Back up advice

Discussion in 'backup, imaging & disk mgmt' started by Longboard, Mar 10, 2006.

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  1. Longboard

    Longboard Registered Member

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    OK

    Have had 2 lucky escapes:

    one after HD failure; was able to restore with Ghost7 whih still seems to be the "ghosties" fave

    one after recent software snafu and was able to restore registry with ERUNT

    NOW have to have better strategy for back-up

    Have narrowed it down to

    Ghost 7 or 9
    First Defence
    Drive snapshot http://www.drivesnapshot.de/en/index.htm
    TeraByte http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/utilities.html
    Bounceback http://www.cmsproducts.com/product_bounceback_software.htm

    The previous Dantz Retospect
    http://www.emcinsignia.com/products/homeandoffice/retroforwin/

    there are a couple of others Nova store and activedisc

    I want to save an image/backup to external USB harddrive and second partition on current drive (plenty of space) on desktop.

    ( have finally decided that must have second box that will never be connected to internet for keeping work related stuff :ouch: more $, and double the maintenance and failure possibilities))

    Ideally want option to boot from from USB drives or happy to boot from floppy but that option seems to be dissappearing from many laptops therefore probably need CD boot as well

    Any suggestions,
    thanks

    ps IF you dont have it GET ERUNT !! http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
     
  2. dog

    dog Guest

    I don't want to seem like a homer ... but Acronis TI8 has never let me down. Quick imaging and restore, I've never had a problem with it at all. It's what I'd recommend.

    I know Nick S uses TeraByte's solution, and I think he'd swear by it too. I'd say you couldn't go wrong with either one. ;)

    BTW - There'd be no need for erunt with a proper imaging solution and strategy
     
  3. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    First Defense is an excellent disaster recovery program, but won't protect you from a hard disk failure.

    I tried Bounceback and it trashed First Defense. I would recommend Acronis True Image(if you don't try to get fancy with it) Terabytes Image for Windows. I also had good luck with Retrospect althought it's slow and it's disaster recovery is a bit confused.

    Pete
     
  4. Rico

    Rico Registered Member

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    Hi Longboard, Dog, Pete:

    I have to second Dog's choice of Acronis True Image. I started with version 8, & a full backup, now my increments are with version 9. No problems, & very simple to use. I've tried BackUpMyPC too complicated, & tried Dantz Retrospect (came with my WD external HD) the one button function, never worked. Also Longboard see, product review at:

    http://www.dozleng.com/updates/index.php?pg=coulabs

    Take care
    rico
     
  5. ErikAlbert

    ErikAlbert Registered Member

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    Right. That's why I'm going to take care of a real image backup system first.
    Both internal harddisks on an external harddisk, is IMO the safest way.
    I would hate to use DVD/CD's for this.
    I also use PAPER as backup system for things, I can't afford to lose.
    Paper doesn't have any technical failures.

    What I will use as a disaster recovery program is still a questionmark.
    Depends on how fast my image backup/restore works and how fast products like FD-ISR, Rollback, ... will work and having several snapshots has also its own advantages.
     
  6. pvsurfer

    pvsurfer Registered Member

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    As you can see from my sig below, I use Acronis True Image at home and Retrospect at work. With a few caveats, they are both excellent and reliable. Both will also create a disaster recovery CD - in the event your HDD won't boot.

    True Image is simply excellent for backup to and recovery from HDDs. It does not natively support optical disks, so if you ever want to back up to DVD, look elsewhere (like NTI Drive Backup or Terabyte's IFW).

    Retrospect Professional (being a file-by-file process) is much slower than an imaging process, but other than that (and perhaps its higher cost), it is extremely reliable for recovering individual files/folders as well as for disaster recovery. Btw, the version of Retrospect that Rico referred to is the light/express version of Retrospect and not to be confused with the professional version.

    Imho, the 'instant recovery' types of programs can be very convenient and will bail you out of lots of problems, but you should not use them in place of a 'true backup program' (such as ATI or Retrospect). And be sure to create your backups on an external source!

    ~pv
     
  7. Antarctica

    Antarctica Registered Member

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    Image for Windows from TeraByte has been doing great for me last year. It is also very "friendly user".:)
     
  8. Howard Kaikow

    Howard Kaikow Registered Member

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    Symantec is releasing Norton Save and Restore this month.
    Looks like it's targeted to be an Acronis True Image 9 killer.

    Need at least Windoze XP to install, won't work with Windows 2000.
     
  9. Longboard

    Longboard Registered Member

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    Thanks for advice lads :)

    Will let you know how I get on
     
  10. Howard Kaikow

    Howard Kaikow Registered Member

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    Ayup, Retrospect is very good.

    I had been using vesion 6.5 since June 2003, but had to stop last month because it is misbehaving since I reformatted my drives as NTFS. No rational explanation.

    When I get another computer, I might consider a more recent version of Retrospect.

    Other than REtrospect suddenly not working correctly when I switched to NTFS, I would still have a problem with:

    1. The default compression selectors in REtrospect 6.5 were not very good. Using the Norma compression settting wit TRue Image 9, TI compressed 24% morethan REtrospect on one backup set.

    2. Open files are not backed up with Rerospect 6.5. YOu needed an additional license for a version that would back uo open files. I believethat this has improved with the newer versions, but I'm not sure.

    3. REtrospect is slow. Currently, I have about 35GB of used files. A backup and compare takes 11.5-12 hours. Both GHost 10 and Acronis TI 9 do it in a bit less than 3 hours. Note that Retrospect does an actual comparre of th efiles backed up. GHost and TI just do a checksum test to verify the integrity of the backup.

    I curious to see whther Symantec (not my favorite company) did things right with the soon to be released Norton Save and Restore (obviously targeted to kill TI). SAve and REstore requires Windoze XP.
     
  11. huntnyc

    huntnyc Registered Member

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    In terms of interface and range of features, it is hard to beat True Image 9. However, in falls somewhat short regarding reliably executing these features. Also, USB 2.0 compatability is lacking along with native DVD support.

    On the other hand Image for Windows lacks built-in features but is utterly reliable, has great speed, excellent USB 2.0 compatability for external HDDs, native DVD support that allows you to write bootable restore disks and its DOS based boot CD is speedy to load and use to restore system images.

    Hope this helps.

    Gary
     
  12. bigc73542

    bigc73542 Retired Moderator

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    Personally I have tried most of the back up apps and I have settled down with Ghost 9 and First Defense ISR. I have never had either one let me down. Some of the others I have tried are really buggy.
     
  13. Howard Kaikow

    Howard Kaikow Registered Member

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    Reply.Start

    Ramble.Mode= True

    Most folkes want to adopt a strategy such as the following:

    1. Backup to external drive, alternating among drives to have more than 1 backup set so all is not lost if an external drive fails.

    2. Many folkes require proper incremental backup, i.e., being able to have an incremental/differential backup to a given backup set independently of any other backup set. Both Retrospect and True Image 9 satisfy this requirement. Ghost 10 does NOT because of the way Ghost 10 implemented incremental backups. Maybe the. new Norton Save and Restore got it right, dunno yet.

    3. A backup is a snapshot of the drives at a point in time. Obviously, if files are open, and changes are being made, ALL backups are obsolete the moment they are done.

    Folkes get all hot and bothered about being able to back up "Open files", and indeed they should to a point. A backup should provide for backing up the current state of a file, even if it is open. Of course, by the time the backup has complete things will have changed, but that's life, it's very unfair! Hysterically, ooops, I mean historically, not ALL backup programs have handled "open files".

    4. A backup program MUST be able to RECOVER just the files and directories, without necessarily replicating the drive/partition/MBR/etc. info.

    5. I've never much cared about "image" backup. Most folkes just need "files and directories" to be backed up. However, no reason to not get a program that does both. I guess that's one reason for the birth of Norton Save and Restore. it will be a war between Norton Save and Restore and Acronis TRue Imagefor market share.

    Image backup and recovery does run a lot faster than a files and directories backup and recovery, but beware of the difference between the two.

    Ramble.Mode= False

    Reply.Exit
     
  14. pvsurfer

    pvsurfer Registered Member

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    Howard:

    Re your Retrospect comments, you are probably aware that v6.5 is about 2 years old (the current version is now v7.5). The v6.5 problems you have alluded to have been since remedied (for the most part). From my perspective, the biggest problem with Retrospect (a highly priced program to start with) is the company's upgrade policy. We expected to pay an upgrade fee when we went from v6.5 to v7.0, but now in order for us to upgrade from v7.0 to v7.5 EMC/Dantz wants us to caugh-up another upgrade fee! ....that stinks! :eek:
     
  15. LockBox

    LockBox Registered Member

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    Howard, I don't know about other imaging programs, but I use Powerquest Drive Image 8 and you can restore a single file/folder by using the "Image Explore" feature, which looks exactly like Windows Explorer. Very simple. You don't have to restore the whole image.
     
  16. Howard Kaikow

    Howard Kaikow Registered Member

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    No way to tell, without getting the later versions.
    Unless you have seen my posting in Retrospect forums, there's no way to assure that you know of the problems. I'm not going to raise them here.


    If you think that's bad, check the early 2003 postings in the Retrospect forum.

    I instigated a revolution that pushed Dantz to finally give in and have an upgrade price for "competitive" upgrades. They never had that before 6.5. I'm sure that I was not the first to raise the issue, but overcoming my obvious shyness, I hammered it home! Initially, the "competitive" upgrade was available only directly from Dantz, not sure how this is done for newer versions.

    Actually, Acronis also needs some lessons in marketing, they really need to more aggressively price (especially with the soon to be released Norton Save and Restore aimed squarely at TI) and they need to make the latest version of the product more widely available. I purchased it only because I was in a bargain hunting mood one day and found for it $29.99(USA), no shipping charge, at NewEgg.

    Acronis needs to quickly try to eliminate the problems that still get reported with version 9, as build 2323 really has worsened their reputation, then they also have to price aggressively.

    I got Ghost 10 for $0 AFTER rebates.
    Symantec tends to aggessively price and offer rebates.
    I would expect that Norton Save and Restore will be available very cheaply over the next year if one keeps their eyes open.
     
  17. Howard Kaikow

    Howard Kaikow Registered Member

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    Ditto for Ghost 10 and True Image 9.
     
  18. Longboard

    Longboard Registered Member

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    Thanks guys: this is providing some good comments for me. :)
    Seems like there are several good options.
    Which do you think provides best support?

    Do I understand correctly that ATI does not support Optical drives and/or USB?

    What are you doing for storage?

    I dont want to over complicate this with multiple hard drives and (correct me if I've got this wrong) but shouldnt my back-up images, or at least one) be on an "outside" drive?

    Thanks
     
  19. MerleOne

    MerleOne Registered Member

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    ATI supports natively only CD, not DVD, but you can create image files then burn them on a DVD with a nero-like tool. Restore is though a bit more complicated in that latter case.

    ATI supports rather well all USB HDD drives and CD/DVD, even in recovery mode.

    If you want direct DVD burning of the images, Terabyteunlimited solutions are really great, but you cannot encrypt images for the moment, and no incremental backups are available. Single file restore is also quite slow.

    Backing up on outside drive is in principle better : if you power supply fries and takes out with itself all your HDD (this *can* happen), you'll regret not having done backup storage on external media, either optical/removable or HDD.

    I personnally use both ATI and Terabytes : I burn ATI images on DVD afterwards, when they fill my HDD backup partition, and I keep a rather current image of my data & system with Terabyteunlimited on a rotating set of DVD+RW.

    Just my 0,02$

    .merle1.

     
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