Chaning backup options

[PFCJames]

I would like to do a backup directly to an external HD we have setup for automated backups. When I go to Utilities - Backup - Select drives PCP v9 is not finding the drive letter for the external drive. If it will work on a flash drive I would think it should work this way as well. I am running Windows XP Home on the PC.

[NeilZ]

I would like to do a backup directly to an external HD we have setup for automated backups. When I go to Utilities - Backup - Select drives PCP v9 is not finding the drive letter for the external drive. If it will work on a flash drive I would think it should work this way as well. I am running Windows XP Home on the PC.

Is the backup drive setup as a networked drive on the network, and setup on the computer under Windows with a drive letter.

If it is not listed as a drive under Windows, Powerchurch has no idea that its even there.

Hope this helps.

[PFCJames]

Neil,

The computer is a stand alone PC running XP Home with an external HD connected via USB cable. When you go to my computer the HD is showing with a driver letter, i.e. I am running the same system setup here at the house and my driver letter is K. I have a Memory card reader in my machine and PCP is picking up the driver letters for each of these Drives G - J but not the ext HD drive K.

Hope this helps explain it a little better.

[NeilZ]

Neil,

The computer is a stand alone PC running XP Home with an external HD connected via USB cable. When you go to my computer the HD is showing with a driver letter, i.e. I am running the same system setup here at the house and my driver letter is K. I have a Memory card reader in my machine and PCP is picking up the driver letters for each of these Drives G - J but not the ext HD drive K.

Hope this helps explain it a little better.

OK .. so the HD works fine at church, but when you get home, it does not get recognized.

Try this ... if you're not using the memory card readers (and FWIW not many do) try to disable them from the system, or reset them to higher drive letters.

I've seen that these things tend to cause more problems then they're worth with some software, and that may be happening here with PC+.

[PFCJames]

Thanks Neil, I'll give that a shot. I'll be back at the church tomorrow night.

[Jeff]

It might not see the drive because v9 will only backup to removable devices. USB hard drives usually show themselves just like any other hard drive on the system. Card readers on the other hand show as removable devices. V10 of PC+ now has the option to backup to any folder.

[NeilZ]

It might not see the drive because v9 will only backup to removable devices. USB hard drives usually show themselves just like any other hard drive on the system. Card readers on the other hand show as removable devices. V10 of PC+ now has the option to backup to any folder.

Ah ... so a networked drive is seen as removable, whereas a local USB HD is, well, local and seen as part of the machine.

[Jeff]

Network drive is seen as a network drive, we made a change early in version 9 to add removable and network drives to the drive letter dropdown. This was a quick fix due to feedback we got shortly after 9 shipped.

We were reluctant to allow backups to the local hard drive because a backup on your local drive won't do you any good if the drive crashes. That is why we have wanted it to be on removable media so it is at least off the machine, if not offsite. Version 10 now does allow you to backup to any folder on your system, including local hard drives. With the new USB memory drives and hard drives, we can't really tell what is removable or not.

So it is now up to the customer to get the backup off the machine. We have worked with three customers since Christmas that had to send their drives to data recovery services. We tried to piece back their data for them as best we could, but they still had a lot of work to recover. For instance, one was able to recover their family table, but completely lost the profile table.

[NeilZ]

So it is now up to the customer to get the backup off the machine. We have worked with three customers since Christmas that had to send their drives to data recovery services. We tried to piece back their data for them as best we could, but they still had a lot of work to recover. For instance, one was able to recover their family table, but completely lost the profile table.

Totally understand ... makes sense to move to version 10, if nothing else, for the security of being able to backup to anything you want.

FWIW ... at my last location,and at this one, I installed a Linksys Network Storage Unit that allows up to two USB hard drives to be attached. Of course, at the last location, I also had the system setup on a mirrored set of drives on the server.

This location I take a thumb drive and backup weekly to take home, along with the backup to the hard drive.

This has saved my bacon a number of times

[Jeff]

We havn't had to restore a backup, but we are set up so nightly any changed file is copied to a machine offsite through a VPN connection. So nightly we have a full copy of our server at an offsite location. We also make backups to local USB hard drive that keeps a few generations in case we have some data corruption but don't notice t for a few days. We also backup key PCs to the offsite computer as well. We transfer about 2 gigs of data offsite every night. This might not work for everyone, we have a fairly fast upstream connection.

I am a big fan of having data offsite, and I really like having it all automated. Before computers, the church I went to as a kid was burned to cover up a theft. I now think what would we do if we came in and the office was just a pile of ashes.

[PFCJames]

Jeff,

What I'm doing now is to back up the entire program and hoping that if need be I can go to the external drive and open the backup copy and restore the data file. If this is not possible please let me know.

Thanks,
James

[NeilZ]

Jeff,

What I'm doing now is to back up the entire program and hoping that if need be I can go to the external drive and open the backup copy and restore the data file. If this is not possible please let me know.

Thanks,
James

I believe it would be safer to do a complete restore of the entire Powerchurch directory, to insure that all the related files not kept under the data directory are also restored. That said, its always good to make a backup using the built in utility, and keeping those backups on the external drive, as well as one to take off-site.

[texas319]

definitlty backup the entire direcetory on a regular basis