Tips, tricks, tools, and techniques for Microsoft Office

My "day job" as a business-computing consultant often requires that I help clients set up and maintain rigorous yet manageable backup strategies. Small business owners are often unaware of the real value of their company’s data or the disruption that its loss would cause so my first task for any new client is to make sure their data is well protected.

In the business world, backup technologies are readily available and include sophisticated (read "expensive") tape drives and complex software applications. But what about SOHO (small office/home office) networks or even individual PCs? Doesn’t the data on these systems have some value? Wouldn’t you consider it "disruptive" if you suddenly discovered that everything on your home computer’s hard drive was gone?

In my never-ending quest for the "perfect" small network backup solution, I recently had the opportunity to test Retrospect Backup Professional for Windows (hereafter referred to as Retrospect Pro) by Dantz Development Corporation. In spite of its lengthy name, Retrospect Pro is simple to set up and use and yet it provides protection on a par with the more pricey solutions used by corporate network administrators.

Retrospect Pro runs on a single Windows workstation and has the ability to back up additional networked computers on your home or small office network. Two remote client licenses are included in the standard package and additional client licenses are available for a nominal extra charge. If your home network is anything like mine, you probably have one main desktop computer which functions as your "server" and one or more additional computers. In my case, my "server" is large, desk-side PC in my downstairs office. Upstairs, in the den, my wife has a desktop PC for her evening/week-end Web projects and I have a notebook, which is actually my primary PC.

I installed Retrospect Pro on the downstairs PC, which supports an OnStream 30GB tape drive (http://www.onstreamdata.com). This system also includes two large IDE hard drives, one of which is used exclusively for archiving our library of digital photos, my wife’s Web site projects, and my writing and client projects. Initially I scheduled this drive to be backed up to tape at regular intervals using Retrospect Pro’s built-in EasyScript scheduler.

The EasyScript wizard includes six simple screens that guide you through the creation of an unattended backup script. To start the wizard, open Retrospect Pro and click the plus sign next to the word Automate in the left menu panel. Select EasyScript and click Next after reviewing the Welcome screen. In the screens that follow, you are asked to choose:

- the type of backup (this PC only or this PC and others on the network)

- the type of media you wish to back up to (tapes, CD/DVD or disks)

- the number of backup sets you plan to have (1, 2, 5 or 7)

- the frequency of your backups (every weekday, once a week, or manually)

If you select the "Weekday" frequency, an additional screen prompts you for the time of day to perform the backup; if you select "Once a Week" you are prompted for both the day and the time.

One of the interesting features of Retrospect Pro is its ability to perform backups to disk files, including disk files located elsewhere on the network. I have used this technique to make quick backups of my notebook prior to taking it on unexpected trips because my 100 Mbps network is almost ten times faster than my 12 Mbps USB 1.1 tape drive.

When planning your own backup strategy, you should always use at least two backup sets. This allows you to rotate your media and ensure that your most recent backup is safely away from the computer while you are creating the new set. If you only use one backup set and your computer is involved in a disaster (such as a fire) while backing up, both your hard drive and the backup copy could be destroyed, leaving you with nothing.

Speaking of disasters, if you are running Windows XP you've probably noticed that there’s no practical way to create a boot floppy to use in case your hard drive fails. Fortunately, Retrospect Pro can create a bootable Disaster Recovery CD that installs a temporary version of the Windows XP operating system and guides you through the process of restoring the system volume from any backup set.

Retrospect Pro can restore individual files from any given backup set, of course, but it also has the capability to do a "point-in-time" restore, returning the computer to an exact configuration even if the necessary files span multiple backup sets.

Theoretically, my wife and I back up our work-in-progress files to special folders on the downstairs computer whenever relevant data changes, but as an extra precaution I installed the included client software on the two upstairs computers. Using Retrospect Pro’s Progressive Backup feature, only new or changed files on the client computers are backed up, saving space and time. If we forget to leave one of the client computers on for backup, a feature called Proactive Client Backup automatically recognizes the availability of a computer in need of backup and prompts the user for permission to perform the task. This is especially handy for my notebook, which goes wherever I go and may not be connected to the home network at the appointed backup time.

I found Retrospect Pro to be an excellent solution for home or small office networks. If your network includes "real" servers, running Win NT Server, Win 2000 Server, or the new Windows .Net Server, you will need to choose Retrospect Single Server or Retrospect Multi Server, depending on your configuration. These more robust (and more expensive) solutions include features for backing up open files in environments where you may be running 24x7 applications such as Microsoft Exchange or SQL Server.

Retrospect Backup Professional for Windows works with Windows 98, Me, NT, 2000 and XP. The retail price is listed on the Dantz Web site (http://www.dantz.com) at $129 but I found it available online for as little as $81.

-- Dick Archer

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