What Backup Software Should I Use?
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- Опубликовано: 29 июн 2024
- ❓ Deciding what backup software to use relies on understanding what kind of backup you want to create. I'll review the options.
❓ What backup software?
Understanding the type of backup you need is important. Use image backup software like EaseUS Todo to save monthly full backups and daily incrementals to an external hard drive. Add cloud storage like Dropbox or OneDrive for real-time and off-site backup. Automate the process if you can.
Updates, related links, and more discussion: askleo.com/171435
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✅ Watch next ▶ What’s the Difference Between an Image Backup and a Files-and-Folder Backup? ▶ • What’s the Difference ...
Chapters
0:00 Backup software
0:40 Step by step guide
2:15 Everything versus some things
3:50 Where to back up to
5:30 Automated or manual
6:50 How many backups?
8:20 How long to keep them?
9:15 Above all, back up
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✅ Watch next ▶ What’s the Difference Between an Image Backup and a Files-and-Folder Backup? ▶ ruclips.net/video/RQ1Mp1Rh4B0/видео.html
This otherwise excellent piece omits arguably the most important "To do" -- exercise a RESTORE at least once. Backing up is just half of the solution -- the other half is restoring from backup.
In my five decades of industry experience, I can assure you that the most rigorous backup strategies in the world are a colossal waste of time if RESTORE doesn't work. This can be challenging in itself, because it is often difficult to find a safe place to perform the restore. If it's at all possible, the gold standard is to restore to a completely different machine.
The rub is that image backup, in particular, typically wants to replace whatever executables, registry settings, and so on are on the target machine. This can create all sorts of issues when restoring to a well-functioning system. Restoring to a different machine is often problematic unless the new machine is exactly the same as the machine that was imaged.
One common scenario when a backup is needed is after a failed system update. The rub is that the target system is now in an unknown state, and the target system may not be able to even access never mind run the restore utility. You'll end up needing bootable media and -- especially in the Windows worlds -- this can quickly get VERY complicated. It is often easy to do even more harm to an already broken system by improperly booting from a "restore" media. This gets particularly dicey when the restore media wants to "adjust" partitions, with various flavors of "secure" settings in the BIOS, with encrypted media, and so on.
My own imperfect approach is to run my Windows 10 Pro system on a "guest VM" running on the underlying iron. I run Rocky Linux on a robust and recent pedestal machine and I use VirtualBox (for Linux) to host my Windows 10 Pro guest VM. The advantage of this is that I can shutdown the guest VM and use Linux tools (I use rsync) to make a complete copy of the entire guest VM from a command shell in Linux. I store these copies on a different Linux file server.
I'll resist the temptation to open the Pandora's Box of Windows vs Linux networking.
I can't tell you how many times various of my clients and employers have spent days or weeks and enormous amounts of money successfully restoring from those rigorously maintained backups. A roomful of backups doesn't help if the media has failed (external drives do fail!), if the restore software is unable to get needed access to the target machine, if passwords and keys have changed, etc., etc., etc.
The bottom line is that backing up is just half of the solution -- backing up is useless unless the corresponding restore is known to work and is usable by you.
I couldn't have said it better. I remember when I was working at a small bank here in NYC and we had to test our disaster recovery (there was no business continuity process at the time) procedures and the site itself. We call up Iron Mountain to tell them to send a given night's backup tapes (9-track reel-to-reel) to our hot site in Parsippany NJ (that was the DEC site). And of course we called DEC there to set up the testing date. In the course of the day, we'd be lucky if all the restore procedures got us to a decent point before we had to leave. But, hey, we tested them. And the regulatory agencies were happy.
_"Backing up is useless the corresponding restore is known to work and is usable by you."_
Not to nitpick, but I think the word "unless" is missing there, between "useless" and "the corresponding restore..." 😊
@@Milesco : Indeed -- good catch. Corrected.
@@thomasstambaugh5181 👍 😁
Very true!! There needs to be an honest discussion of the "scenarios" where you'd restore from backup. It could be a few files, thousands of files, a non-windows drive, the windows drive. Caused by a hardware fail with new and different hardware, the "same" hardware, or a completely new PC with lots of different hardware. Or a virus/malware situation where... how do you determine which backup is "safe"? That could be very complicated. For a business, what if there's a need for a criminal or other forensic investigation where evidence needs to be preserved? Just thinking a bit about this helps even the home PC user understand what's involved. Some case examples would be interesting.
Exploring what you said about the windows boot process is where I realized I don't know enough about this to navigate restore situations. It doesn't seem to be easy to find out about either.
Im concerned about privacy and security when using cloud the way you suggest.
Reminder:
If using the cloud option, don't forget to encrypt your data.
Backup your backup. I also like ssd or nvme storage for backups. Spinny boy drives both internal and external have much higher failure rates and also way slower transfer times as well so if you want to backup and restore files quicker and safer get solid state storage if you can
yes, just SSDs don't have the same longevity as HDDs. They are fast, but with age their failure rate is worse.
Nice one Leo, thanks a ton for breaking down backup strategies so clearly. Your video confirmed I’m on track with image and data backups, and the three-two-one rule. Feeling way more confident about keeping my data safe now!
Acronis Perfect Image works but is VERY confusing to use!
Awesome Thank you for Sharing 💯✴
I have bought a WD Elements 8TB external drive and I backup copy with robocopy everything there. Plus I plan to make images backup of my OS there too.
i take NO chances. I backup my data on a 8GB usb flash drive every month or 2 and I also take photos of data I really need
I use:
- rsync
- Luckybackup
- Pika backup
- Timeshift (set to include /home and all user data)
I use Macrium Reflect to make backups of my system drive to an external- and a portable drive. I use Backup4All to backup data to the external drive, the portable drive and OneDrive. So I have 4 copies of each file in 4 different locations. Frequently I test the backup and restore a few files. And when I leave my home for a longer time I take the portable drive with me. Luckily I haven't lost a single file in over 25 years.
If you use a Western Digital USB drive for image backup, do not encrypt it with WD Discovery. The unlock app is only 32bit and you will not be able to use it for a restore to a 64bit machine. This issue applies to Windows PE 64-bit.
32-bit programs don't run on 64-bit machines??? Since when?
@@stevenvanhulle7242 There is no 32bit support in Windows PE which is used for backup restore by Macrium Reflect.
@@stevenvanhulle7242 Windows PE 64-bit does not run 32-bit programs.
i have always used for FREE Disk Genius. Excellent Software.
For image backups?
I use a back up drive on the computer I want everything on that. Then I use SyncBack Pro to copy this drive to 3 external drives. I set SyncBack Pro to Mirror the drive to the external 3 drives, If I delete something off the internal drive, this will delete the file from the external drives. 1 lesson taught me to have more than 1 external backup when both the internal and the external drives crashed... nasty!!! Thanks Leo.
Leo, I have always thought that the OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox were all synch applications, not backup applications. If you delete a file from one of those spots, does it not get deleted from your computer as well? I use a cloud backup product (which I won't name as I don't want any concerns about being a shill for them) that I have run every night for my 3 systems and my Android phone. The data goes to their cloud system. And yes I have a bunch of my google drive files tagged to be in the backup job. From my perspective, that's 2 different locations. Am I missing something with regards to my understanding of this process? Thanks.
No, you are correct. OneDrive et al are great PARTS of a backup system, but by themselves they are not a backup. If your hard disk goes belly up, your files are still in the cloud (and other machines). Your work in progress is being copied to those locations in real time. Some have online recycle bins to recover recent versions for "a while". But they are not a replacement for a true backup solution.
Just some thoughts on technology: considering the internet connectivity is an offending variable, can't cloud backup solutions be configured to backup from could ecosystems - Google, Microsoft - directly and then they (the cloud backup solution) only pick up the files and folders that are local on the PC (this can be defined by the user) and exclude anything on the PC that is in sync with Google, Microsoft, etc ecosystems - Google Drive, OneDrive etc. By this way the cloud backup solution is backing up user's cloud data directly from the cloud (,i.e. cloud to cloud) which forms bulk of our stuff these days and only picks up stuff for backup from user's PC that is local. It would be faster that way, wouldn't it.
I have a Lenovo P511 PC. It has windows 10, and can't have windows 11. I bought the new ThinkStation P5 Workstation. I need to transfer all my apps and settings to the new machine. So I did a backup image of my P511. If I restore this backup image on my new P5, i believe it will replace Windows 11 that it came with, with Windows 10. What should I do please as I want my new PC to run Windows 11 but keep the apps and settings I had on my old PC. Thank you.
When I backed up how to bring it back when I need it.
Me too. It's a f**king mystery.
That depends on the backup software you choose to use. ALL of them have restore functions. For example, EaseUS Todo: askleo.com/restoring-image-using-easeus-todo/
leo just ran windows 10 ( 7? )backup. I walked away, don't know if ended properly, because I did not get message that it did end successfully. Is there a way to check like easy do?
I use personal backup...
reran manually the windowsbackup, my backup drive did not indicate a new file. The previous backup did not show any file modification. no 2nd message indicating that the backup worked successfully. again the index of c did not show any updates.
You should be able to find the backup image on the drive you backed up TO. (You may need to enable viewing hidden files.)
@askleonotenboom I have multiple people working on the same set of files/folders shared from a one drive account. They often delete stuff which others need. I am able to restore stuff from recycle bin, but would prefer to do a image backup + incremental daily backups to another one drive account or some other place(preferably cloud). What kind of a solution would u recommend for the same?
Image backups are typically too lartge for the cloud (or rather, the internet connection to upload to the cloud). I don't have a great solution, other than periodically copying your OneDrive account with some kind of a scheduled script or batch file.
I wish you would show step by step to do image backup
I have SO MANY articles and videos on the topic. A little searching can go a long way. This has links to many of them: askleo.com/how-to-back-up-windows-10/
I've found that backup software only backsup physical files on the drive and not cloud only files with a pointer on your drive.
That is correct. Backup software is PC backup software. You need to make sure your cloud files are downloaded to a PC regularly (usually simply by using their sync app), and then backing up THAT PC will back up all.
@@askleonotenboom thank you
i just put things on external hdd 4tb wd elements drive
Agreed but worries about ransomware. 😬
@@elderberry-hamster simply dont click on anything suspicous and all good here
@@elderberry-hamster Only plug in the external drive when you backup then disconnect.
Does Easeus ToDo run from within Windows? I keep my data on a usb external drive. So I would be backing up an external data drive to an external data drive.
Image backups are not good at recognizing windows drive letters. They, for this reason, are nerve-wracking.
Yes EaseUS works in Windows 11.
👍👍 JimE
Can I image backup to google drive or OneDrive?
Yes and no. Yes it's technically possible, no image backups are so large as for the upload to take forever and thus be impractical.
EaseUS Todo Backup is the product of EaseUS, a software company headquartered in China.
Where to look for this backup file?
Excellent question, which never gets answered.
Us non tech savvy folks can not find a simple explanation as to how.
On the hard disk you told the backup program to place it on.
Backup, backup, backup...
file:///C:/Windows/Logs/WindowsBackup/ had no date , to see if it worked properly