Best network differntial backup/imaging software...

Hey guys I was wondering about moving over to an automated backup system and I'm hoping I got this in the right section(Storage perhaps? this is Network related )

I want some opinions on software that will:

-Run on my computers
-Do a network backup to a simple SMB fileshare that is mapped to said computer

-Must do a imaged backup of a selected HD (that is, HD fails, reimage, done) IF THAT IS NOT AVAILABLE THEN...
-Must do a full backup of all files
-Must not leave previous backup files, I want only the latest backup stored and nothing else, I honestly do not care about revisions I just want my data backed up!

and most importantly it has to be a differential(?) backup in the fact that it does a one time full backup and then everytime after that only backs up changes and additions into ONE file

I'm sick and tired of looking around for backup programs that are bulky and annoying also the bit about one file, I hate it when a backup program does its backup and has 100s of files in a directory or leaves the previous backup without deleting it! Is there anything either free, consumer or professional that you guys can give me to consider, I'm sure most of you being network or system admins run into this often.

Am I wishful in thinking such a beast exists? Should I be better off just writng a batchfile or script to do this? I've considered that option but haven't really thought about how I'd handle the differential part of it

Thanks!

Differential has 1 main backup file then every change between that backup and the current version. So for example if you did a main backup every Friday and differentials every night if your computer died on Thursday you restore the one from last Friday and then the one from Wednesday night.

Is this for personal use or business?

How often are you wanting changes to be backed up?

While I don't like their antivirus software, Symantec's Backup Exec has a piece called continuous protection server. Every time a file changes it rights only the bit changes back to the server.

http://www.symantec.com/system-recovery-server-edition System Recovery does a image type that I think you are wanting.

I read that same definition of differential somewhere too and it was the closest thing I THINK to what I'd like

I also read about the Continuous protection and didn't know if that was an "industry wide" term most people would recognize but it seems thats exaclty what I'd like but I think it would be a little too invasive for my taste, I'll look into it.

I'm into simple clean and practical, meaning single file, low resouces and something that is a standard or widely used, I don't really want to be tied to one product if I can avoid it unless it is something proven robust and widely used

I guess I'm looking for something in between the two, nothing as invasive and "continuous" like symantec but at the same time similer, by that I mean it checks for file differences at the beginning of each backup. For instance....

One main backup today and from that point on I want a weekly backup run at X time that basically replaces or adds only the files that have changed since the last backup was done.

I thought about just writing a batch/script file that would backup my system and then write one that checked that backup against the current system files and their last modified date and replace/add them to the backup...then I thought about how it would be faster to have some sort of index it checks instead of checking each file over the network....and then I realized I could not only script this but code it and then... and then etc....It dawned on me that someone has probably done this already and why reinvent the wheel if I don't have to lol

Plus the added benefit of being able to do it as an image instead of individual files.

I know I'm being picky and I'll take what I can get and what you guys have used is worth a shot

I am a home user but I work with clients that could benefit from something like this too and I'd love to have something I've used myself that I can fall back onto instead of hastily installing Norton Ghost or some other packaged product on a whim when I don't even use it myself

Also I realized that I can just do weekly full backups from the definition I just gave and no that isn't what I'd like to do, its too much network traffic and hard drive thrashing I don't care for...I see it as copying my entire HD every week, which in some way seems wasteful or dumb or a reduction of life for my HD's and just not efficient in my eyes (yes yes I know the MTBF's are high, HD's are desinged to do that etc etc) but I prefer that I use as little network and computer resources to accomplish this, I just believe checking and copying the differences seems faster and more efficient then just copying over the entire HD every week...I prefer to think of it as a sync to a network drive...I think that best describes what I'd like to do!

One more thing, all software must run on the client, I don't want to run any server software, I'd just like to copy backups to a simple NAS that uses SMB file shares...

what I gave you there are two different programs Continuous Protection Server is part of Backup Exec. System Recovery makes an image that can bring a computer from bare metal to running OS in a few minutes.

There are two types of backup desires do you want to make sure if a machine dies you can bring it back up and running quickly do or do you want protection against a single file needing to be recovered?

Backup Exec (w/ CPS) would be for a single file. System Recovery is for a entire system restore.

Windows has a built in backup program. That alone might be able to do what you want.

Files have backup flags that handle that stuff for you, no needing to check. When you do a full backup that flag is unchecked. when the file changes that flag is reset. When you do a incremental backup that file is unchecked again. but that also means that to get to today you have to run the full backup then every single incremental to get to today. for differential it will leave the file checked so that every time it does the backup it knows that that the files need to be backed up from the last full backup.

I've played with the windows backup and either I didn't see it(more like didn't bother to look TOO hard) or it doesn't have the control I want over it, there is an option with in the the backup settings (all in Win7 btw) that makes a system image + backs up your files, I set this to backup my main drive and after a few weeks noticed that it just kept adding and adding backups and filling up my NAS and not deleting the previous images leaving me to pick through the backup files and delete the older instances. This automatically put me off and I do not want to deal with having to manually delete obsolete backups (again I dont't care for revisional backup, the latest one is good)

As for how granular I want to be with the actual backup? I don't think it's too important that I need single files that I backed up to be picked out for restore, this is mostly for cases which have happened 2 times too many in my life (HD crashes) that I want to avoid but as always being able to pull a file from backup would be nice. A proprietary backup file type is ok, if its browseable its even better, heck I'll even settle with just a neat folder but the way I've seen Norton Ghost, Windows Backup and Time Machine and one other "higher end" backup software save and manage their backup was enough to make me cry...

Also those two you mentioned can they be run on the clients themselves or will one of my servers need to add another service to manage backups now too

Thank you for the insight, I hope I've been as clear as possible

Backup exec would require another server. There is a server side that controls everything then a client part.

I think System Recovery is just a client program. I've never actually used it so can't say for sure.

For windows 7 there is the option that it keeps writing file after file... or you can change the settings and tell it to only keep the latest system image. that would be the one that you want.

Not sure how that works when you do a full then only differentials. not sure if it would be smart enough to deal with that or not. Or if you can set the two like that, might only be able to do a full every so often.

I understand what you are wanting. I just don't know enough about every single backup program ever created to be able to tell you go look at program xyz. As my backup experience has been in two areas. Backing up my machine which I do a full system image every week. And then servers where I use backup Exec. But since you are looking for something completely different than the two ways I do things I can help you

Hopefully I've asked enough questions for you to give enough info now that somebody else will see your thread and be able to tell you exactly what you should look at.

Ahh I haven't been resting, tonight I've been searching!

Turns out the windows backup tool does not have an auto delete option(when used to do full system images), I've read up about it and yes there are (convoluted) options for managing how much storage a backup takes and how it deletes prior backups and the file structure is a mess and all that basically means I don't want to touch it

I'm leaning towards using the command line utility wbadmin to launch a system image backup every week and and having that same task delete the last backup before copying the new one.

May I ask how you do your full system imaging, you said you use backup exec for your servers which it looks like I won't be doing but I didn't see how you do your system images? manually? or is it automated?

You've been a great help, if anything you've motivated me enough to dedicate some time to do some proper research lol

ntba said:

Ahh I haven't been resting, tonight I've been searching!

Turns out the windows backup tool does not have an auto delete option(when used to do full system images), I've read up about it and yes there are (convoluted) options for managing how much storage a backup takes and how it deletes prior backups and the file structure is a mess and all that basically means I don't want to touch it

I'm leaning towards using the command line utility wbadmin to launch a system image backup every week and and having that same task delete the last backup before copying the new one.

May I ask how you do your full system imaging, you said you use backup exec for your servers which it looks like I won't be doing but I didn't see how you do your system images? manually? or is it automated?

You've been a great help, if anything you've motivated me enough to dedicate some time to do some proper research lol

Click to expand...

I have backup exec set to do a full backup of all files every night (Monday - Friday) of our servers. Have a server that is set as the backup server and collects all the files and write them to a tape. My main concern is to be able to restore a file if accidentally is deleted more so than being concerned that the entire server will die and need to be brought back from the dead. I also need 30 days of backups, sometimes more.