Schierer Space

“There are two kinds of computer users in the world, those that have regular backups and those who are about to.” - I’m pretty sure I didn’t make this up, but I can’t figure out where I saw it.

Thanks to John for reminding me that I had put this chunk of how-to advice together a year or so ago. This is excellent blog fodder in the vein of “giving something back to the community”.

I do regular automatic backups, and I keep a copy of my backup off site. This is my backup method. It is the result of personal experience, long philosophical discussions with tech-savvy friends (Hi Eric!) and some just plain laziness^[1].

This is long, but reads quickly, so here we go…

Beyond your Windows PC^[2] you’ll need:

Hardware:
Qty. 2: External Hard Drives^[3]
I’d recommend at least as much storage as you have hard disk, and don’t be afraid to get plenty more… especially if you plan to upgrade your computer soon or plan to keep multiple file versions on your backup. Take your amount of total hard drive space and multiply by at least 1.5. That should be a pretty good place to start.
Brand isn’t really important, but features to look for are:

• Size: It does matter.
• Speed: Higher RPM generally means higher transfer times. Look for at least 7200 RPM.
• Connectivity: I recommend USB 2.0. It is backwards compatible to older USB (but will be dirt slow at this speed) and give pretty good speed response. Most every modern PC supports it. You may see FireWire (IEEE1394) and SATA external drives which are great if your PC supports it. However, remember that the point of a backup is data recovery when your PC may not be working. More compatible is better. Ethernet based network drives are also available. These are quite cool, but I wouldn’t recommend them for the casual user.
• Portability: You’ll want to store these somewhere, so a small package size is a bonus. Don’t pay extra for it though, even a “large” external drive fits easily in a desk drawer.

Software:
SyncBack Freeware^[4] There are others, but this one is free and if you run into trouble I might be able to help you!

Initial Setup:
If you’re backing up more than one PC, then some networking/sharing complications come into play, but I’ll save that for another post which I might actually write if somebody comments loud enough. If not, it’s pretty straightforward. Also, if you’re using multiple user accounts then the privileges used to run SyncBack may be important.

1. Plug in the first drive (you bought two, right?). Position it in a convenient place near your
   PC box where it can comfortably stay attached all the time. I tied down the power and USB cables so there is a pseudo-docking station for the drive on the top of my case.
2. In My Computer. Right click the new drive and give it a recognizable label (like Backup 1).
3. Right click on My Computer and select Manage. (Assumes you’re using XP and you’re logged into an account with admin privileges.)
4. Select Disk Management. (You may if you wish format the drive from here, but it should already be formatted, and a simple delete can be used to wipe out whatever garbage they had installed on it.)
5. Right click Backup 1 (or whatever) in the Volume list and select “Change Drive Letter and Paths”. Select a unique drive letter late in the alphabet. I used “W”. This is important because you want your backup scripts to work with either drive regardless of what else is attached. By default Windows might assign odd drive letters depending on what’s currently connected to your machine. Depending on what came on your drive, you might get some message about affecting installed software. Ignore it (you deleted everything right!). It may also not change letters right away.
6. Use the Disconnect icon in the System Tray to remove the drive.
7. Repeat above with the other drive, except give it some other name like “Backup 2″.
8. Reattach drive-1. Verify that the correct drive letter is displayed. Repeat with the 2nd drive. If not, repeat the steps above, but it worked for me the first time.

Setup the backup:
Let’s assume you follow Bill Gates’ suggestions and all of your critical files are contained in:
C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Documents. You may want to backup the entire Documents and Settings folder for multiple users, but the IE cache is also in this tree by default and there’s no reason to backup all of that garbage.
In any case, this is the example folder I’ll proceed with. You may have data elsewhere, and you can repeat the process as many times as you wish so that all of your critical data is covered. Ignore the OS folders and applications unless there’s something really important you want to save.

1. Install SyncBack. You’re not interested in SyncBackSE ($30). Trust me.^[5]
2. Run SyncBack. It may start a wizard. Cancel out of it. It’s easier to just do what you want.
3. Click Profiles… New.
4. Backup (OK). Give it a name. “Backup Documents for [Username]“
5. Source: C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Documents (or whatever)
6. Destination: W:\Username\Documents (something that reasonably corresponds). I think it will make the folder automatically if it doesn’t exist.
7. Include all sub-dirs (it’s easier… although you may want to make sure that your IE cache is not in this folder! If it is you may want to filter out that folder.)
8. Make sure “Backup the source directories files, including all its sub-directories” is selected.
9. Look at the advanced tab to see exactly what this options means. I use:
   • Source overwrites destination always(backup)
   • Copy file to destination
   • Do nothing, skip the file
10. At this point you can run that profile manually whenever you like.
11. Feel free to check out the “Expert” tabs (activated by that button at the bottom). I use them for the website backup and some fanciness with Wake-On-LAN for networked PCs but you probably won’t need to mess with them for now.
12. You probably want it to run all of your profiles automatically… see below.
13. Test your backup by selecting the profile and selecting Run. It will take a long time the first time.
14. Once it’s done, run it again. It should complete very quickly if all is well.
15. Do this for each Profile, then swap drives and repeat these last two steps.
16. You’ve now “seeded” your backups, both drives should have identical content (unless something changed in between).

Automatic group backups:
Assuming you created several profiles for different folders…. create a group to run them all at once automatically.

1. Profiles… New… Group. Name it.
2. Select your profiles.
3. Click Schedule. Yes. No. Ok.
4. Here’s where permissions come in. You’ll probably want an admin account to run the script so that all user documents can be accessed. If all the folders are controlled by one user, no problemo. Proceed with that user.^[6]
5. Run as: Should have the correct user defined as: MachineName\Username
6. Click Set Password. And put it in. (This is actually the XP scheduling engine, so don’t worry about security… you’re not giving your password to SyncBack, you’re giving it to XP which already has it
   anyway.)
7. Make sure “Enabled” is checked. And decide your preference for “Run only if logged on” (I leave it unchecked so it runs regardless.)
8. Select the Schedule tab. I set mine to run weekly at 2AM every day. Why? Because I rarely use the computer then. Schedule as often as you like. It’s incremental, so no harm no foul.
9. Hit ok a bunch of times.
10. Test it by selecting the group and selecting Run. It will take a long time the first time.
11. Once it’s done, run it again. It should complete very quickly if all is well.
12. Swap drives and repeat the last two steps.

Storage:
Now that your backup is seeded, take one drive to work or someplace reasonably secure that is not your home and leave it there. I try to remember to swap mine monthly.
Don’t do the swap at home! Otherwise, you will have the disaster the day the PC and both drives are
sitting on your desk at home. If your workplace washes away… hopefully your house is still intact. If not, well… maybe your files aren’t your biggest concern. (If you’re really nervous, by a third drive and leave one with the family at Christmas. I did.) A safety deposit box would probably be better than your desk if you have one that is easy/free to access. I don’t, so I use my desk. Don’t want an off site backup? No problem. Just physically separate the PC from the ’standby’ backup media as much as possible. This minimizes the risk of a “Silver Bullet” taking them both out.

Good luck.

Disclaimer: I am a computer hobbyist, not a data security specialist. You must assess your risk to lost data and take actions appropriate to your situation. This works for me and I’m happy with it. Your mileage may vary.
1. I like to say that necessity is not the mother of invention, laziness is. I’m sure I heard that somewhere too but Google was unable to find a suitable attribution for me. [↩]
2. Mac and Linux users will have to look for specific advice elsewhere, but the general approach should be valid. [↩]
3. I use Western Digital 250 GB “My Book” External Hard Drive WDG1U2500N, but I’m about ready to upgrade because I’m running out of space. [↩]
4. At the time of this writing the latest version is 3.2.19.0. [↩]
5. I’m sure the SE and Pro versions are wicked cool, but if you’re taking my computer advice there are no features these packages will give you that will be worth paying for. I use the freeware version and it does everything I need. [↩]
6. Although I haven’t tried it, I suppose you could have different automatic profiles for each user that run under that user’s privileges, but that seems like a pain to me. [↩]

This entry was posted on Friday, September 12th, 2008 at 5:00 pm and is filed under Advice, Computer / Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.