Backing Up with SyncToy: At the beginning of this month, someone suggested using Microsoft SyncToy to back up files. I got it and used it, and I have a question or two. If anyone has...

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

At the beginning of this month, someone suggested using Microsoft SyncToy to back up files. I got it and used it, and I have a question or two. If anyone has experience with this program, let me know, and I'll pick your brain.

csharp Loc: Massachusetts Berkshires

I have been using SyncToy daily for several years now, backing up my entire C drive to a Seagate FreeAgent portable hard drive. At the end of the week I take that portable drive to a second identical computer I have at my weekend house and run SyncToy again. Thus I'm protected from theft, fire and crash unless both houses burned down simultaneously. Belt, suspenders and drawstring. Can't say I know much more about SyncToy.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

csharp wrote:

I have been using SyncToy daily for several years now, backing up my entire C drive to a Seagate FreeAgent portable hard drive. At the end of the week I take that portable drive to a second identical computer I have at my weekend house and run SyncToy again. Thus I'm protected from theft, fire and crash unless both houses burned down simultaneously. Belt, suspenders and drawstring. Can't say I know much more about SyncToy.

When you're backing up to the Seagate, do you use the Echo setting? I used Synchronize first and when I did another session of backing up, I used Echo. When I checked my computer later, lots of files were missing. I had other backups I could use to restore, but I'm wondering why so much disappeared.

csharp Loc: Massachusetts Berkshires

Under Documents Backup, I use Synchronize, and both hard drives become identical with the latest data. I've never tried anything else.

csharp Loc: Massachusetts Berkshires

I've given some further thought to the Echo option. If I Echo drive A to drive B, wouldn't the contents of A replace that of B? This would work if A is the active drive and B the backup. However if you reverse the procedure and Echo B to A, you'll lose all recent files. Is this what happened?

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

csharp wrote:

I've given some further thought to the Echo option. If I Echo drive A to drive B, wouldn't the contents of A replace that of B? This would work if A is the active drive and B the backup. However if you reverse the procedure and Echo B to A, you'll lose all recent files. Is this what happened?

I have used Echo, always going from the computer to the external drive. What I can't understand is how some files vanished and not others.

I'm going to play around with it some more and see what happens. I might just back to Acronis or do a direct copy of files.

markfay Loc: Reading England

jerryc41 wrote:

quote=csharp I've given some further thought to t... (show quote)

I lost a load of photos too, setting was contribute, still don't understand why so I hope someone knows. Win 7

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

markfay wrote:

I lost a load of photos too, setting was contribute, still don't understand why so I hope someone knows. Win 7

I guess backing up your files can be dangerous.

Greatpapa Loc: MA

Hello all

I have been backing up my photos and Business documents on Carbonite. If I was to have a major computer fault there is no problem getting my files from them. Its only 60.00 per year, unlimited storage space and I really like to offsite storage.

Greatpapa

gmcase Loc: Galt's Gulch

I use carbonite too but also like to back up locally in case carbonite takes a big iDump one day.

wingincamera Loc: Spanaway, Washington

One thing to check with if using Carbonite or other online backups is your internet bandwidth restrictions, if any. There was a article in the local paper of a user who exceeded his bandwidth and his account was suddenly closed without notice. He had a contract with limited bandwidth and the small print in the contract gave the consequences of exceeding it.