7

I'm looking for a reliable backup solution on Windows, something with a feature set similar to Yadis.
I've been using CrashPlan for 2 months, but their software lost more than 1TB of my data, that's why I'm looking for alternatives.

Requirements:

  • Real-time local folder-to-folder backup
    I don't need online features, I want to use this to duplicate my files between my local disks.
  • Versioning support
    Should be able to choose how many versions to keep of the files.
    Or at the very least, it should keep deleted files until a specified time or space limit gets hit, and delete them afterwards automatically.
  • Plain backup
    I want to be able to open the backup without special software. No proprietary file formats.
  • Shadow copy
    Backup every file, even locked/system files. (Yadis fails this one)
  • AutoStart
    Doesn't need to run as a service, but that's a plus.
  • Actively maintained
    I don't want to use discontinued products.
  • Relatively cheap
    Should be under $100 for one-time payment, or $60 for a yearly fee.

Optional requirements:

  • External disk support
    Shouldn't have any problem using external disks, at least on the source side.
  • Low resource usage
    I'm not really comfortable with something that eats 1GB of my RAM.
  • Compression support
    Preferably ZIP, but I'm not picky about this. Any ordinary everyday format is acceptable.
  • Freeware or Open Source
  • Linux support
  • Cloud storage
Improve this question
5
  • Same question from same user: Real-time local backup with versioning on Windows 7/8 - Super User
    – nidunc
    Jun 11, 2014 at 21:30
  • @nidunc I'm asking it here, because it was considered off-topic on SuperUser, and I think it's more reasonable to ask it here. But it's a good idea to link these together.
    – Borda
    Jun 11, 2014 at 21:58
  • 1
    For the long term storage, it's generally a better idea to let the file system handle the compression, i.e. to backup into a compressed NTFS folder rather than into a .zip/rar file.
    – Angstrom
    Jun 14, 2014 at 20:50
  • Did you inform CrashPlan about the data loss, in order that they can do do something to prevent it happening to others?
    – Mawg says reinstate Monica
    Feb 12, 2016 at 8:45
  • 1
    @Mawg Yes, I did. They couldn't really care less actually. Their cloud still had most (but not all) of my files, only their hybrid backup lost them locally. Downloading 1TB with their amazing speed of around 30-100kb/s wasn't a pleasurable experience, that's why I've switched to another app. It's easy to prevent, just don't use the local hybrid backup feature.
    – Borda
    Feb 12, 2016 at 18:27

4 Answers 4

Reset to default
6

For anyone who needs reliable one-way data duplication on Windows, I can highly recommend: Bvckup 2

Positive:

  • Meets (nearly) all the requirements
  • It uses delta copying, it's extremely fast, and very resource friendly.
  • Backing up ~300k files totaling ~2TB I've never seen it go over 150MB of memory usage, most of the time it stays in the 20-50MB range.
  • It has no problem using (and tracking) external storage.
  • At the time of writing a Personal license costs $19.95, and they even have a free beta version.

Negative:

  • It doesn't support full versioning, but it does keep deleted files for a configurable amount of time
  • No compression support
  • No Linux support
  • No cloud support

But these were listed as optional, and for versioning it still meets the "Or at the very least" expectation.

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    That's what I use too (+1). I couldn't find a FOSS app that comes anywhere near it, despite a lot of searching. You forgot to mention that it supports MS's Volume Shadow System,. so that it can copy files which are in use.
    – Mawg says reinstate Monica
    Feb 12, 2016 at 8:47
5

It sounds like what you really need is to modify your storage to use a RAID system - if it is configured above RAID 0 then a failed drive is not a problem and results in no data lost.

It also sounds like you would like a versioning file system - several operating systems offer this but AFAIK none from Microsoft. Wikipedia lists several experimental versioning file systems for Linux such as:

  • ext3cow
  • NILFS
  • Tux3
  • Next3

You could also take a look at WebDAV possibly combined with Subversion Autoversioning.

Improve this answer
4
  • You mean RAID 1, right? RAID 0 is absolutely not failure proof. I'm already using RAID 1 for my system drive, but it's not really a backup solution. If a file gets deleted or corrupted, it'll propagate across drives, and of course it doesn't have versioning. That's why I'm looking for a backup solution on top of that. Call me paranoid if you want ;)
    – Borda
    Jun 11, 2014 at 22:02
  • @Borda That is why I said "above 0" - real time back up of a file system == RAID & Versioning FS.
    – Steve Barnes
    Jun 12, 2014 at 5:17
  • Oh, sorry, I misunderstood that part. Know that I know what you meant, it makes sense. Never heard of these filesystems, the idea seems good, but I'm still looking for a Windows solution.
    – Borda
    Jun 12, 2014 at 15:43
  • You can mount WebDAV file systems from most flavours of MS Windows.
    – Steve Barnes
    Jun 12, 2014 at 16:38
3

Free File Sync is a great Open Source application that really does this well http://www.freefilesync.org/faq.php. The features are really rock solid.

Warning: you must be careful to not install the yucky OpenCandy advertisement crap. You may now be able to get a "clean" build without ads by contributing to the developer. Or you can get a Windows binary version compiled from the source , without the ads, called MinFFS on GitHub, https://github.com/abcdec/MinFFS/releases, but that version doesn't support shadow copies.

Fantastically, it also can do comparison of file content not just modification time and size. This can help you spot corrupted files.

And this is nifty: ""FreeFileSync runs on Windows XP/Vista/7/8/8.1/10, Mac OS X 10.7 and newer, and all major distributions of Linux."

Improve this answer
1
  • Surprisingly no comments on this one can you please add billeted pluses and minuses I m looking for open source solution
    – SeanClt
    Feb 23, 2016 at 12:27
0

I suggest that you check out CloudBerry Backup to automate Windows Computer backup to Amazon S3 and Glacier and local storage such as the server as you suggested. It comes with the following features:

  1. Scheduling and Real-Time Cloud Backup Comes with one time fee and no recurring charges.
  2. No proprietary data format and you can access your data using other Amazon s3 tools.
  3. Supports all Amazon S3 regions and Reduced Redundancy Storage and Standard-IA.
  4. Amazon Glacier support
  5. Encryption & Compression
  6. Local Backup
  7. Incremental and Block Level Backup
  8. Network Locations Backup

Get the 15 day free trial

Linux versions is also available . You can learn more about CloudBerry Backup for Linux and also download a 15 day trial version.

Disclaimer: I work for CloudBerry Lab

Improve this answer
1
  • According to the website, only the enterprise edition supports managing more than 1TB of data, and that costs $299.99, which was way out of scope for this question.
    – Borda
    Feb 12, 2016 at 18:32

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge that you have read and understand our privacy policy and code of conduct.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.