My PC recently died on me and I had to buy an entirely new tower. It functions as both music and work computer, so it was mission critical to have all work emails and files recovered. I did this myself, but I also realised that I really need a reliable file backup solution for the future to minimise any recovery time due to crashes etc.
My new pc is running Windows 7 64 bit. Do any of you know a backup utility that can run at scheduled times and backup files to a location either locally or over a home network? It can either be free or payware. I don't mind either way, as long as it's safe and reliable.

While on the topic, this is the first time I've used Win 7 64 bit and I am wondering if there are any tweaks I can make myself to make it better for audio production?

Regards,
Steve

As for backups, I'm sure there are more sophisticated software packages out there, but Win7 has a built-in backup facility.

Look in your control panel. I believe it needs a second hard drive, though. I think it may be able to work on a network.

The kings:

http://www.paragon-software.com/home/systembackup/comparison .html

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/


Paragon has a free version. You can download a free version of a Acronis if you own a Seagate or Maxtor hard drive here:

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?locale=en-US&name=Disc Wizard&vgnextoid=d9fd4a3cdde5c010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD

And you have a whole thread about this topic in this very subforum:

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=201085

I have been using Acronis for a couple of years and its never let me down.Very versatile software.

Demoing Acronis now. Looks very complete.

Paragon looked good, but lacks a few things I need.

^^^^ which features are those?

+1 for Acronis here too (since 2003!)

I need incremental backup of specific network locations. Paragon does a lot with partitions etc, but not network folder backups as far as I can see. Acronis does this.

For Backups, Cobian backup is free and is what I would recommend, on mirror mode and with CRC-checking enabled.
For optimising, my guide's below.

I see no reasons to set up soft intended for imaging backup if you need to do incremental backup of files. Among paid soft I can recommend @MAX SyncUp. www.atmaxsoft.com/syncup.html For Win 7x64 it'll be Ok. It does local backup, backup to NAS and to server (FTP), also online backup to Google drive. You may configure schedule of process as you need. Recovery of files and folders is possible individually.
As to freeware I didn't use it but free soft seems to have limited functions and its creators may not have motivation to update and support it well (imho).

Better safe than sorry

+++++ for Acronis stuff.

If you've got a Seagate disk they have a free version of Acronis something. I'm not sure if you can schedule with that though. Search on Seagate DiscWizard.

Very straight forward.

As someone else already said, try getting the free version. I think they give out acronis for free to more than just WD or Seagate now, but I may be wrong.

I'm actually going to re-download the free version tonight so that I can back up my OS partition. I have a WD, Seagate, and a Samsung drive so I am covered.