Different backups softwares. which one to choose?

In years of testing and using disk backup software, I selected the one program that never failed to create a viable disk image and restore my PC whenever I needed it. It can successfully restore a bare-bones PC to full working order. Active@ Disk Image is a PC backup solution for an entire computer or any sets of PC disks (including removable and optical), including operating system, applications and user files. A backup image may be stored on a USB drive, network storage, burned directly to CD or DVD discs, or kept on any other media. In case of computer failure, a backup image may be used to recover your computer system or find & restore any necessary files from within an image. Active@ Disk Image creates two types of disk images (1) Backup Disk Image is used for backup of entire computer or any PC disks, and contains used disk space only (2) Raw Disk Image contains an identical copy of every disk sector-it can be used for backup of non-Windows systems.

And Active Disk Image Lite is Freeware.

Like jimbo45 my C: (operating system and programs) is on an SSD. My data (personal filessuch as Documents, Pictures etc.) are on a 2 TB internal spinning disc (D:).

I use Macrium Reflect Free to make an automatic backup of C: every day (no differentials needed) to an ext. USB HDD keeping two previouse ones. In tests I have used the image it produces to restore my C: It works perfectly.

For D: I use FreeFileSync (Free, donations welcome) to backup to another ext. USB HDD every day. Unlike Macrium it does not make a copy of the entire disk - just those parts which have changed. To do that FFS compares D: with the backup, makes a list of new files to be saved and existing files to be updated. It then saves only those fies to the backup. It also deletes files on the backup which are no longer on D:. An average backup takes a few minutes compared to Macrium which in my case takes (would take) over an hour. There is no need for separate differentials, partly because this backup is done every day, and partly because of the way FFS works (not saving the whole disc). At present I initiate it manually using a shortcut on the Desktop. I will soon be setting up FFS to do this automatically.

This setup suits me perfectly.

Stevekir said:

Like jimbo45 my C: (operating system and programs) is on an SSD. My data (personal filessuch as Documents, Pictures etc.) are on a 2 TB internal spinning disc (D:).

I use Macrium Reflect Free to make an automatic backup of C: every day (no differentials needed) to an ext. USB HDD keeping two previouse ones. In tests I have used the image it produces to restore my C: It works perfectly.

For D: I use FreeFileSync (Free, donations welcome) to backup to another ext. USB HDD every day. Unlike Macrium it does not make a copy of the entire disk - just those parts which have changed. To do that FFS compares D: with the backup, makes a list of new files to be saved and existing files to be updated. It then saves only those fies to the backup. It also deletes files on the backup which are no longer on D:. An average backup takes a few minutes compared to Macrium which in my case takes (would take) over an hour. There is no need for separate differentials, partly because this backup is done every day, and partly because of the way FFS works (not saving the whole disc). At present I initiate it manually using a shortcut on the Desktop. I will soon be setting up FFS to do this automatically.

This setup suits me perfectly.

Hi there
in fact you are adopting roughly the same solution as me - but all on a Windows platform.

I chose my way as I have around 9 TB of music / video files so using the NAS server to update the changed music / multi-media files is for those who have a Linux based NAS server is IMO the best way.

I plug the external USB drive on to a USB3 port on the NAS server and then the rsync job runs daily at 00.05.

I can also plug the HDD on to a Windows HOST laptop, and then mount it on to a Linux VM that I run with vmware on the laptop. With SAMBA the NAS will see the external USB drive as an external network drive -- job done -- this is handy if the NAS is in a position not easily acessible. It's best if large amount of data being updated to use a LAN rather than a Wifi connection - although decent 5GHZ wifi will give decent speed and if running the job overnight --I don't care if it runs for say an hour or so.

Cheers
jimbo