Backup Software Recommendations?

with reliable tech support

[myrrh]

I want to back up my files to ftp daily and am looking for suggestions for backup software. My main criterion is that the tech support is reliable, as I am technically challenged.

I've tried Handy Backup and NovaBackup, so I'm looking for programs other than those two.

[lammert]

Hi myrrh,

Making backups of valuable information on your computer is an important system administration task and it's good that you bring up that issue here. Too often people forget to make backups and only realize the necessity of it when it is too late.

Looking at the products you mentioned, you are probably looking for a solution to backup files from a Windows computer. There are many backup programs available, both free and paid solutions and to lead you in the right direction some extra information might help. For example, do you want to backup files on a server or desktop? only personal files or also system files? the ability to make images of your disk in case you need to do a full restore of your computer after a crash? etc.

You mentioned that you want to FTP the files to another location. Is this within the local network or over the Internet? If you backup over the Internet, you may need a solution which uses encryption over FTP, to be sure that no-one is able to look at sensitive data during the transfer.

[myrrh]

Yes, it is for Windows. Since I am likely to need to rely on support of a product, I'm not considering anything free.

The files I want to back up are personal files (as opposed to system files) and from a desktop PC.

I want to FTP over the Internet and though I haven't been too concerned with encryption, it would be nice to have that option.

Also, what exactly is an "image of a disk?" I've heard of that before, but don't understand what it is.

Thank you.

[lammert]

Making backups from personal files is relatively easy. System files sometimes have the nasty habit that they are inaccessible during backup when they are opened by the operating system.

An image of a disk is a compressed 1 to 1 copy of all the information on a hard disk. The image is stored in one large file or in a number of smaller files and you can copy that image back to a new hard disk in case your original hard disk crashes. Images are large, often several gigabytes, but their advantage over regular backups is that they contain a complete copy of all the programs, settings, data etc of the disk. With an image you can restore a fully functional system in some minutes to less than an hour. Because image files are so large they are not usable for daily backups or for transfer over the Internet to a remote host. A backup practice used by some people is therefore to make a new image only after significant changes of the disk, for example after the installation of a new program and use regular file backup schemes to store changes since that image creation.

Free doesn't always mean bad or not-supported. Some free solutions have great support of the on-line community where you can have your questions answered in minutes, rather than digging yourself through the support system of a commercial organization.

I must admit that for my own backup I still use command line FTP utilities embedded in script files. Great for the geek, but not so for the average computer user :(. That's why I don't have much experience with the more user-friendly FTP backup solutions. I hope that other members can input their experience with FTP backup solutions here and help you in the right direction.

Just one rule: Mentioning of products is allowed in this thread, but no promotional campaigns please.

[Future]

have you tried r1soft ?

[dreamcatcher]

I used Cobian Backup for awhile, but these days I stick with FBackup, which is ideal for my requirements.

dc