The Optimal Backup Strategy

Z-DBackup supports various methods for backing up data on a computer or in a network. I will try to give you an insight into different backup strategies that are possible with Z-DBackup.

Copy Backup (The Default Setting of Z-DBackup)

With Copy Backup, all selected directories are copied, but the files are not marked as copied (the archive attribute  remains unchanged). A possibly preexisting backup file is deleted prior to backup. When you use this backup method, you only need the most recent backup file to be able to restore all your data. If you want to use Copy Backup, none of the five backup methods must be selected in the setup! Copy Backup is the default setting for a newly created backup set.

It can happen that a file was accidentally deleted or has been corrupted and needs to be restored. This will usually come to the attention of the user only after a few days, and in the meantime, the damaged file was already included in the last backup. For this reason, a Copy Backup should always be done according to the generation principle. If you use removable media for your backups, the copy backup should be done with different mediums. If the backup is copied to another hard disk or a network drive, the program option Cron Backup should be enabled to include the backup date in the name of the archive or directory.

Which files should I include in a backup?

Of course, it does not make much sense to back up files that you have available on a CD/DVD/Blu-ray anyway, the Windows system and installed programs that are available on CD/DVD/Blu-ray.

Most important are all files that you created yourself, such as documents, letters, pictures, e-mails, favorites/bookmarks, databases, configuration files, book-keeping data etc. that need to be kept or that you want to reuse on a new system, and also all smaller programs and tools, updates and drivers that you do not have on CD but which were downloaded from the internet or installed from CDs which are no longer available.

The backup is much easier if all relevant data is located in a directory structure underneath a common directory. Z-DBackup can include up to 255 different directories (plus all their subdirectories, of course) in one backup set. This allows you to easily copy all your data to another location or removable medium. Use the password option to protect your data from being accessed by unauthorized persons.

Daily Backup according to the generation principle:

•Create a backup set for your daily backups and create either a shortcut on the desktop or a schedule for automatic backups.

•Suggestion:

oPrepare four mediums and label them Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday

oPrepare four mediums and label them Friday 1, Friday 2, Friday 3, Friday 4

•The mediums labelled Monday to Thursday are overwritten every week, the Friday mediums are overwritten every four weeks. This means you have a generational backup with which you can access snapshots of your data from different points in time, up to one month before now.

Normal Backup

With a normal backup, all your files are copied at each backup and are marked as such (the archive attribute  is deactivated). You only need the most recent backup to restore all your data.

If the backup is copied to a second hard drive or to a network drive (which we recommend), you should activate the option Cron Backup, so that the backup file name contains the date of the backup.

 Incremental Backup
 A series of incremental backups starts with one full backup. At each following backup, only those files that were changed or have been created since the last (full or incremental) backup will be copied. All copied files are marked, i.e. the archive attribute  is deactivated.

 With this backup method, you need the most recent full backup and all following incremental backups to restore all your files.

Differential Backup
 A series of differential backups starts with one full backup. At each following backup, only those files that were changed or have been created since the last full backup will be copied. The archive attribute  of copied files is deactivated during full backups, but not during any of the following differential backups.

 If you use differential backups, you need the last full backup and the last differential backup to be able to restore all your files.

The incremental and differential backup methods are quite similar. Both are used together with regular full backups, but need less time and space for the intermediate backups. With these backup methods, you would use the Friday mediums for full backups and the MON–THU mediums for differential/incremental backups. Then, on mondays, only files which have changed on that day are copied. On tuesdays, with incremental backups, only files which have changed on that tuesday are copied, i.e, anything which has changed since any last backup. With differential backups, files which have changed on monday or tuesday are copied, i.e., everything which has changed since the last FULL backup. The differential backups need a little more time and space than incremental backup, but the advantage is that you only need the last full backup and one last differential backup to restore all your files.

 Data Synchronization
 In addition to full backups, incremental and differential backups, Z-DBackup can also be used for sychronization/mirroring of files and directories. The program creates an exact copy of the data from the source directory in the target directory. The NTFS access permissions can be copied as well. When this method is used, only new or changed files are copied to the target directory. Optionally, data in the target directory which is not present in the source directory can be deleted automatically or with a user prompt.
 

This kind of backup is sometimes a little faster than differential backups and many users find it easier than incremental or differential backups.

Emergency backup and system recovery

Z-DBackup offers the possibility to create a complete image of a drive. Such an image of a drive differs from an ordinary data backup of "all" files on a drive with Z-DBackup in that information on the formatting of the hard drive, the file system used and the start sector be secured. In addition, with such an image backup, the hard disk is backed up in a consistent state. The entire operating system can later be restored from a generated Windows system image (an image of the system drive), e.g. after a hardware failure.

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