Anyone have a suggestion for some good backup software... cheap or free would be good.

I want to have daily backups made from my documents on the c drive and music from one external 500 gb drive to another external 500 gb drive. I am having problems with the windows task scheduler... says access is denied or something along those lines.

I either need to figure out how to get the windows backups to work, or use something different alltogether.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

I know many of my IT friends are using Acronis

looks promising. home edition runs 49.99 so not too bad. I think I may try and figure out why the windows backup isn't working properly first tho.

Anyone else have a suggestion?

Are you running Vista or XP?

xp

robocopy is a free tool from MS if all you want is a backup copy of files. I do a robocopy from my main drive to my external one. I have a scheduled job, but I'm more likely to just click on the batch file I have on my desktop to do it manually once in a while.

BTW...it is in the resource kit here. or there is also a GUI version of an updated version of robocopy called richcopy here

Acronis seems to be the backup software of choice. My cousin has done backups of a unix system using the pc version even though this is not a supported feature.

The ability to do a bare metal restore is very nice. I have already done this once and it works very well.

If you are like me, constantly adding and removing software, then reloading your PC from scratch now and then is not always a bad thing. I usually find that I get very noticeable returns in speed increases every time I do it. Therefore I back up only my data and if my OS goes kaboom, I view it as forcing myself to do a much needed re-install anyways.

Still, this alternative view is not for everyone. Also, if I relied on my home PC for work, an instant solution would be much more valuable.

I agree Zarack, we use Robocopy often at work to migrate files from one server to another. I moved over a Terebyte one weekend.

I have a baseline backup that I know is clean that I can go back to any time. It includes the basic software I will always want.

The nice thing about a bare metal restore like this is that you don't need to worry about reinstalling driver updates and the like. It is much simpler than a complete re-install of your sytem.

If you haven't already purchased the second 500 GB hard drive, I have a Seagate Freeagent Pro external hard drive which comes with an auto backup feature that immediately backs up your hard drive as soon as anything new is created; it's really slick.

Yeah, I already got it. I really wasn't in the market for one but found the 500 gb western digital my passport for $93 and couldn't resist. I already had one which is used for music (and some tv shows)...

I am running richcopy right now and backing up my pictures on my pc and my music from my external drive right now... couldn't figure out a way to set a scheduled backup with richcopy yet (if it is even possible), but in reality I can just run it once a week or so and it should be fine.

I may try Acronis... and still haven't been able to get the windows task scheduler to work. I use to have spybot search and destroy to auto updates and then a scan every night but that isn't working now either. I changed my computer name and user name a while back and task scheduler hasn't ran since, and any new attempt to set something up with it gives either doesn't work or gives me an access/permission error.

oh well, window task scheduler sucks anyway. (sour grapes!)

Try using newmachinename\newusername in the tasks, along with the new password. That's probably what happened.

Reread my post and realized I left out the most important part.

I went through this a while ago and if you are not looking for an instant PC rebuild option and just want to backup data, this is what I ended up going with after trying many, many options. I was willing to buy something but ironically, this freeware tool had everything I needed. Usually, freeware sacrifices something for it's convenient pricing.

AceBackup

It is freeware but seems to have every feature found in commercial models. At least all the stuff I needed and then some.
- Full or incrimental backups
- compression or 'as is'
- maintains the directory structure
- multiple file versions, if desired.
- a Scheduler
- Encryption or not
- options to backup via FTP, DVD or CD


I'm probably forgetting some key features but there is probably a better list on the web sight. Easy to use and very reliable so far.

Very nice package for freeware.

I've had good luck with the free version of SyncBack. I've been using it for years and I really like it.

Do any of these PC Backups also copy over apps? I'm trying to find a backup solution for my PC. If my PC 'dies', I want to reinstall my Windows from scratch and the restore my entire environment.

Now that I think about it, I'm looking more for a ghosting package.

Tom, thanks for the SyncBack link, started using it last night, great program! Do you just backup your profile folders for each user?

Yeah, basically, that's how it started. Now, I just tell everybody in my house that they have to store their crap on a virtual server I set up for that purpose. I'm mostly just concerned about pictures, music and documents, and the first two of those absolutely have to be centralized anyway. It's a good program for not only the automated stuff, but also to do project-based data moves.

Thats what a bare metal restore does. It is a disc image.

Thanks. Fortunately, I was able to use Linux and dd my drive. Cheap but VERY dangerous if you type it wrong...and I have...TWICE.

I ended up going with ACEBackup. It has worked flawlessly everynight (set to run at 2am). It works in conjuction with the windows task scheduler which I did manage to get working.

Thanks for all of the great suggestions.