What is the best backup software?

[BobH]

Excellent definition and perfect example of the need for HIR.

Thank you, Stuart!

[BobL]

Generally, IMHO, HIR (hardware independent restore) - as Stuart pointed out - is only if you need to put an image onto a different computer than it was created from.
Most users (myself included) will usually restore images if: 1. we messed up our OS or 2: if our hard drive fails. Neither of which would require HIR to restore an image.
You mileage may vary, but I don't have, nor do I want HIR at this time.

[StuartR]

I got the HIR package as a freebie from Acronis but I've never had the need to use it

[BobH]

I downloaded and installed the 30-day trial of Shadow Protect Desktop. I then told it to backup my 2 internal hard drives to the newly installed external USB 3.0 HDD. To my surprise, it did so without hesitation or complaint. It has been my experience that trial software generally has been functionally altered to prevent it doing any output. This might just make my decision for me.

I'm still wading my way through the wiki on Shadow Protect. There is much I need to learn about images and incremental backups. I go back to the days when you just made copies of everything except the OS and reinstalled it when it got cranky.

Can anyone point me to a good wiki or article on data protection generally and more specifically on imaging a system and backing up data and OS?

in advance!

[Teunis]

For the Shadow Protect Recovery Environment (when you need to restore e.g. the boot partition) to work with USB3.0 you may have to load additional drivers. So, if want to restore from an external USB3.0 drive (USB 2.0 is always recognised) and the external USB 3.0 drive is not shown in the list, try the additional driver as indicated in the Recovery Environment menu. It may work. Don't forget to refresh the drives list. It did in my case where I have a Renesas smartcard driven external USB3.0 drive connected to my laptop, with Shadow Protect 5.02.

Regards, Teunis

[westerneagle]

I'll throw my 2 cents in....

I have been using SyncBack (Free version) for years.....very simple back up for files.

[jmt356]

Will the restore work before I install the drivers for the new motherboard, graphics card and hard drive? If not, how will I be able to boot up?

[BobL]

If you are referring to Mike J's reply for Syncback, that is a backup program for files, not an imaging program - so your computer would need to already be booted up.

[StuartR]

If you're asking about HIR, then it manages the essential drivers in a similar way to a clean install of Windows. The correct drivers are usually available from the Operating System but you may be prompted to provide them on removable media.

[BobH]

I have spent much time poring over the Shadow Protect documentation. This seems to be very powerful and flexible software, and as such appears to have a steep learning curve. I like the user interface far better than anything I ever saw in Acronis, but I would like to see a much simpler subset of the documentation that would give a dimwit like me a simple step by step procedure for doing a weekly full image backup with hourly incremental backups. There are so many features and they seem to be powerful enough to handle almost any backup situation imaginable.

If anyone here is using the desktop version and would care to share how they implemented it and use it, I would very grateful for any advice.

in advance!

[BobL]

Basic, but what I do here with Shadow Protect is use the schedule feature.
Full back on Sunday AM 7:45
Incrementals Monday through Saturday at 7:15 AM.
Keep 3 sets
and the rest are default settings.
I have the images placed on an external drive - all I need to do is make certain that drive is plugged in otherwise

Works flawlessly, and with the annual maintenance ($17.00) the initial purchase is the biggest punch in the jaw.
Hope that helps.

[Bigaldoc]

... If anyone here is using the desktop version and would care to share how they implemented it and use it, I would very grateful for any advice.

In addition to what BobL said, I initially started by using the Wizard and checking each step along the way before I "finalized" my backup job.

[BobH]

Basic, but what I do here with Shadow Protect is use the schedule feature.
Full back on Sunday AM 7:45
Incrementals Monday through Saturday at 7:15 AM.
Keep 3 sets
and the rest are default settings.
I have the images placed on an external drive - all I need to do is make certain that drive is plugged in otherwise

Works flawlessly, and with the annual maintenance ($17.00) the initial purchase is the biggest punch in the jaw.
Hope that helps.

Thanks, BobL!

Have you ever had to use it to restore your system?

Have you ever used the features that allow you to mount the image and select particular files?

I have a 1.5TB externally connected Western Digital HDD using USB 3.0 which seems to be very acceptably speedy. Mine is a single user desktop with far more horsepower than I am ever likely to use, but I have had more unrecoverable crashes than I care to admit. Acronis just would not work for me. I don't know if I was the problem or it was, but I'm determined to keep a good series of backups for this system. Of course, restoring to an HDD means that there is a risk of the drive failing; so I plan to make periodic backups - maybe monthly - on DVDs. I know that Shadow Protect will do this, but the documentation is a bit daunting in that I must learn many things in order to use it.

I sure wish the publishers would write a more user friendly document. The one I read documents the system beautifully for a technician who routinely deals with all the issues addressed, but it is a bit of an overload for this old man.

Thank you for the response!

[BobH]

... If anyone here is using the desktop version and would care to share how they implemented it and use it, I would very grateful for any advice.

In addition to what BobL said, I initially started by using the Wizard and checking each step along the way before I "finalized" my backup job.

Thanks Big Al!

Have you ever had to restore from an image? Ever made CD/DVD/BRD backups?

[PaulB]

Bob, I found the ShadowProtect documentation a bit overly technical myself. However, using the Wizards makes the job quite easy. I have recovered many individual files and folders using the restore wizard. I have not yet needed (fingers crossed) to do a complete system disk restore using the recovery CD. (You may not either as I don't think the trial package includes the recovery disk download.)

I backup everything in all partitions weekly (as described above) and do hourly incrementals. The size of the weekly backups is approximately 160 GB at standard compression. Your backups should be quite fast using a USB 3 disk. I would never consider using Cds or DVDs for backups. I use an extra external HDD for this. I believe Al alternates on a weekly basis between two separate external HDDs. This is a very good practice.

[BobH]

Bob, I found the ShadowProtect documentation a bit overly technical myself. However, using the Wizards makes the job quite easy. I have recovered many individual files and folders using the restore wizard. I have not yet needed (fingers crossed) to do a complete system disk restore using the recovery CD. (You may not either as I don't think the trial package includes the recovery disk download.)

I backup everything in all partitions weekly (as described above) and do hourly incrementals. The size of the weekly backups is approximately 160 GB at standard compression. Your backups should be quite fast using a USB 3 disk. I would never consider using Cds or DVDs for backups. I use an extra external HDD for this. I believe Al alternates on a weekly basis between two separate external HDDs. This is a very good practice.

Thanks, Paul!

I've tried to wring out the trial version but have run into some password problems. They are probably a function of trial code or maybe the phat phingers of an old poor typist.

The suggestion to use multiple external HDDs and to alternate among them spreads the risk but if household current causes the problem and fries your battery backup and surge protection (it's happened to me), one might lose all the HDDs. That is the only reason that I would consider making a monthly optical disk backup.

Again, thanks for the response.

[BobL]

Sure did (restore my system w/ShadowProtect). Used the ISO brunt on a DVD to boot my system and used my external drive's image file to restore from. A few harry moments along the way but shadowprotect did do a full restore and my system reboot merrily to my desktop.
I've found that burning on DVD's was too slow and prone to errors (my images run a total of about 54 gigs so that would be what 9 dvd's?). I'd stick to the external - I usually keep that external unplugged and use it strictly for images so it's like is much more likely to longer than my laptop that gets used daily).
I've also 'mounted' my image and drag/dropped individual files from the image onto my desktop for single file retrieval - very straightforward and direct.
Hope this helps.