Back Up

Interesting perspective on HARDWARE, since we're on the subject of backups:

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ENTERPRISE WINDOWS: OLIVER RIST
Monday, October 6, 2003
 Tape drives may seem stodgy, but they're still the best safety net
Affordability and dependability more than compensate for their lack of
coolness

By  Oliver Rist  October 03, 2003

Lately, customers are giving me flak about tape drives. Some simply don't
want to spend the time or money swapping tapes and moving the appropriate
tape off-site; others just don't think they are cool enough. There are many
alternatives to tape drives, but Fonzie factor aside, having a tape at the
end of a storage chain is still the best safety net.

Disk-based backups, for example, are much easier because storage prices are
so low. Going from a 240GB RAID system to a 480GB RAID system can often be
accomplished within the same enclosure at only the man-hour cost of
installation and a few hundred dollars per disk. But the result could be a
real-time mirror of the production storage environment located on the
original 240GB.

Some backup software vendors are making use of this and similar scenarios.
StorageTek's EchoView product line, for example, captures all events on the
network in real time rather than the scheduled snapshots typical of tape
drives. Disk-based backups also complement products such as Veritas' Volume
Manager. This is a disaster recovery tool designed to mirror entire
computing operations between remote sites. With leased lines squeezing your
bandwidth, having a disk solution at either end capable of taking
information as quickly as it's delivered can be a real advantage.

For small office and personal use (such as for weenie road-warrior
executives who are too busy to back up their important files until someone
steals their notebooks), USB 2.0 is a boon. I know one sys admin with a
problem road-warrior who was too busy to back up, yet every emergency
involved a "critical" file. Two hundred dollars bought this guy an external
120GB USB 2.0 hard disk that simply plugged into his docking station. A
little time at the scripting console forced a backup to that drive whenever
the user re-docked. Any problems at home or on the road could be easily
solved by making the drive temporarily available on the network.

I'm still not such a big fan of optical backup solutions. For personal use,
I suppose they're fine. But in a corporate environment, that's simply too
many disks. Even if some maniac were to use the upcoming 29GB DVD-ROM disks
for general backup purposes, that's still a ratio of four to one when
compared with single 120GB tape.

And speaking of tape, what's all the negativity? Tape is a proven medium
that's kept up with the times from a capacity perspective. If disaster
recovery is on your mind, who wants to swap out hard disks an

MSBackup is visually impressive & certainly has endless docs. But it is
a poor tool for a full system backup. For one thing, it will not span
media. You will not upgrade to a new OS with it, as it is incompatible
with other versions of itself. Also, you will go nuts trying to do
incrementals, archive bits, etc., I'm sure. To do a full system restore
from it, you need to fresh install Windows first. And there is tweaking
involved. It WON'T be pretty. Take a look at
http://support.microsoft.com/d efault.aspx?scid=kb;[LN];Q166172
Duplicating Windows 95/98/98 Second Edition Installation to a New Hard
Disk

Once you have a functioning system, especially one close to a clean
install, do a full system backup. If you have multiple partitions, I
guess a backup is a bit more complex. It depends upon the ties between
the Registry & the other partitions, as to whether they must be backed
up concurrently.

http://home.satx.rr.com/badour /index.html Backup & partitioning strategy
http://home.wanadoo.nl/geurt/h ome.html Extended Operating System Loader
http://powerquest.com/driveima ge/ Drive Image
http://www.acronis.com/product s/trueimage/ TrueImage
http://www.betterbackup.com/ Retrospect CD Backup
http://www.bootitng.com/ 's BootIt NG, has a variety of backup
capabilities: Copy to HDD, or Image to HDD or to CD. (TBIView, freely
downloadable, can retrieve individual files from an Image.)
Shrink/expand your partitions without data loss. Multi-boot, if you
dare. Free, run from floppy, but pay up as I did if satisfied. To
install & use beyond 30 days, $34.95.
http://www.cdrfaq.org/ CD R/W Backup
http://www.cyberiapc.com/backu p.htm MyOwnBackup (MOB) (Free)
http://www.hp.com/cgi-bin/cpos upport/swdl.pl?c=co105&i=co105 en&p=hpcd...
Simple Backup
http://www.karenware.com/ PtReplicator (Free)
http://www.lifesaverbackup.com /
http://www.mvps.org/links.html Should have good info
http://www.pcmag.com/ Lots & lots of sturdy downloads. There is a $20
yearly charge now.
http://www.powerquest.com/part itionmagic  Partition Magic
http://www.ranish.com/part/ Ranish Partition Manager
[url=http://www.rescue-me.net/gold.ht

look for it in the add remove programs list in the control pannel. it should
be under windows apps (or whatever they call it now)

 it is lacking a litlle you should check into using somehting else if
possible.

You are a lucky person. The backup program provided with Windows is a snare
and a delusion. In other words, it is garbage and will lull you into a false
sense of security. Go to:
www.pcmag.com

Search for articles on backup software and hardware. Their "editor's choice"
picks can be trusted, based on 20 years of following their advice.