Not too long ago the hard drive in my primary computer died. Fortunately, the death was progressive so I was able to make a quick backup before the inevitable complete failure occurred. My approach to the backup was a basic drag-n-drop of files and folders to an external hard drive. The process took longer than necessary and I wasted a lot of time trying to determine what was and was not critical. In the end, while drag-n-drop did the job, I wished there was a way to automate the process and convert this basic computer task into a reasonable backup solution. I started to look around, and here is what I found.

Not many free open source backup applications for Windows

I started by looking for a free open source backup utility for Windows and was surprised to find very few options. What I found was either no longer maintained or simply just not good enough. Also, I only considered products that did not implement a proprietary backup format. Such a restriction would force me to always use this application for backup restoration and I wanted something with a little more flexibility.

Disk space is cheap and external hard drives are large enough to make basic drag-n-drop a viable backup solution without the need for file compression or the use of a “proprietary” backup format. And while drag-n-drop is easy enough, I really want something to automate the process.

What I want in a backup utility

The right solution would allow me to select a group of folders and click a button to move them from my hard drive to the external one. Later I should be able to come back and click the button again to move over anything new or updated. Finally, if my hard drive fails again, I should be able to plug my external hard drive into a new computer and restore my backup with a simple drag-n-drop. Fortunately, I found something that could do exactly what I wanted and it comes from Microsoft, and surprisingly isn’t marketed as a backup utility.

It’s free, it’s simple, and it comes from Microsoft. It’s SyncToy

SyncToy as described by Microsoft is an “easy to use, customizable application [that] helps you copy, move, rename, and delete files between folders and computers.” The current release is beta 2.0 and available for free download from Microsoft. Whether it remains free in the future has yet to be seen, but as of this writing the 2.0 beta has enough reliable functionality to make it my backup application of choice.

SyncToy works with both Windows Vista and XP and has the following modest system requirements:

• Microsoft .NET Framework v2.0
• 1GHz Intel P3 processor or equivalent
  
• 256MB RAM, 512MB RAM recommended
• 20MB free disk space

The application uses SQL Server Compact Edition which is a client side database that SyncToy uses to store its metadata. Luckily you don’t have to purchase SQL Server Compact Edition because it comes as part of SyncToy installation. Also, SQL Server Compact Edition exists only to help facilitate synchronization and doesn’t do anything extra to the files and folders that are flagged for synchronization (e.g. SyncToy doesn’t use a proprietary backup format).

Once you have SyncToy installed, using it is as simple as selecting some folders to backup (a.k.a. sync) and chosing a destination. You can sync to an external hard drive, as I did, or another computer with a network shared folder. This brings up another possible use for SyncToy: syncing important files and folders between a desktop and laptop computer. If you routinely work with two different computers (e.g. desktop and laptop), I’m sure you imagine the tremendous benefit of this feature.

What’s lacking from Microsoft SyncToy?

The only downside I can find with SyncToy is that it has no built in sync scheduling capabilities. If you want to sync your machine, then you have to kick off the process manually. If scheduled computer tasks routinely disrupt your work, then this lacking feature might actually be a benefit; however, if you often forget to perform critical tasks such as routine backups, then this missing feature could be the reason you decide to not use SyncToy. Fortunately, there is a way to force a scheduled backup with SyncToy, and I’ll demonstrate that in my Wednesday post on 6/18/2008. In the meantime, download SyncToy from Microsoft and give it a try and let me know what you think.

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Filed under: How-To & Tech Tips