Get a FREE fully-working copy of Steganos Security Suite 7 (worth £49.99) when you sign up to the Practical PC Newsletter. Review: SyncBackSE
Ian Waugh looks at SyncBackSE and thinks it's a great way to protect your data
| Product | SyncBackSE |
|---|---|
| Company | 2BrightSparks |
| Web | www.2brightsparks.com |
| Price | $30.99 |
| We like | Automatic backups, copies locked files |
| We don't like | Takes a while to plumb its depths |
| Rating | 9/10 |
| Requirements | Windows 2000/XP/Vista |
As many homes now have two or more computers and an increasing number of us are storing music, photos and videos on them, it makes sense to safeguard them by backing up. You can backup to a second hard drive, an external hard drive or a NAS drive.
However, knowing and doing are two entirely different things. If we could just press a button and have all our data backed up automatically, we would. But PC life is rarely that straightforward.
The major problem for most people is finding a program that will do the job automatically. If that sounds like you, SyncBackSE could be just what you need.
The program uses Profiles to define the files you want to backup, and how and when they are to be copied. It can be used at both basic and advanced levels so let's run through the typical process you might use to backup some files.
First you enter a name for the Profile, then select one of three types. Backup, as you'd expect, creates a backup, but you can also Synchronize ensures the files two folders are the same, and Group groups several Profiles together so you can run and schedule them at the same time. We'll select Backup.
You're then asked if you want to backup or sync to an FTP server. In most cases you won't. You're then given the option of Zipping the files into a single or multiple Zip. While this can save space, our reasoning is that if anything goes wrong, the files will be more difficult (or perhaps impossible) to extract so we prefer not to compress backups but it's a personal choice.
Then you select the folder that you want to backup and then its destination. This can be another drive, another folder, or a network drive.
Finally you can enable Fast Backup if you wish. While this is faster - as you'd expect! - it has certain limitations and until you become familiar with the program it's probably best not to use it.
You're then presented with a summary of the settings and at this point you can select individual files and folders for backup. So, for example, you could select the C drive to begin with but then pick the files and folders on that drive to back up.
The Profile can then be run and scheduled to run at specific times - a fully automated backup system!
Locked up
There are a couple of problematical situations that can occur when trying to copy files. The first is that many programs cannot copy a file that is in use or is being used by another program. There are sound technical reasons why this is so but if it prevents you backing up files it's a nuisance.
SyncBackSE can backup locked and open files with one limitation - the program must be running the host computer. For example, you can install SyncBackSE on one machine and schedule the automatic backup of other PCs in a network. However, it would only successfully copy locked files on the machine it's installed on and not on the networked machines. To do that you have to install separate copies of SyncBackSE on each machine. The software license allows you to run it on up to five machines which should be enough for most home networks.
Secondly, you may still get errors if, for example, a file has been deleted before the program gets around to copying it. This can happen if you're working on a file during the backing-up process or if you try to back up a file that's being used by the system.
When creating a profile, it's tempting to backup an entire drive. That's the sort of situation that's likely to lead to such errors and it's also very wasteful of disk space so it's worth spending a little time selecting files that won't produce errors when creating the Profile.
While the default settings will be fine for many people, the program has many additional functions such as creating incremental backups, file versioning (recover data by "rolling back" to a previous backup), synchronisation, encryption, filters and many more. The on-line help is excellent, too.
Conclusion
Once set up, SyncBackSE runs seamlessly in the background, backing up and presenting reports in your browser when necessary. It's flexible enough to afford power users serious customisation while beginners can easily set it up using default settings. Highly recommended.
