How do you backup your system?

Catoosa · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from CoolTrader:

Do I need to consider the possibility of power supply failure and get a backup power supply?

A backup power supply would be nice but expensive to properly setup. I think that would require starting with a server case setup for dual power supplies.

I would suggest looking in the BIOS settings to see if all of the power supply voltages are within 5% of their nominal. If any voltages are out of spec, I would replace the power supply unless you have previously installed a power supply with user adjustable voltages. The voltages can be out of spec on a new power supply or they may drift out of spec with time. Also, the voltages will change as the power supply heats up. I check my voltages both hot and cold about every three months. I learned the hard way that when a voltage is out of spec and everything seems to working fine, do not assume that slow data corruption is not going on in the background. In my case I had a backup HD on the shelf that went back to 16 months previous to go back to and start over from there.

CoolTrader · Aug 23, 2005

I just checked the voltages in BIOS, all within 2% range of error. Under what circumstance should I replace the PS? How long is the life time of a PS?

Catoosa · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from CoolTrader:

I just checked the voltages in BIOS, all within 2% range of error. Under what circumstance should I replace the PS? How long is the life time of a PS?

No problem with your PS voltages. Those voltages are great. I do not think I have ever had a PS with all voltages within 2% of the nominal voltages. PC parts manufactures build their parts to function properly as a minimum within the plus or minus 5% voltage ranges. You can not tell how long your power supply will last (may fail today but will most likely last for many years).

tcosync · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from Catoosa:

I would suggest looking in the BIOS settings to see if all of the power supply voltages are within 5% of their nominal.

Hi Catoosa,

My PSU operates within 2-3% most of the time but I notice from the Voltage monitor that it regularly has spikes beyond 5% for a few seconds each time probably due to added load on the CPU.

Do you think there is a reason for concern? Man, this has me very uneasy now.

Catoosa · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from tcosync:

Hi Catoosa,

My PSU operates within 2-3% most of the time but I notice from the Voltage monitor that it regularly has spikes beyond 5% for a few seconds each time probably due to added load on the CPU.

Do you think there is a reason for concern? Man, this has me very uneasy now.

The power supply voltages I would be looking for to be within 5% of nominal are the 3.3V, 5V, and 12V. If these voltages are out of spec in the BIOS settings, I would change the PS. If I had voltage spikes in any of those voltages that were much beyond the 5% from the nominal, I would be checking the power rating of my power supply (I am going to always be sure I use an adequate PS power rating for the PC I am building). I would not want a power supply with a power rating of less than 350W for the less demanding PC. I use 400W to 450W PS for the average PC and 550W for the more demanding PC loaded down cards and drives.

Holmes · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from gnome:

You really don't want "windows hidden files that can't be replicated by the program".... Cloning programs copy every HD sector exactly [at least they're supposed to]. "Imaging" is the budget approach to "cloning". If you can spend the money on an extra HD or two, cloning is much better, faster and safer.

Acronis and Casper are the two big players in this marketplace. And if the software included with a new HD doesn't perform perfectly [which is sometimes doesn't], looking elsewhere is not likely to be rewarded.

Backup capability is a BIG deal to me. I've tried several of the other cloning programs... both free and not. They ALL were either slow or unreliable. I have used and HIGHLY recommend both Acronis and Casper XP... you can't go wrong with either.

Same here, backup is of paramount importance. Both on- and off-site. Similarly speed of restore is very important (backups can be done at convenient moments but restores are always urgent)

For years I have been using PQDI (Power Quest Disk Imager) and have been very happy with it. When I got my IBM laptops I got some "free" software with it which looks like being the same as Acronis, don't know for sure since IBM has a habit of hiding the original vendors. I found it excruciating slow to use for a restore. (about 1.5 Hours versus < 10 minutes for PQDI)

What is the performance of Acronis / Casper because PQDI has been acquired by Norton (if I am not mistaken) and I have more than once see Norton screw up things.

Many thanks
Sherlock

ElectricSavant · Aug 23, 2005

I know this is not the correct way, but I feel I need to do something.

I have 3 computers on the home network, so I turn sharing on and copy the important stuff to another computer.

I am terrible at this and I do it when I'm bored instead of daily like I should.

Michael B.

Holmes · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from ElectricSavant:

I know this is not the correct way, but I feel I need to do something.

I have 3 computers on the home network, so I turn sharing on and copy the important stuff to another computer.

I am terrible at this and I do it when I'm bored instead of daily like I should.

Michael B.

And when you get a nasty virus (like I had three years ago) then it screws up all your machines and you are (-fill in the blank-)!

Thats is when I started to take it very seriously.

Do it now before it is too late, trading is a business and you cannot let your guard down Michael!

Sherlock

gnome · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from Holmes:

"...What is the performance of Acronis / Casper..."

Performance depends on how much data is to be copied.

Casper has "SmartClone", where updates to cloning involve only files which have been changed since last time. Very fast... literally 1-2 minutes on my rig.

Casper's "standard" copy is about 500-700MB/min.

Acronis is pretty fast on copying a HD... about 1.5-2GB/min. I haven't "imaged" to a HD partition, but that is probably pretty fast too. Image restoration from a removable medium is about 200MB/min on my machines.

Holmes · Aug 23, 2005

Quote from gnome:

Performance depends on how much data is to be copied.

Casper has "SmartClone", where updates to cloning involve only files which have been changed since last time. Very fast... literally 1-2 minutes on my rig.

Casper's "standard" copy is about 500-700MB/min.

Acronis is pretty fast on copying a HD... about 1.5-2GB/min. I haven't "imaged" to a HD partition, but that is probably pretty fast too. Image restoration from a removable medium is about 200Kb/min on my machines.

Thanks, sounds like my PQDI has to be hanging around a bit longer. Am just wondering how long it will be before the NTFS file format changes and PQDI won't work anymore.... (My restore works at 700Mb / min and the backup is around 500Mb / min)

Sherlock