I've yet to find a freeware program with all of these features (plus scheduling).

1) For some folders/files I'd like to have a limited number of multiple instance backups

2) I'd like my internal storage drive mirrored to my external drive

Can someone please advise? I can accomplish this with separate programs, but I'm wondering if there is an all-in-one solution out there.

Edited February 22, 201313 yr by xmf

As many even paid professional solution doesn't even come with all those features (some offer optionnal components that will do all of this), i doubt you'll find easily something free except if you only want a set of scripts doing the job.

Perhaps you could provide more information about point 1): where do you want to backup (cd/dvd/tape/hard drive) ? when you say you need many instances, do you want many backups be done at the same time frame or many backup sets of a part of your datas ? If you just want to backup to hard drive and have many backup sets of a part of your datas, you could create a partition for those data and create shadow copies on this partition (shadow copies is a windows server 2003 and higher functionnality that allow to store different versions of the files stored on a partition ).

For the second point, if you want realtime replication, you could create a raid 1 between the two drive (either a hardware one if your controller support it or a software one). If you want something less complex a simple robocopy /mir /mon might be enough.

Thanks for the reply.

1) backing up to internal storage drive. with instances, I mean the last 3 (for example) full versions of a backup are kept.

2) real-time is not necessary, but I will look into a raid1

As many even paid professional solution doesn't even come with all those features (some offer optionnal components that will do all of this), i doubt you'll find easily something free except if you only want a set of scripts doing the job.

Perhaps you could provide more information about point 1): where do you want to backup (cd/dvd/tape/hard drive) ? when you say you need many instances, do you want many backups be done at the same time frame or many backup sets of a part of your datas ? If you just want to backup to hard drive and have many backup sets of a part of your datas, you could create a partition for those data and create shadow copies on this partition (shadow copies is a windows server 2003 and higher functionnality that allow to store different versions of the files stored on a partition ).

For the second point, if you want realtime replication, you could create a raid 1 between the two drive (either a hardware one if your controller support it or a software one). If you want something less complex a simple robocopy /mir /mon might be enough.

There are also some free cloud based services that can provide that type of function, even automatically, for a small amount of data such a 2GB. DropBox is one. You could also set up multiple accounts, but I think only one in use at a time, by using multiple emails to register each account, if you needed more free space, and they have paid for options as well.

Cheers and Regards

Edited February 22, 201313 yr by bphlpt

Thanks bphlpt, I hadn't considered a cloud solution. I'm not looking for that now though.

There are also some free cloud based services that can provide that type of function, even automatically, for a small amount of data such a 2GB. DropBox is one. You could also set up multiple accounts, but I think only one in use at a time, by using multiple emails to register each account, if you needed more free space, and they have paid for options as well.

Cheers and Regards

Then for point 1) shadow copies are definitely a good as they can store a lot more than one version of each file store one partition (the shadow copies can be stored on anther drive). If this doesn't suit your need, then 7zip or any decent archiver with command line interface might be easily scripted to do the job.

your suggestion

my head

I do appreciate the advice, but I know nothing about scripting, I was really just looking for a pre-made program - but thanks. I guess I'll stick with 2 separate programs to get the jobs done.

Then for point 1) shadow copies are definitely a good as they can store a lot more than one version of each file store one partition (the shadow copies can be stored on anther drive). If this doesn't suit your need, then 7zip or any decent archiver with command line interface might be easily scripted to do the job.

Then it might be useful if you told us exactly why you are trying to do this. We might be able to suggest a better solution if we better understood your true needs, rather than helping you do what you think you want when that might not be the best way to do it. Just a thought

Cheers and Regards