What backup software to go for?

[Technique 34]

I looked at the 'best backup for 2018' thread but there's not much of a discussion going on in there.

 

I really need to sort my backing up of my system out otherwise i'll be back here at some point with a sob story how i've lost everything on my PC.

 

I'm sure i remember reading some time ago that Acronis True Image is a big of a resource-hog these days. I know it used to top your poll year after year but no longer. The last time i looked in to backup software must've been 2 years ago and Macrium Reflect was getting rave reviews on here. I still have the installer which is dated December 2016.

 

I went on to the Macrium site just now and it mentions a pay for version. I note on their site the free version doesn't do incremental backups.  Is that how most people back their system up (incrementally)?

 

Is it worth paying for a backup software? Will they get me a considerably better deal than a free one (not just talking about Macrium here)?

[goretsky 1,035]

Hello,

 

Without having more information such as how much information you have to back up, what types of back up technologies you are interested in and your budget, it's going to be difficult to answer.  You might want to check this recent thread about backups for some ideas about how to flesh out your own search for a backup solution:

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

[Tech Geek Alex 26]

I wasn't sure if you were looking for local backup software or if you were looking for cloud backup.  If you are looking for cloud, may i recommend https://www.idrive.com/uk idrive.  For the record I don't work for them, just used them for many of my customers and have never had an issue.  Hope that helps 

 

 

[Tantawi 173]

I was in the exact same boat as you 2 years ago, tried almost ALL paid and free tools, my conclusion:

Best free: Duplicati
Best paid: Acronis Backup

My strategy:

Onsite backup: Nightly incremental backups to a NAS
Offsite backup: The NAS sync one way to my Microsoft OneDrive.

Acronis Backup is a set and forget kind of solution, which what I use for the past 3 years now. Totally worth it. I currently use version 2018, haven't found anything I need in version 2019 so was not worth the upgrade cost for me. I have a key for 2017 version that I can sell for a decent offer, if you feel like it.

Good luck!

[Technique 34]

Well i have a 256GB SSD which is mostly just the operating system and software.

I also have a 1TB (496free) drive and a 2TB (915 free) drive with various files stored on them.

2TB SSHD drive.

 

Regards the technology i'm not sure how to answer that tbh. In the past i've just done a whole image backup whenever i've felt like backing up. This may be a week later or a month or more. I've read (very briefly) about incremental backups which will back up the changes since the last backup. Sounds interesting but not sure if it's the best option or not.

 

Regards budget, i tend not to come to these things with budgets. I prefer to see what the better options are and then from that see if i accept the price or not. I guess that's not how most people do things but it's generally how i work.

 

Regards cloud backing up, i don't really think i'm too interested in that to be honest. I prefer to back up to an external hard drive.

 

I have Acronis True Image Home 2011 but for some reason the installer no longer works. I paid for it so i should have a serial number in my emails somewhere.

 

Funny that i made this thread yesterday because today i got this email from Acronis...

 

 

 

I have nothing against Acronis or indeed any backup software. It's only that i'm fairly sure i read that recent versions of Acronis started packing a load of crap that hogs resources.

 

The PC i'm running on...

 

AMD Phenom 2 2.6Ghz

The 256GB SSD as OS drive as i mentioned

16GB Corsair RAM

1GB Nvidia GeForce graphics card

Win 7 Pro 64 bit

The hard drives i mentioned.

[bledd 123]

Best free option and it's awesome..

 

Veeam Endpoint Backup

 

Incredibly simple software to use.

[Technique 34]

Does Acronis compress the backups?

 

I set it up last night to back up all drives and to turn the PC off after finishing. When i got up the PC was off so i thought great. Checked out the backup and it said so...

 

 

Strange i thought. I opened it up and sure enough all the drives are listed there. Whether it backed all the files up is another matter but the drives are there.

 

All these drives plus another 2 drives on a different partitioned HDD which aren't rammed but will take up additional space...

 

 

Yet the total for all is 886GB?