I have a 160GB external HD just sitting here and I know I should probably put it to use and back up my HD. I know about Arconis True Image and Norton Ghost create drive images that can restore your HD in a jiffy. Are there any other more cost effective ways to back up the entire HD? This laptop has already failed once and i think its about to go again. Plus I will be getting a new one for school and want to transfer my stuff over easily. Thanks.
The external hard drive and the software you mentioned would be a very good solution. If you are just talking about data then you can burn it to a DVD if you have a DVD burner. If not the a regular CDRW would work also but not hold as much information. If you are talking about Gigs upon gigs of data then you can use one of those of site storage companies. They are usually pretty easy to set up and they will encrypt your data so that only you hvae access to it and you can set it up to do weekly or monthly back ups. If you want to go this route or look into it let me know and I can get you the information to one that I have met.
I forgot to mention before that I use two different back up precautions. I have a secondary hard drive in my system that I back up all my data to weekly and then at the end of the month I back the secondary drive up to an external hard drive. This would not work with your laptop though since you cant put two drives physically in the laptop. But you can perform the same basic function by partitioning your hard drive into 2 parts.
I've used Casper XP extensively and have been pleased with it's reliability and speed. Currently using it to duplicate a standard software install on 35 new PC's. (It is doing a complete copy of a 40GB drive in 14 minutes.) Also recommended for use as a backup program - you can find more here: http://www.fssdev.com/products/casperxp/ PC Magazine gave Casper good marks also: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1606870,00.asp Good luck!! 8)
You did not say what O/S your using??? If your getting a new laptop and you have the original CD's that came with the old laptop you really don't need a clone copy, unless you have software loaded with no CD's to reload. If you try to copy this clone to the new laptop your asking for driver problems. I would just do a data backup and save the money on the clone software. If you have WinXP Pro is has a great backup program. If you have the home version, it's not loaded, but it's secretly hiding on the CD. Here is how to get it started. Insert the XP CD, Start, Run, NTBACKUP.MSI (It's in the folder D:\Valueadd\msft\ntbackup where D: is the letter of your CD drive.) This will launch the Windows Backup Utility Installation Wizard, which will install the utility automatically. When it is finished, click "Finish." If your looking for a great "on the fly" data backup try Second Copy 97. It's free and does a great job of backup behind the scenes while you work. Make sure you pick the "97" one, it has no trial period but is an older version. http://www.centered.com/download.html If your going to clone to an USB external from your laptop make sure you try a boot from it before you consider it a good backup. Ghosting to a USB external is sometimes faulty, not often, but it does occur. Remember only boot on the laptop it was cloned from. If you try to boot it on any other machine it will make changes to the original copy. Remember to do a virus and spyware check before the clone. Otherwise you have a permanent problem every time you use it.
