Omega Owners Forum
Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: Viral_Jim on 11 July 2017, 17:44:08
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As I know there are a few technical bods on here I was hoping someone might be able to help me out. SWMBO and I have a laptop each (both win10 home) and I could do with a solution to backup essential documents on a regular basis (probably nightly).
What I'm after is a program running in the background that periodically copies the contents of a specific directory on each laptop to a local removable media so they can be easily grabbed if a HDD fails and also pushes the contents up to a secure cloud drive.
I'm happy to pay (at the very least I doubt the cloud storage will be free) but I don't need an enterprise grade tool and the kind of price tag that would attract. Also not interested in changing the OS on either machine, mine I CBA and SWMBO runs a number of tools for her business that would cost £'00s to change to a different OS.
Any ideas/experience greatly welcomed. :y
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I use https://www.cloudberrylab.com/backup/windows.aspx
To backup my files and folders to Amazon s3 I use it as a realtime backup service so it is continually scanning the folders and uploading any changes.
It costs $29 for the software and Amazon s3 is about £8 per month for around 30gb of data.
It works for me.
Cheers
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Cheers chrisio,
I will have a look at that solution and the price seems in the ballpark of what I was hoping to pay. :y
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Google Drive is excellent. I use that for my work stuff - I pay a couple of quid a month for 100gb. I've used it for years and never had any problems.
I use Crashplan for my archive stuff. It's $60 a year for unlimited storage. I'm currently uploading about 1gb to it.
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Google Drive is excellent. I use that for my work stuff - I pay a couple of quid a month for 100gb. I've used it for years and never had any problems.
I use Crashplan for my archive stuff. It's $60 a year for unlimited storage. I'm currently uploading about 1gb to it.
The way I read google drive info, you have a folder on your desktop, and anything in that folder is synced between google and your machine automatically. Is that correct?
If so then it's just what I'm looking for :). But, that being the case, what do you use crashplan for?
Sorry for all the questions. This is all new to me ;)
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google drive is great and free for under 15GB (which is a lot of documents). not good for large outlook mail files. other than that if you have less than 15GB no need for anything fancy or expensive. except google drive or at least the free version only seems to keep versions of each file going back 30 days
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correction google drive allows you to set individual files as 'keep forever' this seems to mean every change is kept not just the last 30 days worth . 30 days is plenty mind.
plus https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2017/06/14/google-backup-and-sync-could-bring-full-computer-backups-google-drive/397635001/
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The only thing I have found with the likes of google drive/one drive etc is that it only backs up what you put into that folder. The other way to do it is to use another back up program which uses google drive as its backup location - that way you can keep all your normal file structure and it does the rest.
Cheers
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Ive done loads of working and playing around with Cloud Storage and they all offer similar but different features depending on what you are trying to achieve. There are 2 main types System and Hardrive Back up and File Back Up, Sharing etc, the latter is what your after.
The Main Leaders for File Back Ups are OneDrive, Dropbox and Google Drive, OneDrive comes free with Windows (5Gb space) which can be upgraded up to 1TB of space either on its own with monthly subscription or gets bundled into newer Office Suits, both Dropbox and Google Drive can be upgraded by monthly subscription.
OneDrive offers a simple back up for Photos, Documents etc, and a simple sharing across Devices but starts to become painfully horrid to use when you start trying to sync different Files or Folders of your choice at any one time and its Web Only Interface is painfully slow, Google and Dropbox are similar in different respects.
If your looking at a free (10 to 20gb) or paid subscription (500mb to 2TB) I would highly recommend pCloud, it just works and is fast as its its Web access, and is more of a case of what it doesn't do in terms of features. You can download its PC App for simple Files and Folder Syncing and or you can use the Mapped Network Drive App, so the entire Cloud Storage appears as another Hard drive on your PC, you can Back Up your OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive into the pCloud storage so all your Clouds appear in the pCloud account, Remote Upload ie, Upload large files from a URL directly so you dont have to download a File and then upload to again to pCloud, Image and Video Conversations in the Cloud, ie upload a 1080p Video and then chose to download 720p or 480p for Mobile, it has a built in Office Viewer, Encryption etc, the feature list is endless. :y
https://www.pcloud.com/
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have any suppliers cracked the problem of backing up a largish (9GB) outlook pst file to the cloud while it is in use? didn't work with google drive last time i looked :(
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Thanks chaps :y
One day in and so far I'm happy with google drive. Previously all my stuff used to live under My Documents somewhere, so just pointing everything to the google drive folder was no biggie for me.
I find being able to view documents on my phone more useful than I thought it would be so that's a bonus.
I dont really need an email or contacts backup solution as that all sits within Google or iCloud anyway. :)
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have any suppliers cracked the problem of backing up a largish (9GB) outlook pst file to the cloud while it is in use? didn't work with google drive last time i looked :(
Nope, and never will be. The PST file format was never designed for that type of use, and was never designed for that size. MS have been gradually increasing what its maximum recommendation is, from 20Mb a few years back to I believe 2Gb now. In all cases, it was for fast storage only (ie, local or local LAN only). Anything else will corrupt regularly.
Outlook is designed for an Exchange backend, and you can have large storage on Exchange servers nowadays. Any other usage is not recommended, you are far better off with a lighter weight email client that can actually do IMAP properly (no version of Outlook can yet (without eventually corrupting itself)). Its usable with POP3, but nobody really should be using that in this day and age.
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The PST file format was never designed for that type of use, and was never designed for that size. MS have been gradually increasing what its maximum recommendation is, from 20Mb a few years back to I believe 2Gb now.
"In Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007, the maximum size of a Unicode pst-file has been limited to 20GB. In Outlook 2010, 2013 and 2016, this limit has been set to 50GB. You can increase (but also decrease) this limit via the Registry or via Group Policies."
https://www.msoutlook.info/question/increase-pst-file-size-limit
also https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/982577/the-file-size-limits-of-.pst-and-.ost-files-are-larger-in-outlook-2010
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"In Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007, the maximum size of a Unicode pst-file has been limited to 20GB. In Outlook 2010, 2013 and 2016, this limit has been set to 50GB. You can increase (but also decrease) this limit via the Registry or via Group Policies."
https://www.msoutlook.info/question/increase-pst-file-size-limit
also https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/982577/the-file-size-limits-of-.pst-and-.ost-files-are-larger-in-outlook-2010
If it's fundamentally broken, making it bigger doesn't help. ;)
As I found, back in the dark ages before I ditched outlook, even putting the PST file on a network drive ends in tears. It really is a product that belongs in the bin these days.
Besides, most people want to share emails among multiple devices these days, which Outlook doesn't support as the IMAP support is crippled. Get a decent IMAP service, put in place some means of backing up the folders on the server and then use a decent IMAP client on your device(s) of choice and never be away from your inbox. :y
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and never be away from your inbox. :y
I am increasingly unsure that this is actually a good thing! ;D
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and never be away from your inbox. :y
I am increasingly unsure that this is actually a good thing! ;D
With a suitable procmail filter it's fine. He says, from the airfield, having given up on work for the day to go flying.
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;D Ah, memories.. I used to run my own mailserver and manage everything locally - these days I just ship everything to gmail. Laziness > data security :-[ :-X
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The PST file format was never designed for that type of use, and was never designed for that size. MS have been gradually increasing what its maximum recommendation is, from 20Mb a few years back to I believe 2Gb now.
"In Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007, the maximum size of a Unicode pst-file has been limited to 20GB. In Outlook 2010, 2013 and 2016, this limit has been set to 50GB. You can increase (but also decrease) this limit via the Registry or via Group Policies."
https://www.msoutlook.info/question/increase-pst-file-size-limit
also https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/982577/the-file-size-limits-of-.pst-and-.ost-files-are-larger-in-outlook-2010
The maximum sizes are enforced to stop them growing too big, because they will corrupt.
OST's by their nature will be local. PSTs need to be local as well, or moderately sized ones can be on fast local LAN. PSTs are really not that much refined from the MMF files of Microsoft Mail, and in a former life when I looked after one of the largest MS Mail systems globally, I can assure you, even locally, you could guarantee corruption after about 20Mb. "Exchange" (as in the client) and "Inbox" (the mail client in consumer Windows 95) also had the same limitations - not a hard limit, but a "if you go over this, you will bugger it" limit. Incidentally, both Exchange and Inbox would also corrupt an MS Mail Postoffice under similar scenarios. Bless them.
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As I found, back in the dark ages before I ditched outlook, even putting the PST file on a network drive ends in tears. It really is a product that belongs in the bin these days.
Outlook is fine. As long as you understand what it is. Its an email client for MS Exchange mail servers. Works really well in that scenario. Completely useless for non MS Exchange servers.
Under MS Exchange, there is no need for PST files (as if you have half an ounce of intelligence, you will have all your mail on the server, not local), so the problem goes away. Completely.
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MS exchange being another thing I wouldn't touch with a barge pole. Got that T shirt. ;)
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MS exchange being another thing I wouldn't touch with a barge pole. Got that T shirt. ;)
Well, yes, it has a place in life, but ain't for everyone. And doesn't work too well if you don't use an ActiveSync client like Outlook. And server side, its a memory hog. A proper memory hog.
But it does have a place in life :y
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As a user, of a constant 10yrs or so, I have found outlook with M$ Exchange to work very well. TBH the biggest downer of those 10yrs was being moved from blackberry to apple for my personal communication device.
I love my personal iPhone and loved my iPad until I sold it (to buy a stained glass window). But as a tool for email, messaging and telephony, the blackberry was far superior.
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As a user, of a constant 10yrs or so, I have found outlook with M$ Exchange to work very well. TBH the biggest downer of those 10yrs was being moved from blackberry to apple for my personal communication device.
I love my personal iPhone and loved my iPad until I sold it (to buy a stained glass window). But as a tool for email, messaging and telephony, the blackberry was far superior.
That's weird, as I found opposite, with Gooseberry being cumbersome (yes, we did use BES (unreliable piece of junk)), with crApple being near seamless, except Mail, Calendar, Notes and Tasks all being separate apps on iDevice.
We now have to use Win8/10 phones. Wow, what a step backwards in usability.
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We now have to use Win8/10 phones. Wow, what a step backwards in usability.
Thankfully I've not been subjected to that. I understand it's a real dog egg!
That said I've just installed windows 10 on my new/old laptop and I rather like it. I took against it on my work device but it transpires that that's because whoever chose the default setup and layout made a real pigs ear of it and prevented users from changing it.
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We now have to use Win8/10 phones. Wow, what a step backwards in usability.
Thankfully I've not been subjected to that. I understand it's a real dog egg!
That said I've just installed windows 10 on my new/old laptop and I rather like it. I took against it on my work device but it transpires that that's because whoever chose the default setup and layout made a real pigs ear of it and prevented users from changing it.
Hell hath no fury like an IT manager scorned :D
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We now have to use Win8/10 phones. Wow, what a step backwards in usability.
Thankfully I've not been subjected to that. I understand it's a real dog egg!
That said I've just installed windows 10 on my new/old laptop and I rather like it. I took against it on my work device but it transpires that that's because whoever chose the default setup and layout made a real pigs ear of it and prevented users from changing it.
Desktop Win8 was a great OS with a piss-poor interface. Win10 is a much better interface, but a not so great underlying OS (particularly last years version).
Windows Phone 8 or 10 is just plain, errr, crap.
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have any suppliers cracked the problem of backing up a largish (9GB) outlook pst file to the cloud while it is in use? didn't work with google drive last time i looked :(
Your struggle uploading a single file that size up to the cloud, it will probably crap out half way through and fail or want to retry from the beginning again.
If its purely for back up purposes, you could try breaking the file size into segments ie, 100mb or so then uploading, that way if it does crap out it will retry from the last failed segment, but bit of a pain as your have to recreate the file size again on download or recovery. Also remember what the Max File Upload size is for each Cloud Account ie, OneDrive is 10GB max.
Another option is to use a File Uploader that breaks the File size then reconstructs it again once in the Cloud, theres a few around but one I would recommend is Zoom Uploader, its Freeware and works really well, works on just about every Cloud Storage out there. Bit of a pain to set up for each Cloud Account but once done does its job perfectly. It also allows Pause Stop and Resumable Uploading, even between PC Reboots which is really handy for Large Files
http://z-o-o-m.eu/ or http://z-o-o-m.eu/down.htm
Tip with Zoom, once youve set your Cloud Account up, go to Tools/Settings/Connection/HTTP Buffer Size = and set this to the same size or just under your ISP Upload throughput speed (in kB). This will give the fastest upload speed.
ie, Say your ISP upload speed is 5Mb, then 5 divide 8 is 625kB so set the Buffer to 512kB not 1024kB. ;)
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Google Drive is excellent. I use that for my work stuff - I pay a couple of quid a month for 100gb. I've used it for years and never had any problems.
I use Crashplan for my archive stuff. It's $60 a year for unlimited storage. I'm currently uploading about 1gb to it.
The way I read google drive info, you have a folder on your desktop, and anything in that folder is synced between google and your machine automatically. Is that correct?
If so then it's just what I'm looking for :). But, that being the case, what do you use crashplan for?
Sorry for all the questions. This is all new to me ;)
Sorry, been away a couple of days.
I use Google for my business stuff, I have a 100gb plan. I have a Google drive folder on my HDD, and folders inside that. Used that for a few years, no issues whatsoever.
The crashplan is for my personal stuff, because I have a lot of video and photos which add up to around 1TB. Google is too expensive for that kind of storage, so I went with CrashPlan for that. Hope that clarifies it a bit.