What is the best way to back up a computer's files? [closed]

Use Crashplan for backing up. Why? Its free, and has been out for 2 years w/ many robustifying updates. Also

• Encrypts/compresses the backup;
• sends backup off-site;
• You can set up a second computer (parents, sister's, distant relative) to do backup;
• Did I mention it is free?
• Restoration of files is simple.

You can get free storage with a windows live (hotmail) account with what they call skydrive. You could also setup a gmail account and backup data to it. Read more about that here

Both of those are free, but keep in mind you are trusting your data to people who arent you!

An excellent pay option is Mozy. Unlimited storage for $5 a month. You can get up to 2gb for free, which may be enough depending on your stoarge needs. Again you are trusting your data to the company and their data centers/security. The great thing about mozy is the software is very easy to setup for automatic backups (that way you cant forget!)

Ultimately the best idea to keep the data in your hands is to buy a external hard drive, and copy files to it. Like these The backup can be done manually or with aumated software like Cobain, and many many others.

Please note. Many people get the terms incremental and differential confused when discussing backups. In my experience, differential is preferable to incremental.

They both rely on a "full backup" that can happen once or on a recurring schedule. Then they differ.

Incremental backups only copy the data that has changed since the last incremental backup. This means that if you need to restore from backup you'll need the full backup and all incremental backups up to the date you are attempting to recover.

Differential backups copy all data that has changed since the last full backup. This means that if you need to restore from backup you'll only need the full backup and the differential from the date you're trying to recover.

Have you checked out Live Mesh?

You can Sync your folders with it and grab them form any computer and even some devices. It is stored on a could.

Well that certainly depends on what you want to do, what your setup is like, and how long do you want it to take.

Some more details would be great :)

I use Microsoft SyncToy to sync my projects folder to my external hard drive.

I also use DropBox to upload the same folder to the cloud.

To take a complete image of a disk, I use Drive Image XML.

Edit: Totally forgot to add: I use Sync Back at home too.