Earlier today I had a hard drive failure on my laptop. I had lots of stuff saved to other media (CD & DVD) but still had some stuff that I will never see again. What's a good automated solution for backing up my PC? I want something that I don't have to mess with much. Something like an external hard drive or tape drive??

Hmmm, NAS or "network accessible storage".

I personally make a USB external hard drive and use Norton Ghost to ghost an image of my internal hard drive to the USB drive - that way if it ever crashes, I can just ghost the image back onto the new drive and my computer will run just like it did the last time it was booted/backed up.

Thanks--that's what I was leaning towards. I am ready to order ghost--is Seagate the way to go for a USB drive? Can you set ghost to do daily images? This is the second time in two years I have had this happen and I want a good backup plan this time.




Hmmm, NAS or "network accessible storage".

I personally make a USB external hard drive and use Norton Ghost to ghost an image of my internal hard drive to the USB drive - that way if it ever crashes, I can just ghost the image back onto the new drive and my computer will run just like it did the last time it was booted/backed up.

I am not sure on the "daily image" thing w/Ghost. I haven't fully explored what it's capable of, I literally use it for mirroring drives to back things up.

As for externals, I just love seagate products. I typically build my own USB drive, it's much cheaper. I normally get the cheapest IDE Seagate drive I can find online and bundle it with one of these Bytecc cases:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817145347

I would use NewEgg to buy the case and the drive if it were me, but obviously it's your call :).

Assembly is very easy - take the drive out of the bag, remove the external $25 enclosure, mount the drive i nthe enclosure, hook up the power and data cable to the drive, close up the drive case, plug it in and you're good to go. Be sure not to drop the case when the drive is in it (this is true with any USB hard drive)

I run backups for a medium sized business with a 6-computer network.

I use external Iomega USB hard drives. Building your own hard drive in USB enclosure is a better option now, unless you're technically squeamish and can afford a bit more to buy a pre-packaged drive.

I'd recommend Norton Ghost 9 software, since it can run in Windows (most other stuff still reboots and runs in DOS). *** BUT *** If you are running server software (Windows 2000/2003 Server), you can't use Ghost 9. You'd have to use Ghost 2003 (which still runs in DOS).

Norton Ghost 9 does have scheduling, so you can have it run daily backups.

Thanks to all--I ordered ghost and a seagate usb drive--cheaper to make my own but I was feeling lazy.

Thanks to all--I ordered ghost and a seagate usb drive--cheaper to make my own but I was feeling lazy.
If you don't mind sharing, where did you order it from? This is exactly what I need to do. I'm to lazy, in a hurry or just can't remember to run a back up often enough to be beneficial.

I really want a portable external so I can carry it with me when I travel. In case my desk top is stolen, burned, or struck by lightning I'll be able to recover my data.

If you don't mind sharing, where did you order it from? This is exactly what I need to do. I'm to lazy, in a hurry or just can't remember to run a back up often enough to be beneficial.

I really want a portable external so I can carry it with me when I travel. In case my desk top is stolen, burned, or struck by lightning I'll be able to recover my data.

They have nice prices on them at Sam's club or Costco. I always order hard drives from them or from Newegg.com. If you have any old drives laying around, you can buy an empty enclosure from Newegg and put the drive in it. That is what I did, and it saved me a lot of money.

Depending on the amount of storage you need, you have options. The standard external drives use a full size hard drive, so they are kind of large. They have the benefit of havng 300+ megabytes of storage. The down side is they are larger, and have to be plugged into a wall jack for power. That means two cords, one with a power brick. They can be a pain to travel with.

There are also some that use notebook drives. They are a lot smaller, and some don't have to be plugged into the wall. They can take their power from the USB port. These would be nice if you used them primarily on the road because there is no power cord or power brick to mess with, and they are small and light. They usually are slower, though, and have much smaller capacity (maybe 80 megabytes or so).

There are some newer ones out that don't use a hard drive at all, and have no moving parts. They only hold maybe 5 megabytes, but they are small enough to fit in your shirt pocket. The only cable is the one that goes to your USB port.

If I was buying a drive to use only on the road, I would get one of the smaller two drives. If I was getting it for home/office use only, I would get a nice fast one with a 300+ megabyte drive. For both, I would look into the smaller ones that are powered off the USB port.

Slonaker

i always order everything from newegg.com. you cannot, absolutely cannot, beat their price or quality of service anywhere. i rarely ever buy computer parts locally, especially not from major chain outlets like Beast Buy or Circuit Sh*tty because they markup everything at prices of 10%-40% above cost for computer hardware and for cables (especially printer cables and network cables), markup can be as much as 400%!!!

Ok, here's what I am considering. It's the Seagate USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive. It looks like the 100 gig is the best bang for the buck. Considering that I have a 60 gig in my desk top and it still has 70% freespace I think that 100 gig would give me more than enough storage.- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822154407

It looks pretty cool too-

http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/22-154-407-02.jpg

I have two things I am trying to accomplish with this. I want to be able to automatically back up "everything" on my desktop. Do I need to use Norton Ghost 10.0 or can I use the back up utility supplied with XP?

The other thing I would like to do is be able to acces this data while on the road. I just bought my daughter a nice Dell laptop. Will I be able to access all my data stored on the external drive even if I don't have the same software loaded on the laptop?

Damn man, that is expensive. I can get a 250GB hard drive and a $40 Bytecc case and make that drive :crazy:.

Here's the deal with regard to your questions - and some people will have a different POV on this:

If you use Norton Ghost, you will get an exact replica of the drive - you have two choices: You can mirror the entire computer hard drive over to the USB drive - then it's like you're carrying around your home computer on the portable drive. Alternately, you can create an "image" of the drive - which is basically just a big binary file with all of your little files bundled into that one big file....but you need to have Ghost on any computer that you want to view it with. So - to answer both of your questions, yes, Ghost is kickass...I prefer the 2003 version myself, but it will do what you want.

Alternately, MSBackup, the native backup utility for Windows, it will save everything into one big image file also. Any Windows based computer can browse these files (no special software needed), and every time you need to access them, you need to open MSBackup, open the image file, browse through it, then manually extract that file you want. You can't re-bundle it into the image! At least not that I know of.

My opinion: Ghost all the way. Mirror your current hard drive onto it. You will have direct access to your files. No special stuff needed. If your current drive ever dies, you can literally remove the drive from the USB case and pop it into your current computer and boot like nothing ever happened :D

That assumes the USB drive is a 3.5" drive (standard desktop) and not a 2.5" drive (laptop drive)

Damn man, that is expensive. I can get a 250GB hard drive and a $40 Bytecc case and make that drive :crazy:.

<<<<<<SNIP>>>>>>

That assumes the USB drive is a 3.5" drive (standard desktop) and not a 2.5" drive (laptop drive)

The drive he linked to is a 2.5 inch drive that runs off USB power. That is why it is low capacity and high price. It should be VERY portable, though.

I'd like to have one. :)

Slonaker

Very portable....VERY prone to damage. Most can't even handle a 12" drop onto a carpeted surface (this would be a low nap, non-plush carpet with concrete underneat like in an office). I know this from personal experience, after destroying two drives. :D