Hello...

I am in search of advice in terms of back up software for our home. We have
2 pc's running XP, a laptop (wireless) running XP, and another laptop
(wireless) running Vista.

I have a SimpleTech external hard drive, USB, connected to my PC, with 4
folders, one for each of the PC's.. (eg: Vin, wife, kid1, kid2)

Any suggestions on automatic back up software? I've been doing each unit
manually... it's not a good idea, we tend to forget...free would help very
much as well.

Thoughts on Comodo? Hinxsoft?

--
Thanks & B'rgds,

Uncle Vinnie

Uncle Vinnie wrote:
> I am in search of advice in terms of back up software for our home.
> We have 2 pc's running XP, a laptop (wireless) running XP, and
> another laptop (wireless) running Vista.
>
> I have a SimpleTech external hard drive, USB, connected to my PC,
> with 4 folders, one for each of the PC's.. (eg: Vin, wife, kid1,
> kid2)
> Any suggestions on automatic back up software? I've been doing
> each unit manually... it's not a good idea, we tend to
> forget...free would help very much as well.
>
> Thoughts on Comodo? Hinxsoft?

Get a Seagate Replica 500GB drive and actually use it to backup the
machines. It will backup so you could even do a bare metal restore or just
a file version restore if needed. Simple, works on multiple computers, no
knowledge needed so you could get anyone in the family to do it.

Why do I say this even though you said you already do it manually and you
tend to forget? Because you are still using the USB drive and even if you
have it hooked up to one PC and shared over the network - I still think
you'll tend to forget something or the other. Set yourself a reminder on
some device of yours to do the backups and do it.

Or - just set a scheduled task to do whatever you are doing manually now on
each computer. Why purchase/download/install anything else? If you have a
method that works now - convert it to automatic.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

Good point, thank you!

Shenan Stanley wrote:
> Uncle Vinnie wrote:
>> I am in search of advice in terms of back up software for our home.
>> We have 2 pc's running XP, a laptop (wireless) running XP, and
>> another laptop (wireless) running Vista.
>>
>> I have a SimpleTech external hard drive, USB, connected to my PC,
>> with 4 folders, one for each of the PC's.. (eg: Vin, wife, kid1,
>> kid2)
>> Any suggestions on automatic back up software? I've been doing
>> each unit manually... it's not a good idea, we tend to
>> forget...free would help very much as well.
>>
>> Thoughts on Comodo? Hinxsoft?
>
> Get a Seagate Replica 500GB drive and actually use it to backup the
> machines. It will backup so you could even do a bare metal restore
> or just a file version restore if needed. Simple, works on multiple
> computers, no knowledge needed so you could get anyone in the family
> to do it.
> Why do I say this even though you said you already do it manually and
> you tend to forget? Because you are still using the USB drive and
> even if you have it hooked up to one PC and shared over the network -
> I still think you'll tend to forget something or the other. Set
> yourself a reminder on some device of yours to do the backups and do
> it.
> Or - just set a scheduled task to do whatever you are doing manually
> now on each computer. Why purchase/download/install anything else? If you
> have a method that works now - convert it to automatic.
>
> --
> Shenan Stanley
> MS-MVP

--
Thanks & B'rgds,

Uncle Vinnie

In news:(E-Mail Removed),
Uncle Vinnie <(E-Mail Removed)> typed:
> Hello...
>
> I am in search of advice in terms of back up software for
> our home. We have 2 pc's running XP, a laptop (wireless)
> running XP, and another laptop (wireless) running Vista.
>
> I have a SimpleTech external hard drive, USB, connected to
> my PC, with 4 folders, one for each of the PC's.. (eg: Vin,
> wife, kid1, kid2)
> Any suggestions on automatic back up software? I've been
> doing each unit manually... it's not a good idea, we tend
> to forget...free would help very much as well.
>
> Thoughts on Comodo? Hinxsoft?

You can use XP's ntbackup.exe (not installed in Home by default but is on
the disk to install). That's easly free. You can schedule it to run backup
jobs with the Task Manager. Pay particular attention to the ASR floppy info
while you're reading the Help fle about t.

Best way IMO but not free, is to install and use either Norton Ghost or
Acronis True image. Acronis is fully capable and a bt cheaper and probably
what you want though it lacks a few of the bells & whistles Ghost provides.
Both have demo versions you can download to try out; download each, pick the
one that "feels" like it fits your working mode the best.

There ARE a few that are free, but I don't use any of them so can't
recommend anything. Beware two things:
-- Spyware/scammy stuff of course, and
-- If the backup program can't use VSS (Volume Shadow Copy Services), it
can NOT back up your operating system, so check and test carefully. A good
program will tell you how to enable VSS services. If it doesn't, or doesn't
provide its own control of it, it will fail to completely backup the OS.
Simply stated, It boils down to simply not being able to back up running
programs, of which there are always several running in the background, so
using it to Restore from wouldn't create a usable OS.

HTH,

Twayne`