HI Folks

What's your recommendation for backup software.?

WinXP small / home network - backing up to (ideally) a hard drive in one 
of the pcs plus a usb-connected hard drive...

Don't mind paying for some decent, reliable software...

Thanks in advance
Adrian

In article , Adrian says...
> HI Folks
> 
> What's your recommendation for backup software.?
> 
> WinXP small / home network - backing up to (ideally) a hard drive in one 
> of the pcs plus a usb-connected hard drive...
> 
> Don't mind paying for some decent, reliable software...
> 
Acronis..

-- 
Conor

I only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't 
looking good either. - Scott Adams

On 03/07/2008 in message  Adrian wrote:

>HI Folks
>
>What's your recommendation for backup software.?
>
>WinXP small / home network - backing up to (ideally) a hard drive in one 
>of the pcs plus a usb-connected hard drive...
>
>Don't mind paying for some decent, reliable software...

I use SyncBackSE over a network, see:
http://www.2brightsparks.com/

I have been running it on a schedule overnight for several years and it 
has never let me down. It does local backups as well.

-- 
Jeff Gaines Damerham Hampshire UK
It may be that your sole purpose in life is to serve as a warning to others.

Bitstring , from the wonderful 
person Jeff Gaines  said
>On 03/07/2008 in message  Adrian wrote:
>
>>HI Folks
>>
>>What's your recommendation for backup software.?
>>
>>WinXP small / home network - backing up to (ideally) a hard drive in 
>>one of the pcs plus a usb-connected hard drive...
>>
>>Don't mind paying for some decent, reliable software...
>
>I use SyncBackSE over a network, see:
>http://www.2brightsparks.com/
>
>I have been running it on a schedule overnight for several years and it 
>has never let me down. It does local backups as well.

I use Second Copy (still using SC2000, as it happens) with much the same 
effect, but we are talking critical data backups here, not 'bootable 
system image'. I don't see much point in the latter, since any failure 
other than just a HDD is going to leave you needing a new configuration 
anyway.

Apart from simple backups, I like to keep N archive versions, just in 
case I need the one I deleted last week, or the one that was incorrectly 
updated on Tuesday, or whatever. A straight volume copy isn't much help 
for those.

-- 
GSV   Three Minds in a Can
12,169 Km walked. 2,402 Km PROWs surveyed. 43.4% complete.

Adrian wrote:
> What's your recommendation for backup software.?
> 
> WinXP small / home network - backing up to (ideally) a hard drive in one 
> of the pcs plus a usb-connected hard drive...
> 
> Don't mind paying for some decent, reliable software...

For file-level backup, I use rsync, which can be used standalone to 
backup files to a local or network drive, or as a client/server system.

As a client/server system, there are additional benefits including the 
ability to transfer only changed parts of files, compress the data being 
transferred (the data are uncompressed at the other end), and use an 
encrypted channel (secure shell).

Finally, it's free. There is however a downside: rsync is originally a 
Unix tool; like most such tools, it is configured by a hand-crafted text 
file and command-line options - no GUI. It doesn't understand some 
filesystem features peculiar to NTFS (eg ACLs and multiple file 
streams), but this is not likely to be an issue for your intended use.

A Windows-friendly option is DeltaCopy, which is basically an rsync 
wrapper: http://www.aboutmyip.com/AboutMyXApp/DeltaCopy.jsp (note that I 
have not used this).

On Windows, I use cwRsync: http://itefix.no/cwrsync/

Alex