Is There A faster Way To Backup??

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 11:26 am

Hey there iso happy hunters, I did a backup the other day of my HD, it has around 250GB of data on it which doesn't include any video files, using the Windows 7 (32 bit) built-in backup program and an external Seagate 1TB HD I set it to begin at around 8pm and it didn't finish until around 2am, Is it just me or is that very slow, both HD's are formatted to NTFS, another strange thing is that the used space on the Seagate is showing 455GB, That can't be right can it, I was also wondering if any of you guys out there in forum land had a better/faster way in which I could backup my PC using the Seagate drive as I would rather not use the internet.

Thanks for your time, patients, knowledge and help.

P.S. If there is any more information anyone needs please comment as I will be checking this thread regularly.

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 11:47 am

make an image file(.iso) of ur system. we have many posts on it .. im to sleepy to go look for the links lol.

EDIT: on an external HDD or SSD

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 11:57 am

The speed its backing up can depend on what is being backed up over, like usb 2 or usb 3, and if anything else going on if your doing over network for example.

Not sure if its the windows tool that slow, but you could try using a free backup program like the below which are specically geared to this, and will prob have more features:

Comodo BackUp - http://backup.comodo.com/download.html
AceBackup - http://www.acebackup.com/
EASEUS Recovery and Backup - http://www.easeus-deletedrecovery.com/

You can do differential or synchronised backups, where once it has done a full backup once, it then only backs up anything saved since the last backup. So wont take anywhere near as long.

Might be others in the freeware thread too:
http://ca.isohunt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=347661&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

you can also clone your hd as sid says. Think clonezilla is one free app for that. Again think theres that and a few more in the freeware thread.

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 12:11 pm

............ don't let the wife drive.

an image is the way to go, an iso that is.

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 3:57 pm

Loads of software as already said this one is not bad..
http://www..(de)/products/sat.hdclone.html

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 5:23 pm

It's going slow because your using an external hd connected by usb, a sata connection will fix that. As for the size, if you have only used that drive to backup using windows know that it will keep as many backups as it can untill it reaches it's limit. you can change this setting, also you can go to disk clean up and delete all but the last restore point. I don't run scheduled backups just one with a fresh install with all the drivers ect. And then i do a backup with all my software installed that way i got 2 good clean backups of the os. Then for personal files and stuff, whatever i want to keep goes to another hd( this i stay on top of my self no need to have a running process 24/7 to do that). So the best backup software for me is the good ol'e "Drag and Drop" avg transfer speeds 100 MBs. Wink

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 6:03 pm

I also back up quite a lot of stuff online, are you able to do that ?

Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2011 7:52 am

sidarial wrote:

make an image file(.iso) of ur system. we have many posts on it .. im to sleepy to go look for the links lol.

EDIT: on an external HDD or SSD

As far as I know if I were to just make an image file of my system I wouldn't have access to the data stored, if I accidentally deleted a file I couldn't just restore that one file I would have to restore the entire system so that a system image has never appealed to me.

bazzer101 wrote:

The speed its backing up can depend on what is being backed up over, like usb 2 or usb 3, and if anything else going on if your doing over network for example.

Not sure if its the windows tool that slow, but you could try using a free backup program like the below which are specically geared to this, and will prob have more features:

Comodo BackUp - http://backup.comodo.com/download.html
AceBackup - http://www.acebackup.com/
EASEUS Recovery and Backup - http://www.easeus-deletedrecovery.com/

You can do differential or synchronised backups, where once it has done a full backup once, it then only backs up anything saved since the last backup. So wont take anywhere near as long.

Might be others in the freeware thread too:
http://ca.isohunt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=347661&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

you can also clone your hd as sid says. Think clonezilla is one free app for that. Again think theres that and a few more in the freeware thread.

Thanks for all this bazzer I will be looking into these suggestions.

robmead wrote:

............ don't let the wife drive.

an image is the way to go, an iso that is.

Don't have a wife, I play for the other team. Wink

thatazzzz wrote:

Loads of software as already said this one is not bad..
http://www..(de)/products/sat.hdclone.html

I think there might be something wrong with your link tazz, it said server not found. lol.

JamesHotwire wrote:

It's going slow because your using an external hd connected by usb, a sata connection will fix that. As for the size, if you have only used that drive to backup using windows know that it will keep as many backups as it can untill it reaches it's limit. you can change this setting, also you can go to disk clean up and delete all but the last restore point. I don't run scheduled backups just one with a fresh install with all the drivers ect. And then i do a backup with all my software installed that way i got 2 good clean backups of the os. Then for personal files and stuff, whatever i want to keep goes to another hd( this i stay on top of my self no need to have a running process 24/7 to do that). So the best backup software for me is the good ol'e "Drag and Drop" avg transfer speeds 100 MBs.

It's an external hard drive so I can't use a sata cable (as far as know), It only has one backup on there, the one we are speaking of, it is a new drive and it performed a backup for the first time the other day, so how there is 455GB of data from a PC that has only 250GB of data on it I can't say, I don't use scheduled backups either, I prefer to do them myself when I feel the need after I have put important data or drivers on my PC.

robmead wrote:

I also back up quite a lot of stuff online, are you able to do that ?

I don't really like to back things up online, I have also never done it before.

Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2011 2:15 pm

Hmm the link seems to be working for me strange ..
Also Paragon and Acronis are also things to look at..
The Backup Capsule is also handy in the Paragon download as is the P2V Migration ..

Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2011 2:44 pm

was the external hd already NTFS or did you format it yourself? reason i ask is that some come in NTFS and some in fat(32). if you format an external drive using the windows formatting service or commands and the drive is more than 500g you loose half or more sometimes. not sure why but its a common problem. i use swissknife to format, very easy programme and does any size without loss in capacity, cant help you with the speed as i only drag and drop to back up sorry. obviously usb 3.0 is the fastest if using that type of connection.

Posted: Sat Oct 29, 2011 12:19 pm

Off topic I know, but every time I see that avatar of yours tazzz I can't help but think of a guy that used to be a mod here named 8mm. He used to use the same one.

Posted: Sat Oct 29, 2011 2:18 pm

Kill4nothin wrote:

Off topic I know, but every time I see that avatar of yours tazzz I can't help but think of a guy that used to be a mod here named 8mm. He used to use the same one.

I do remember him was not that bad of guy he did post some funny pics lol.. The last avatar I seen of his was a scan of his baby ..

Posted: Sun Oct 30, 2011 2:32 pm

thetazzzz wrote:

Hmm the link seems to be working for me strange ..
Also Paragon and Acronis are also things to look at..
The Backup Capsule is also handy in the Paragon download as is the P2V Migration ..

Just done a simple backup to the drive I mentioned with Paragon and it was great, a clear winner for me, it took 2hr 49min and used 236GB of space on the drive, I think it's good as the only thing I left out was my "Videos" folder.

Thanks tazzzz and the rest of you for your time and effort I really appreciate it. Very Happy

Posted: Sun Oct 30, 2011 2:43 pm

No probs mate all here to help each other Wink

Posted: Sun Oct 30, 2011 3:35 pm

Nice thread guys, some good links in here. Am about to buy more storage myself, partly to back-up existing stuff. About 18months ago i had an external seagate hdd that packed up, and hadnt backed anything up. Rolling Eyes