Why is backup so slow?

[Bill Anderson]

I've built a new system.

Asus P5K Deluxe Wi-Fi
QuadCore Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600, 2400 MHz (9 x 267)
System Memory 2048 MB (DDR2 PC2-8500 SDRAM 1065)
Four 500 gigabyte SATA HDDs
PLEXTOR DVDR PX-716A (IDE)
Sapphire Radeon HD 2600XT

It's not currently set up RAID, though one of these days I plan to
experiment by turning two of my HDDs into a RAID 0 striped array. No
RAID now, though. Strictly SATA and IDE.

For years I've used Ghost to back up my system. I do most of my backups
to a hard drive in Windows, and those backups run easily and quickly.
But I like to maintain at least one DOS backup of my C: boot drive
partition. Boot Ghost from a CD, backup to DVDs, etc.

The files in my current 60 gigabyte C: partition currently occupy only
about 17 gigabytes.

But it takes about four hours to back up C: on DVD-R using PC-DOS based
Ghost. And it takes over two hours to recover using the disks. The
backup occupies two full DVD-Rs and a tiny tiny bit of a third.

Should it take four hours to back up 17 gigabytes using PC-DOS based
Norton Ghost? Do I need to make some change in BIOS to make my IDE
Plextor DVD-burner perform faster? Would it help to buy an SATA burner?
Is this normal?


Thanks for any help you can provide. If there's nothing to be done, I'd
like to know that too.

 

[johns]

I've never been able to make Ghost run well. It always
seems to be out of date for any system I've tried it
on. Instead, I still use PowerQuest Disk Image .. or
I do a simple manual backup by copying my working
files to a USB drive .. or even another partition. I
can do a manual backup of my working directories
in less than 5 minutes .. email, My Docs. And I
can do an image of nearly 40 gigs in about 10 to
15 minutes ( no compression ). Even better, I can
archive image backups on a 300 gig USB drive.
I haven't had to do a recovery in years, but back
before McAfee, I did plenty of recoveries .. in about
10 to 15 minutes to a fully restored system.
Personally, I think the day of the DVD copier is
long gone. Portable USB drives are reliable and
long lasting if the power is left off. DVDs are no
more reliable.

johns

 

[Ed M.]

I've built a new system.

Asus P5K Deluxe Wi-Fi
QuadCore Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600, 2400 MHz (9 x 267)
System Memory 2048 MB (DDR2 PC2-8500 SDRAM 1065)
Four 500 gigabyte SATA HDDs
PLEXTOR DVDR PX-716A (IDE)
Sapphire Radeon HD 2600XT

It's not currently set up RAID, though one of these days I plan to
experiment by turning two of my HDDs into a RAID 0 striped array. No RAID
now, though. Strictly SATA and IDE.

For years I've used Ghost to back up my system. I do most of my backups
to a hard drive in Windows, and those backups run easily and quickly. But
I like to maintain at least one DOS backup of my C: boot drive partition.
Boot Ghost from a CD, backup to DVDs, etc.

The files in my current 60 gigabyte C: partition currently occupy only
about 17 gigabytes.

But it takes about four hours to back up C: on DVD-R using PC-DOS based
Ghost. And it takes over two hours to recover using the disks. The
backup occupies two full DVD-Rs and a tiny tiny bit of a third.

Should it take four hours to back up 17 gigabytes using PC-DOS based
Norton Ghost? Do I need to make some change in BIOS to make my IDE
Plextor DVD-burner perform faster? Would it help to buy an SATA burner?
Is this normal?


Thanks for any help you can provide. If there's nothing to be done, I'd
like to know that too.

If you are running in DOS mode, it is very possible that your drives are in
PIO mode and are running at less than half of their potential speed since
the Windows drivers are not loaded. This is the main reason I don't use
Ghost anymore. It was great before very large drives came about, but damn
frustratingly slow now. Acronis True Image 10 is what I use now and it is at
the very least 2-3 times faster than Ghost. You can try it free from the
Acronis site and see if you like it before buying. I just got the "Home"
edition and it does what I need. It also supports Vista for future needs if
you ever go that way.

Ed

 

[geoff]

I used to do backups like that but not anymore. I have two disks, although
many here talk about one disk with a new system, and I use the second disk
for backup as well as other things.

The second thing is I separate data from programs, so, backups are easier.
If something is super critical, I'll put it on a cd but that is rare. Most
things are recoverable in some way.

-g

 

[Bill Anderson]

I used to do backups like that but not anymore. I have two disks, although
many here talk about one disk with a new system, and I use the second disk
for backup as well as other things.

The second thing is I separate data from programs, so, backups are easier.
If something is super critical, I'll put it on a cd but that is rare. Most
things are recoverable in some way.

-g

Thanks, Geoff, and thanks to the others who responded. I suppose I need
to change my model for backing up my system. I've been doing the same
thing for years. It appears I need to re-think how I handle it. Four
hours to back up one partition is a bit much.