Five star simple software #3: SyncBack

Making backups is often something many don't think about, or make the time to do. Until of course the day that it all goes pear shaped, and you wish you'd done something about it. I'm an efficiently geeky kinda guy, so I try and do this regularly, and I've tried many different types of back up software. I don't want, or truly need anything complex, don't want real time back up, I just want it to back up all my stuff, when I say, from place A to B, end of story.

Simple you'd think to get software for this, but many just don't do what you want. They either limit you, or charge a fortune to do something basic. By default Windows 2000, XP & Vista have their own offerings, but none cut it for me. I was close to giving up, especially after a disastrous attempt at the other offering from Microsoft called Sync Powertoy. However the only 'power' involved was the waste of power I used in testing it out. Firstly having to validate my copy of Windows, then to be told I can only download it if I use Internet Explorer. Nice guys. Stupidly, I persevered, but the app itself has easily breakable logic behind the so called syncing, so I ended up with multiples of the same files, and worse still, it deleted some which were perfectly legitimate. Awful, awful, piece of software. And I only bash Microsoft here in the hope you avoid this, and try out the real piece of five star software...

...Which is by a company called 2Bright Sparks. Their offering is called SyncBack, and is a fantastic, light, and simple application, that just works, and very well at that. The logic, layout and overall experience of using it, is simplicity itself. Admittedly, the first time you set up a profile for the sync to run, you have to think carefully about the process and set options, but once done, it works like a dream, and simply does what it says on the tin. The paid version comes with more features than I think I would ever use, and I find their older freeware version: SyncBack Freeware V3.2.14 [Click for a direct link to the file] to be more than adequate, with full reporting, and plenty of other options to get advanced, should you wish, its pretty perfect. Click the title to go their main download page with all their products, or visit the direct link just above to get straight to the freeware version.

Simple, it works, and free. Now go get backing up.