Time Machine-esque backup on PC

[burkhartmj]

This has probably been a forum topic already and maybe even on an ep of the show, but I have a USB external I want to do incremental full-drive backups to, but I have no clue what software to use.

I don't particularly care about the interface, as long as it is usable, I couldn't possibly care less if it is flashy or pretty.

Free is always preferred, but pay-for suggestions are welcome too.

[ArmpitOfDeath]

Vista Ultimate has a similar - yet better in many ways, although it requires that you have slightly more than a brain that's easily distracted by shiny silver to use it - facility built in but if you're on XP or other editions of Vista, I'd highly recommend Acronis True Image Home 11. Much more comprehensive than a Time Machine + Superduper combo, and (somewhat surprising to me in real life use) less hassle when it actually comes to crunch time.

[burkhartmj]

Yeah once I get enough money scraped together for ultimate x64 I had planned on using the built-in one, but thanks for the tip on the acronis one, sounds good.

[chris3d]

I'm not sure if Acronis will let you backup files in the same method as Time Machine. It may just erase / backup everytime it runs, which means you are not saving old files, but rather backing up the most recently version of your hard drive. The appeal of Time Machine is that it only backs up new files, or files that have been changed and only erases old backups when the external drive runs out of space.

Acronis may do this, I'm not sure. I just thought this was worth mentioning.

[ArmpitOfDeath]

Any backup worth it's salt does incremental backups with rollbacks. As does Acronis - which does more. There's nothing that unique about Time Machine apart from the fact that they've shiny'd it up and made the operation understandable to even the most mentally challenged of soccer moms.

[chris3d]

I get the feeling you're not exactly an Apple fanboy :) LOL

[burkhartmj]

bit the bullet and got the acronis backup program. It actually works very nicely. So far I have an incremental backup that occurs everyday at 530AM. Dunno how it's gonna handle once the drive is full, but currently I get a new backup file everyday with only the changed files.

[ArmpitOfDeath]

I get the feeling you're not exactly an Apple fanboy :) LOL

[gritted teeth of being trapped in OS X app-land] Being an owner of a brace of what Apple considers 'Pro' hardware yet doing real work, and having more than the minimal brainpower required to keep a Vista install up and running just as well as, if not better than, OS X - you might be right. [/gritted teeth of being trapped in OS X app-land]

[megahz]

Does Acronis allow you to search for or recover single files from backups or do you have to restore an entire backup? I've used them in the past, but haven't look a thier products in about 5 years.

[burkhartmj]

Does Acronis allow you to search for or recover single files from backups or do you have to restore an entire backup? I've used them in the past, but haven't look a thier products in about 5 years.

Haven't needed to restore anything yet, but tried out a file I deleted last night and it was able to pull out just the one file, though how recently changed all depends on how regularly backed up your drive is [of course]. It's not as moron-proof as time machine but if you actually pay attention, it works fine.