Now what do I do? Part 2

In the previous posting, I mention what is considered to be a worst case scenario. Total loss of the drive. Unfortunately, that isn’t the only situation that a backup should be considered necessary. Accidental deletion of a folder or a file is another problem that can happen. Hitting the wrong key of clicking on the wrong icon is easy to do and many times you will hear groans of anguish echoing down the halls or even screams of angry similar to “Not Again!!” That’s when it’s smart to quietly walk away stifling your giggles.

Fortunately, I have found a good answer to that problem. The application has a fairly long name but it does the job extremely well.

Simply Safe Backup 2005 gives you all the tools used by the professional System Support people use in the Business world. It’s fast, accurate, and it’s free. Downloads.com has it listed so go get it. One caution I will offer you, however. Read the manual. The application has a lot of options to set and you need to know what they are before running the archive. But, it’s well worth the effort.

What can it provide you? Well, you can backup single files, a group of files, or one or more whole folders in a ‘project’ (their label for the stored process) or any number of folders up to the full drive. It will back up to a hard drive folder, a (zip) file, a file server, a zip drive, a tape, FTP server, CD or DVD; Split Data Files, Locate-Compare-Verify tools, Perform Smart Backup, Perform Unattended Backups, 1-Click Windows NT Service-Start-Stop, Backup & Restore Wizards! With the MySQL backup agent, backup any number of MySQL servers and databases with your backup job (unattended). You can maintain backup jobs with Backup Inventory. You can also backup changed or new files simply by selecting the appropriate “Project” and clicking START.

This thing is fast. I ran a backup on 350 Mb of files and it took 75 Seconds and I wound up with a 162 Mb archive. It would have been faster except I selected Verify Archive. The process is clearly displayed so you know what is going on. The sequence of events for my backup was setting the backup wizard options, clicking Start and watching it build the archive, write it, verify, and then compare its contents to the source. Exiting the application will prompt you to save the ‘Project’.

The ‘Project’ file is used the next time you want to backup the same group of files. All you need to do is select the ‘Project’ and click Start. Any file with a date/time that’s after the archived file is processed. Any other file is ignored unless you specifically request it.

The recovery wizard will allow you to select anything from one or more files to whole folders with ease. You can literally recover all or any part of an existing backup. You are presented with a listing of the contents of the archive and you just select what you want or need.

Oh, and one more thing before I close this posting. If you are planning to write the archive to CD, you can create the archive to fit the capacity of the CD, either 650 Mb or 700 Mb, and the files can be written to the hard drive for copying later instead of writing them to CD at the time of the backup.

This is a really good answer to the problem of backing up your system. Its well worth the time and effort to use.

Have Fun!

Filed in: crash hard-drive backup recovery software Ghost imaging