Recommended Backup software

Hi! I've been using Acronis True Image for several years but now I've gotten fed up with it. I have an external USB WD MyBook drive that I use for backups which I've only had a few months. Acronis True Image ver. 10 boot cd will not recognize it. I refuse to purchase another version of this software. I'm tired of it!!!!! I have tried building the Bart Pe Disk and it doesn't recognize it either but if Windows is working, Acronis sees it then. I am tired of fooling with this mess. Is there any backup software out there that will work with my external drive? What good is a backup if you can't use it when you need it? All suggestions are welcome.

 

See this concurrent thread. I have the same USB drive.
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=197894

 

Here's some reviews to look at. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2704,2259186,00.asp

 

RAD, I read the threads you suggested. Did you finally get the Paragon boot cd to recognize your My Book external drive? From everything I've been reading about this program, there were people having the same problem with their USB external drives as I've been having with Acronis. That is my fear. I don't want to purchase another program and then find out it doesn't work any better than the piece of junk that Acronis is. And, from everything I've read, it sounds like the trial version does not support external USB drives when you try to make a boot cd from it. I have read some threads about people trying the trial version and had made the boot cd using it but when they tried it and booted with it, their usb external drive would not show up. This makes me feel like "why bother if I'm not going to be any better off". I don't want to pay out money for nothing. Thanks for your help!

 

As posted in the parallel thread, did a reboot last night to verify that the Paragon Recovery CD DOES SEE MY USB DRIVE.
I never had any problem with it; I just did it again because I couldn't really remember if I had truly tried it.

I can't comment right now on the trial version, because I went ahead and bought the full version. I can't remember if the trial version had trouble seeing USB drives. But I can verify that the full version sees it.

Actually, the trial version and full version of the software are the same. But with the full version you get a downloadable ISO image of the recovery disk. The ISO image might have more drivers that help see the USB drives.

Worst case scenario: It doesn't see USB drives.
But you can also save bootable images direct to DVD, so although it may be convenient to save images to USB drives, if you just save one image to DVD, it can restore your system to a state where windows is running, and you can THEN restore the USB image. (That is something I have done, because, like you, I became extremely paranoid after Acronis failures. So I now have multiple backup scenarios invisioned.)

But the provided ISO image does see USB drives; so that scenario is only if I happen to break or lose my multiple copies of the Recovery disk.
Extremely unlikely. D

Restoring an image with Paragon takes something like 30 min to an hour on my 230 GB Hard Drive. So it is not something you want to do all the time. But it is also short enough and reliable enough that I have done it quite frequently now when I try some software that ends up being "buggy" or something. I just create an image before installing the trial software, and restore that image if the software doesn't seem to uninstall smoothly.

 

Hi Rad,
if paragon has problems seeing usb drives you can always do what i did and request paragon create you a vistape recovery cd.
works great here and i use it alot.
and you can load drivers once its lanched.

 

Mine doesn't have a problem; but I do note that paragon's support staff seems willing to actually listen and understand what I say, and always answers my questions competently within a day. Not like the automated form emails that some companies keep spewing out. Those companies will remain nameless. :wink:

 

One interesting note:
I actually live within about a mile of the Storagecraft (Shadowprotect) Home Office in Draper, Utah, USA.
I really wanted to give them a try, so I could support a local company. But their website is (or at least used to be) very vague about VISTA support, and their free trial version seems like they are trying to discourage home-users. I got the impression that they are really only interested in corporate accounts. So I wondered how seriously their support staff would take a home user. They scared me away, so I never tried it.

Maybe they are great; I am just pointing out that their website and information materials are sadly lacking if they are trying to build individual user business. Anyway, since we Americans believe in supporting whomever really acts like they are trying to satisfy the needs of the customer, I ended up trying and buying Paragon from about half the globe away ! :d

 

My problem with my external WD MyBook drive is it didn't come with any accessible drivers. There is no cd and you can't download them from their web site. This drive is literally a plug and play drive. So would it do any good for Paragon to create me a recovery cd? I'm using Windows XP Professional, would this make any difference? Thanks everyone for your time and suggestions!

 

Well I dont know what so vague about this on their page describing SP desktop?:

My impression is too that they dont encourage home users. Maybe they want to keep the most "noobish" users away There is less work with more computer savvy people I guess. I dont know, but as a home user I can not complain about their support. Whenever I have had a problem they have patiently helped me.

 

Hello Chattycathy,
1.are you saying that the standard paragon recovery cd doeent see your external WD mybook?
2.or are you saying that the installed windows version of paragon doesnt see your external WD mybook drive?

once that is answered im sure i can help
lodore

 

lodore, I'm sorry I didn't make myself clear. To be honest, I haven't tried Paragon yet. I have downloaded it but not installed it. I'm still trying to gather information before I do anything including trying the trial versions. I guess you could say, I'm doing my homework first. What I meant in my previous response was, "IF" I wanted to make a recovery cd to restore from a backup on my WD USB MyBook and if it required drivers, then I couldn't because the typical user can not access the drivers for this drive. If we can, I haven't found them yet. Someone had said earlier:

so I was explaining how and why that would not work for me because of the lack of drivers or lack of access to drivers. From what I understand, which may be incorrect, Paragon will not make a recovery cd from the trial version that will access external USB drives. I don't want to fork out money and THEN find out it still won't access my external drive because if that happened, I may as well stay with Acronis. I know $29 isn't much but it can add up fast if you keep purchasing and taking a company's word that it will work with USB external drives and then find out it doesn't. I hope I've answered your questions and thank you for your time.

 

Hi chattycathy, paragon offers a 30 day refund if not satisfied.Hope this helps.

http://kb.paragon-software.com/paragon/include/templ/object2.jsp?catId=2124&objId=2500&statId=1038083&foLang=en

 

ShadowProtect has supported Vista for a while now. You can always try it out for free, so you have little to lose. That warning, that ShadowProtect is an Enterprise product, probably is there to scare away absolute novice users (I don't know this for sure - I'm only speculating) because such users are so needy (support-wise) that you end up losing money when you sell product to them.

 

LOL what ? who ? needy ? you talking about all that patient support for that damn sukarof or pete always trying to break it with some wierd Noo Yark software set-up with some obscure RAID or video driver

That's nuttin: you should see what dopey Q's I make to Terabyte. lol

 

Well, Sukarof and Pete aren't exactly novice users... Real notice users often take *hours* of time on the phone just to walk through the most basic tasks.