Best Syncing Software?

I've been using FreeFileSync for several years now, have been very happy with it, and highly recommend it (I also strongly recommend enabling Versioning in FreeFileSync). The only downside is the free version's installer does have Open Candy in it, which will install bloatware (Usually Chrome and the Google Toolbar) unless you choose custom install and uncheck the bloatware. As long as you use the custom install and pay attention instead of blindly clicking, you will not get any of the bloatware (I have a more accurate term for bloatware but Mama told me not to use that word).

Some Antivirus and Antimalware programs will give a false positive on the FreeFileSync installer. Malwarebytes 3 is one that does. After downloading the FreeFileSync installer, I temporarily turn off Malwarebytes, install FreeFileSync, "sandbox" the installer in a .zip folder (this allows me to keep the installer for possible future reuse), restart Malwarebytes, and, to be on the safe side, immediately run a scan to make sure something didn't slip through (so far, nothing has).

samuria said:

The best way now is to use Google drive or ondrive you simply save files on your hd to the folder and it's backed up instantly then available on any device anywhere in the world giving you 26 gig backup goto another PC and files appear by magic.

No, that is a very bad idea. First, Google is notorious for being very nosy. It would have access to any data you send their way and use it for advertising and to sell to advertisers. Google is also notorious for discontinuing services with no or inadequate notice. I trust Google as far as I can spit upwind in a hurricane.

LadyF, the aforementioned Syncing process is much more a Replication process rather than a Backup process. Over in community.spiceworks.com forum, several posters indicated the important differences between syncing/replicating and backing up.

Concerning FreeFileSync, I noticed that if I remained with Donation versions 9.3-9.6, it appears that FreeFileSync does not revert to the normal non-Donation operations. And, with auto-update turned off by me, the only positive is that I get my monies worth a bit longer.

RolandJS said:

LadyF, the aforementioned Syncing process is much more a Replication process rather than a Backup process. Over in community.spiceworks.com forum, several posters indicated the important differences between syncing/replicating and backing up.

I totally disagree. A backup can take many forms but its basic purpose is to provide more than one copy of your data in separate locations (ideally, data should exist in no less than three places, such as on the computer, on an onsite backup drive, and on an offsite backup drive). Imaging or cloning are the only way to backup system files, with imaging being far more efficient. They are necessary since merely copying system files will not make them bootable.

While cloning and imaging can be used to backup data, both are time consuming and extremely inefficient. A folder/file syncing program, when set to Mirror mode, will compare the original drive with the backup drive and copy any new or changed data on the original drive will be copied to the backup drive. Any data on the backup drive that is not on the original drive will be deleted from the backup drive. The result is the backup drive will essentially be an exact duplicate of the original drive. If one loses data on the original drive, the process can be reversed for recovery. Since only new, changed, and deleted files are involved, updating a backup takes far less time and involves far less writing to disk (a big boon for SSDs), unlike imaging and cloning which requires transferring all data with every update.

FreeFileSync also has an optional feature called Versioning which, when enabled, will take files deleted from the backup drive and send them to a user designated folder or drive. This protects files accidentally deleted from the original drive from loss. It can also be used to recover earlier versions of files. I strongly recommend using versioning.

Another advantage of Folder/file syncing is one does not need special software to be able to read or copy individual files or folder. In fact, if one has a data only drive die and doesn't have a replacement drive handy, one can simply remove the dead drive, replace it with the backup drive, and be up and running in minutes (this is advisable only if you have more than one backup drive, which I recommend anyway).

I've been using FreeFileSync for several years for backing up my data and it has served me well, including quick and complete recovery after a data drive became corrupted.

Backup and syncing are similar but different system processes - at least in the way that I was taught

Syncing is a derivation of synchronising which is a system where two or more locations are kept identical. This can be one way or two way (or multiway)

Assuming three synchronised data stores - A, B, & C

In Full Synching any change in any of the locations will be replicated immediately without human intervention in the other two locations. This system can have problems with modern Ransomware attacks as the application of locks on a file on A can be replicated, (posh word for copied,) to C and D

The way that Microsoft's OneDrive or Google's Google Drive work meets the criteria of a Full Synching MultiWay system (that is backed up at the server end so can if used carefully be used to recover data locally after a crash

In the same three way system One way synchronization requires a master and slave system(s) if we use A as the master ...

Any change to store A will be replicated instantly in both B & C but changes in B or C will not make any change in A and should, in reality, be reversed to be identical to A

A backup is a copy of the state of data at a single point in time If at any time you copy the contents of A, B or C above you are making a backup A backup is normally removed from the source date after creation to protect the integrity of the backup data

There are also practical differences between Cloning and Imaging although both may use the same techniques and even software. A clone is a transfer from one working system to another working system that is performed in a single operation. It's mostly seen in the, Bit by Bit, relocation of an operating system to a larger or different type of storage medium, (HDD to SSD, or 128GB SSD to 256GB SSD Etc.)

An image uses the same bit by bit copy of the drive medium as the above clone operation but stores the resultant data image on a non live media for future rather than immediate use

A file backup copies the current state of each file in a data set to a storage set, (often compressed), and is the traditional way of storing a set of data and of working out what needs to be included in Differential or Incremental backups.

These days the status of imaging means that some backup systems now use Imaging to create the backup.

Once the initial contents check and composition required for a backup is performed, (this is needed for both storage systems), it is usually quicker to create an image of the data than to copy files and set flags on a file by file basis, Just think of how much quicker it is to create a macrium image of a drive or partition than to copy the files individually.

The major advantage of a file by file backup that allowed an individual file to be retrieved is no longer an issue with the mountability of modern images, thanks to the advances in virtualization technology it's in some cases to actually mount a virtual copy of a system backup and actually use the OS on the drive elsewhere

Also just to complete the set there is the subject of Raid, although some see this as a form of backup it is not, was never designed to be It is vulnerable to the issues that synchronising can be - an attack that damages the data on the medium used can make the system unusable, A raid system is a collection of drives working together to provide quicker access to the data needed by the user over older Bus systems that used to choke at low data rates, with the speed of the modern SSD and even the HDD you can reasonably ignore Raid except in specialist uses - It can be set-up to keep data accessible for databases where a drive fails but needs to be backed up the same as any other data drive