I have been backing up my hard drives to an external drive manually, and it takes forever, because it will overwrite all, but it will not skip all that are already there, so it takes hours to overwrite the already backed-up ones. I'm looking for a program that will backup only the files that aren't there or are newer. Now that's probably a common feature to backup programs, but I really don't have any currently - if you know of one, especially free one, please make a recommendation, and THANKS!
Suggestions for intelligent backup
(3 posts) (3 voices)-
promytius1
MemberPosted 12 years ago # -
ChrisS
AdministratorThere was a post earlier this week about Gizmo's "Probably the Best Free Security List in the World" which, contrary to what one might initially think, is about computer and data security. Section 20 of the list deals with data backup. The versions of Fbackup, Comodo Backup and Cobian backup that I've used in the past will do what you want and I suspect that the current versions will do the same.
FWIW, I've found it much faster to image my drives on a routine basis, and after any major software changes, and have Karen's Replicator monitor my Data Directories to capture daily changes. But I rarely install new software and my data changes often so while my system works for me it may not for you.
Posted 12 years ago # -
mikiem2
ModeratorI have been backing up my hard drives to an external drive manually, and it takes forever, because it will overwrite all, but it will not skip all that are already there...
To answer your question directly Paragon Backup software can do incremental backups [which I think is what you're asking for], & do it on a schedule, on demand, running in the background while you do something else etc... However you also complain about the time it takes, & incremental backups are slower, not faster to perform.
First off a big part of your problem *may* be how you're putting the backups on an external drive... USB 2 speeds can be almost intolerable & made worse by anti-malware apps -- some PCs/laptops & external housings/docks are also better than others when it comes to USB transfer speeds. Use USB 3 or eSATA. You can buy docks with both eSATA & USB 2 in the $13-$20 range & up, while drive housings or cases with the same connections can be found starting in the $20-$30 range. USB 3 docks & housings go for about the same prices, but you may have to spend $12-$20 on a USB 3 card if you don't already have USB 3 -- many PCs/laptops already come with eSATA, & if not, for PCs at least there are cable adapters for around $3-$4 that add an eSATA connection at the back of the case & plug into either a regular SATA port or a designated eSATA port on the motherboard. The eSATA gotchas are you usually can't hot plug/unplug but have to turn the system off 1st, and many systems have problems with external drives over 1 TB -- otherwise it's the same as if the drive was plugged in internally. Read reviews on docks you consider buying as several have reports of switch failures. With a dock the drives are open to the air rather than enclosed so heat is less a concern than with those housings that don't have built-in fans, but drives are for the most part unprotected -- places like meritline.com offer simple cases for a few dollars to help protect drives that aren't plugged in & in use. As far as drives go, I just bought a Seagate 1 TB green drive for $40 shipped. BTW, buying the hdd separately rather than pre-packaged in a drive housing may give you a better drive warranty for the same or less total cost.
That said, a lot of times I think people use external drives when they don't have to, when they have no need to move that drive from system to system, from 1 room or building to another room or building. Keeping or putting that drive in your PC's case eliminates those sorts of connection issues, & no one's going to accidentally drop that drive, or touch it when they've got a strong static charge built up. And there is an alternative for about the same price as an external drive -- Blu-Ray. I've seen Blu-Ray burners go for as low as $75 on sale, & 4x, 25 GB blank discs start at about $1 each -- you also have the advantage that you can easily store 1 or more backup discs off-site, in a P.O. box if nothing else. Assuming your backup's already written to files on an internal drive, it takes me a bit under 1/2 an hour to burn a Blu-Ray disc. Redundancy is cool -- the more places you store your backups, the greater the odds that every copy can become lost or damaged... I like to hang onto older drives [ones that were replaced with newer/bigger, even if they were replaced because they were old & no longer trusted] and keep them in the PC case just for a local backup copy. Then I copy that backup to an external drive, & every so often burn to disc as well. Hanging onto old backups is also cool... just a couple of examples: 1) a poorly written Windows Installer setup file can break Windows Installer in your copy of Windows, you won't know that anything's broken until you try to install another app that uses Windows Installer, & that might be over a month later. Repair is not always possible. 2) the best written mal-ware does a very good job of remaining hidden, so it might be quite a long time before you find out you've been infected. In those sorts of situations a months old backup can still be better than a complete wipe all the disks & reinstall routine.
With that hardware part out of the way then, for software I haven't found a better choice than Paragon. Acronis works well, & drive makers like Seagate give away limited versions, but I've had problems with the drivers it installs -- I used it to clone the main drive in my wife's PC [with that $40 drive I mentioned earlier], & after uninstalling once that was completed, I had to go through the registry to turn those drivers off & then after a restart delete them... because those registry entries were protected it was a PITA, but they slowed Windows' start time *Very* noticeably. [I used that Acronis app for the clone because I already had it installed to check the old drive.] Some folks like EASEUS' backup app, but it won't run portably to restore a system backup after booting into something like LiveXP [similar to WinPE but IMHO better] on a USB stick or CD. Paragon will.
Paragon backup apps can backup your drives/partitions a few ways, but I prefer a straightforward partition image backup. It works with raw data on the drive so it's faster -- when you start dealing with files/folders things slow down dramatically... that's why I won't use an incremental backup, even though Paragon's apps support that method, because to compare archived & live file versions you have to deal with individual files & that makes things Much slower. Paragon's backup apps can also backup the 1st track of your boot drive [you have to use the wizard to get that option], which has saved me more than once. What I think is the worst mal-ware out there also infects that 1st track, so a known good Paragon backup *might* be the only way to avoid re-installing Windows if infected. Not having access to individual files in a disk/partition image backup used to be pretty big negative, but Paragon apps can mount backup archives the same way you'd mount a ISO file or virtual disk, & then you can just copy/paste whatever files in Windows Explorer -- later versions of Paragon's apps do this really well.
As far as speed goes, Paragon has 2 methods of backup -- their traditional drive/partition backup routine & their system backup, which backs up in the background while you're doing whatever else you want to do. Working in the background is much slower, but if you're doing something else that doesn't matter. Their regular backup routine takes me roughly 1/2 an hour for ~50-60 GB worth of files/folders using a 2nd internal drive for the archive destination. Note that their latest version 11 can take longer if you have all the safety features turned on [in case of power failure etc.], & I have found that virtual disks don't compress well [actually they compress well in terms of file size, but that compression process takes a Very long time], whether you're using a backup app or simply something like 7-Zip... to back up virtual disks I simply copy them somewhere else, & I delete them from the partition before backing that partition up. Also FWIW, I multi-boot into XP Pro, win7, & win8 on this rig, & have found Paragon Backup archives are smaller if I back up the partitions while running XP Pro -- I've found this on other multi-boot PCs as well. When you're backing up don't forget about Windows' file Shadow Copies -- they can take up a considerable amount of space, & if you do a disk/partition image backup they are included. I generally turn them off prior to backup to delete everything, or you can create a new, base restore point & use Windows Disk Cleanup to delete anything older than that... or of course you can just let them be included in the backup.
Posted 12 years ago #
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