Looking for a program...

[hansolo77]

I know we're all a bunch of techno geeks, so this would probably fit right in here. I'm in no hurry though, so don't feel like you need to respond ASAP.

I've been tinkering with Windows Server 2012 R2 and am trying to get it setup and running smoothly. Something I'm looking for though is an offsite backup solution. Something I can run that can utilize cloud storage. Server comes with a built in support to do a system backup with Microsoft Azure, but they want to charge for the space you use PLUS a regular rental fee. There are various other cloud services available like Dropbox, Amazon A3, etc. The problem with those are they all charge for access. Some of them might offer a FREE plan, which would do little to suit my needs. They usually have a size limit of 1gb or something. I need something I can use to backup my entire system drive in case of a failure. Right now, that would require a minimum of 75gb, but preferably more. Also, I need a utility that can work on a schedule and provide incremental backups to the site instead of completely copying the whole system each time.

To get things rolling, I have a Seedbox. I got it in January and really love the speed and uptime. I asked in the IRC support channel if it would be allowed for me to utilize the available storage space in my slot for system backups. They said it would be allowed. Then over the last couple of weeks, they've effectively DOUBLED the capacity of storage on all slots system wide. I'm paying about $15 a month for 1tb of storage now, with 0 bandwith limitations and something like 10GB/s bandwith. Such a deal.

So now I just need to find a program that can take my system drive, and back it up to a folder I can create on the Seedbox. I won't have to go BUY a backup service, and pay a fee for the amount of storage I use or for upkeep. It'll all be included in my Seedbox. 100gb is 1/10th the storage available to me, and would probably be all I would need. So does anybody know of a program/utility I can get (preferably free, but I can pay if it has a good support structure and highly rated/recommended) that can do what I'm looking for?

[stigzler]

Gone off 2011 already!?

[tthurman]

This looks interesting. May be worth a read.

Disclaimer:

I have no experience with seed boxes, so I could be way off the mark with this suggestion.

Why not just use XCopy in combination with task scheduler?

Note, I didn't read all of this, and can see XP icons, but the same general principles still apply.

I use this all the time, and it's about as painless as it gets IMO.

Never mind, missed that it's not local.

[nullPointer]

Never mind, missed that it's not local.

I think this is the crux of the matter. It's going to depend on what transfer methods are supported by your seedbox provider. Is FTP supported?

[hansolo77]

@stigzler - Yeah, I actually had a MAJOR crash with it. Don't know what happened. It completely locked me out of all of my low level OS functions (like Device Manager). It kept telling me that I was connected to the computer remotely and only had READ access (couldn't change anything). Google turned up the solution to just rename the computer. But I couldn't do that because my Admin login wasn't an Admin. I couldn't MAKE him an Admin unless I was an Admin. So not only did the permissions get screwed up, but some how my security was too. I looked around and decided to try Windows Server Essentials 2012 R2 since it was Wikipedia's determination that it was the next step in the Windows Home Server product line, and was the latest version of any Windows Server available (before Windows Server 2016 comes out). If you sign up, you can get a free 180 day trial. That's 6 months. Plus, as long as you have a backup, you can reinstall the OS and restore the files and have another 180 days, indefinitely (or so I've heard). So yeah, with WHS 2011 giving me trouble literally right after install, I decided to go this route, and it's been very stable with no issues so far.

Anyway...

@ Everybody else..

My seedbox supports FTP and sFTP. Honestly, I've looked at a few programs, and nothing really grabs me as being worthy. I've actually been deeply reconsidering even bothering with it. I like the security in knowing that a backup exists offsite should a failure happen. I really don't suspect a failure to occur on an SSD drive. But you never plan to fail, just fail to plan. I'd really like to make something work, but I'm also confronted with the problem of doing a remote restore should the need arise. So even though a simple upload to the seedbox would be nice, there would be no simple download back to a bare bones new drive. I'd still have to reinstall the OS, and install whatever program would be necessary to get the data back. So like I said, I'm reconsidering. I had hoped somebody may have ran into this problem (though not really a "problem") and had a working solution.

StableBit, the makers of the awesome DrivePool, are actively developing a service called CloudDrive. Basically, it allows you to create an additional VirtualDrive on your system that is built into the kernel of Windows at the lowest level possible, making it appear as a regular drive. Then you configure it to use any number of available cloud services. If you have more than 1 service, you can "Pool" them together with DrivePool, and use them all simultaneously. Theoretically, all you'd have to do then is program your Server Backup to backup to that Drive. The problem is that many of these cloud services offer very little drive space on the Free level (like 1gb). My OS drive is up to 40gb already. This would be the perfect option. I asked if the program supports any type of FTP, so I could use this with the Seedbox, but he said it doesn't have the functionality.

I gave SpiderOak a try last night. It gives you 2gb of their own storage space for you to use, and then you can add an infinite number of additional devices (like other computers, cellphones, SEEDBOX, etc). My seedbox FAQ's actually lists this program and specific instructions on how to install it on your slot, which I did. It creates a new folder automatically for you, and reports it's location to the SpiderOak primary server. When you run the program on your local machine, it tells you that you have 2 devices, THEIR 2gb, and the newly created one on your seedbox slot. The problem is, when I tried to use it, the program just stalled out and did NOTHING. Plus, I don't know exactly how it would work. Essentially, SpiderOak is for file syncing (not drive syncing). So if you put a file in the SpiderOak folder, it automatically transfers it to all of the devices on your list. Now say I put my C:\ drive in there. Well, SpiderOak would duplicate it to all devices. But the "free" device they build is only 2gb and my C drive is almost 40gb. So would it only put 2gb worth on there, and then the other 38gb on the seedbox, or would it not bother with the free drive? I tried to just REMOVE the free device, but it gave me a warning saying I can't remove the primary/default device... After spending nearly 2 hours getting it set up, and then like 3 hours waiting for it to DO something, I gave up and just uninstalled it. I had high hopes for it because you could run it in the background, schedule backups, and do a bare bones restore without needing to install the OS. Maybe I just didn't do it right. I'll have to look into it more.

[nullPointer]

Honestly I would try to keep it as simple as possible. If you used a a command line capable SFTP client such as WinSCP, you could write a simple batch script for the upload and then just use Windows Task Scheduler to systematically invoke it on a regular basis. There may be some hidden gotchas (not sure), but it would seem to work out on paper at any rate.

[hansolo77]

Yeah I thought about something simple. Trouble is, I need it to do incremental, otherwise it would just take forever.

[nullPointer]

Yeah I thought about something simple. Trouble is, I need it to do incremental, otherwise it would just take forever.

Yeah I wondered about that as well. You could always experiment with breaking it up a bit (backup X directory on one schedule, Y directory on another schedule, etc.). Of course, ideally it would be nice to do a merged backup for only those files that have changed, and this proposed solution falls apart a bit in that regard.

Hmm ... actually as I think about it, one program that I've recently started using for backup, and absolutely love (so far), is FreeFileSync. It does actually allow for user configurable file comparison, to run the sort of merged backup described above. I just checked the list of supported features, and it does in fact support SFTP as well. I've not tried the FTP functionality, but like I said, I've been very pleased with it for local backups across LAN. IMO it would be worth checking out to see if it might work for you as well.

[hansolo77]

I'm thinking about maybe giving CrashPlan a try. I've asked in the IRC channel on the seedbox what people would recommend, and it's come up a couple times. Of course, the BIG suggestion everybody is giving is Rsync. I don't think they quite understand what I'm wanting to do though. I'm looking for a complete system disk image backup, not just files like documents, photos, etc. Programs that "sync" are typically used to keep a synchronized backup of files like that. For a true system image backup, I need something that will allow backup of hidden system files, etc. I think that was part of the hurdle I was having with SpiderOak. After installing the client on my machine, and the seedbox, it just sat there even though I told it to do a backup of the entire C:\ drive. I think it was trying to synchronize with the seedbox's client, and was getting locked up in trying to see what files had changed between the 2. Further investigations through various online reviews actually say SpiderOak's only achieving factor is it's ZERO KNOWLEDGE, but the actual functionality of the service is crippled and damaged and always failing to work right. So it actually comes as no surprise then that I was having trouble.

CrashPlan still needs looking into though. An online review said it's fast and works great. And while the free service offers only 2gb of storage ON THEM, you can still use the program to do a complete system image backup "on a friends computer" for no extra charge. So the only hurdle here then would be the need to install the appropriate client on the seedbox slot so they can communicate. Not sure if they offer a Linux (or whatever OS the seedbox hoster's use) compatible client or not.. need to spend some time on their website and see what they have.