MyLogfile.txt /NFL /NDL
:: /R:n :: number of Retries
:: /W:n :: Wait time between retries
:: /LOG :: Output log file
:: /NFL :: No file logging
:: /NDL :: No dir logging

ROBOCOPY %_source% %_dest% %_what% %_options%

Paste that into notepad and save as backup1.bat

Now open Task Scheduler on windows and setup a task to run whenever you want and point it to the .bat file you just created.

Robocopy comes already installed on Vista and Windows7, You will need to download it for XP.

This link will also explain more : http://ss64.com/nt/robocopy.html

[Technical Ben]

Ohhh. So robocopy is part of windows? Never realised. I still use the default Win 7 backup service.

[psp83]

Ohhh. So robocopy is part of windows? Never realised. I still use the default Win 7 backup service.

Yeah, It never used to be though.

I've tried several backup programs in the past and find this the best one once you get used to it & finding/setting the options you need.

The one I pasted above is just a simple mirror copy & will only copy files that have been changed after the first run.

If you delete a file from the _source it will get deleted from the backup, but you can change that with the different options from the link I pasted.

[armadillo]

So has anyone successfully used Robocopy, Easeus, Odin or Windows 7 native backup/restore to restore a corrupted, suspect, non-booting or blue-screening Windows OS from the backup?

I ask because many backup solutions look great until you actually try to restore your OS from them.

I appreciate Baz's need to find an alternative to Acronis, which he is having problems with. I have restored my OS (XP) between 50 and 100 times using Acronis.

[Glenn]

I use Windows Home Server and have successfully restored the laptop back to a working condition without any problems.

[armadillo]

Is that with Odin, Glenn?

[Glenn]

No, that's just something I found last week. WHS backs up my PC's over night, so there is always a current backup, I also keep the original build backup too.

[Baz]

So has anyone successfully used Robocopy, Easeus, Odin or Windows 7 native backup/restore to restore a corrupted, suspect, non-booting or blue-screening Windows OS from the backup?

I ask because many backup solutions look great until you actually try to restore your OS from them.

I appreciate Baz's need to find an alternative to Acronis, which he is having problems with. I have restored my OS (XP) between 50 and 100 times using Acronis.

havent done a restore yet Armadillo but success with full back up,tested and verified, and 1 incremental and it worked very easily.straightforward to use.Made a boot disc too which I also tried and works fine,this is where my Acronis was giving me grief.

Hope I dont get the need to have to do a restore so may never be able to tell you  


I dont really want to give up on Acronis but having found this I may just leave TI for a while.

Again, many thanks for your superb help Armadillo,if you have any more ideas or I crack the problem I will let you know  

[armadillo]

No, that's just something I found last week. WHS backs up my PC's over night, so there is always a current backup, I also keep the original build backup too.

So have you done just one restore with WHS or more than that? I have not heard of WHS. Link?

[Glenn]

I've used it several times.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/windowshomeserver/default.mspx

[Steve]

I've used it many times over the last few years on several Windows machines and it's been very reliable, plus the server and OS has many other uses.


http://www.wegotserved.com/

http://www.idnetters.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,9530.0.html

[armadillo]

I dont really want to give up on Acronis but having found this I may just leave TI for a while.

By "this" do you mean Easeus?

Again, many thanks for your superb help Armadillo,if you have any more ideas or I crack the problem I will let you know  

Thanks. It bugs me that I did not come up with the final solution. Alas, I think it is one that only the Acronis developers can solve.

[armadillo]

Thanks for the links Glenn and Steve. Glenn, I am not always quick on the uptake. I had not realised that Windows Home Server and WHS were the same thing 

The system requirements given mention 2GB RAM and only NTFS supported. I assume that means for the machine on which WHS is installed, rather than a restriction on the machines it can back up.

Looks like a fairly complex and costly solution for backup if you do not want to access data from more than one PC and do not want to access it over the internet and do not want a mail server, i.e. if you only want backup and restore.

But it looks like a comprehensive solution for anyone who does want all those features.

When I build a system, the first thing I check is the recovery software. Hence, I did at least 20 restores from Acronis backups before making my system live. And I did upwards of 40 during my time as a beta tester for Kaspersky AV, which used to blue-screen nearly daily. At the end of beta testing, I restored to before I originally installed Kaspersky AV.

I have been a bit remiss in not testing restore on my laptop. But since I keep no data at all on it and only minimal software, I have nothing to lose by waiting until I need to restore for real.

[D-Dan]

As mentioned in another thread, for full disk (or full partition) backup I find clonezilla hard to beat. It's fast both on backup and restore, can backup over a network, restored systems have always worked for me (I'm something of a tinkerer and eventually tinker my OS to death, leading to the need to restore a backup) and it's free

What more can you want?

Steve

[Baz]

By "this" do you mean Easeus?

Thanks. It bugs me that I did not come up with the final solution. Alas, I think it is one that only the Acronis developers can solve.

Yes I mean Easeus and credit where its due, you helped me a lot.


dont worry i'll find something else to test you with      just ask Rik i'm forever bugging him   

[Rik]