External backup advert in recent tog mag

[Eoghan]

Hi all,

could someone please tell me of the company who produce (Ithink) an external backup medium with software.

i think it has been advertised in some more recent practical photography magazines. i'd be interested in checking them out.

REASON:

my sis in law wants an automated backup-to-external HDD facility and i think those guys offer such a device.

thanks

Eoghan

 

[tigre64]

You should be able to use any type of external HDD (usb connected or network connected) and there is also a free sync tool from Microsoft (i'm sure there are others for other operating systems) the Microsoft one is called SyncToy 2.0

you can use task sheduler in M$ to automate the synctoy process.

 

[mrgubby]

I *think* some of the external HDs come with a button that you press & it does everything for you.

 

[Chappers]

Quiet a few companies supply external HD with backup software. It does sometimes depend on the price you are paying if you get the software or not. I've had drives from Freecom and Maxtor both of which supply backup software. You need to look on the spec or box to see which does or doesn't.

However beware. Maxtor SW wont talk to a Freecom drive and vice versa. So if you have more than one drive they have to be the same make.

Also most backup software compares files and dates on both the computer and external drive to see which needs updating. If you have a fairly large collection of files and images it can take hours ( literally). Sometime the best option is to simply drag and drop files from the computer to the backup drive

 

[Dangleman]

I *think* some of the external HDs come with a button that you press & it does everything for you.

The "Maxtor One Touch" is the range you're thinking of here I'd bet. Not got one myself though.

I use Microsoft's free Synctoy program for backing up between drives. It's really easy to use and the principles and techical gubbins involved are the same, I think.

 

[EasySlideScan]

also you want to make sure that if you have a data loss in your main source, then you need to be able to access you backed up data easily. So if your using a 3rd party backup tool, you'd need to install this to recover the data. If however you've just copied the data then it can be recovered from any PC / Mac.