Backup Software - V2i Incremental contains everything...?

Author

V2i Incremental contains everything...?

Kenneth

2004-08-28, 2:45 am

Howdy,

I just took a look at my incremental V2i backup (as if I were going to
restore) and was surprised to see that it appears to include
everything on the system. The file size is much smaller, but
everything seems to be listed.

Clearly, I am misinterpreting something...

What might I be missing here?

Thanks,

--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."

Travis

2004-09-03, 5:45 pm

Hello, Kenneth,

I don't have V2i, but, to my limited understanding ("limited
understanding" being a "newsgroup tech support" general warning)
"differential" on Seagate on W98 and Veritas on XP Home (if you've
found and activated it) will check your entire disk, looking for
things that have changed since its last full or normal backup, when it
dated and marked all the files as backed up. If it finds that mark
changed or missing (or however it tracks them), or finds a new file,
the changed and/or new file *only* will be backed up. That's why the
resulting file should be only a couple percent the size of your full
backup, but growing over time and more and more stuff is changed
and/or newly added -- *and* why you see the entire disk tree listed.
Some should be listed but empty if nothing in them was changed or
created.

Then, if a total restore is needed, you use your original full backup
and just the single differential on top of that. This is the benefit
over "Incremental" backups that generate a whole series of little
backups that, while fast to create, leave you with a bunch of files to
keep and add to the full backup in order to get up to date.

"Differential" is an excellent approach in my opinion. I have Drive
Image 7.03 which makes an image, all or nothing, of the entire drive.
Granted it only takes 28 minutes to do my 20GB or so, but generating
an entire image every day or week or whatever just to track the
changed or new files seems klutzoid, and creates difficulties if you
want to maintain a copy off-site for security on any removable media
apart from an external hard drive. Even DVDs are a pain when you have
to re-write five of them, again, just to get up to speed on a few
differential files.

I'm considering using Drive Image for a twice a year catastrophic
back-up, taking advantage of its "PQRE" independent-of-Windows boot
and restore capability (like Ghost), and using old Veritas on XP to do
the on-site backups to my slave hard disk, both full and differential.
As I understand it, V2i was created to overcome the all-or-nothing
restrictions inherent in Drive Image.

Good luck,

Travis

"Kenneth" <usenet@SPAMLESSsoleassociates.com> wrote in message
news:83e0j09sv2kqmaa2l5c53d714fh72rtlp6@
4ax.com...
> Howdy,
>
> I just took a look at my incremental V2i backup (as if I were going
> to
> restore) and was surprised to see that it appears to include
> everything on the system. The file size is much smaller, but
> everything seems to be listed.
>
> Clearly, I am misinterpreting something...
>
> What might I be missing here?
>
> Thanks,
>
> --
> Kenneth
>
> If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."

Kenneth

2004-09-03, 5:45 pm

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004 10:55:37 -0400, "Travis"
<travis_at_charbeneau_dot_net> wrote:

>Hello, Kenneth,
>
>I don't have V2i, but, to my limited understanding ("limited
>understanding" being a "newsgroup tech support" general warning)
>"differential" on Seagate on W98 and Veritas on XP Home (if you've
>found and activated it) will check your entire disk, looking for
>things that have changed since its last full or normal backup, when it
>dated and marked all the files as backed up. If it finds that mark
>changed or missing (or however it tracks them), or finds a new file,
>the changed and/or new file *only* will be backed up. That's why the
>resulting file should be only a couple percent the size of your full
>backup, but growing over time and more and more stuff is changed
>and/or newly added -- *and* why you see the entire disk tree listed.
>Some should be listed but empty if nothing in them was changed or
>created.
>
>Then, if a total restore is needed, you use your original full backup
>and just the single differential on top of that. This is the benefit
>over "Incremental" backups that generate a whole series of little
>backups that, while fast to create, leave you with a bunch of files to
>keep and add to the full backup in order to get up to date.
>
>"Differential" is an excellent approach in my opinion. I have Drive
>Image 7.03 which makes an image, all or nothing, of the entire drive.
>Granted it only takes 28 minutes to do my 20GB or so, but generating
>an entire image every day or week or whatever just to track the
>changed or new files seems klutzoid, and creates difficulties if you
>want to maintain a copy off-site for security on any removable media
>apart from an external hard drive. Even DVDs are a pain when you have
>to re-write five of them, again, just to get up to speed on a few
>differential files.
>
>I'm considering using Drive Image for a twice a year catastrophic
>back-up, taking advantage of its "PQRE" independent-of-Windows boot
>and restore capability (like Ghost), and using old Veritas on XP to do
>the on-site backups to my slave hard disk, both full and differential.
>As I understand it, V2i was created to overcome the all-or-nothing
>restrictions inherent in Drive Image.
>
>Good luck,
>
>Travis
>
>
>
>
>
>"Kenneth" <usenet@SPAMLESSsoleassociates.com> wrote in message
> news:83e0j09sv2kqmaa2l5c53d714fh72rtlp6@
4ax.com...
>

Hi Travis,

I thank you for your comments...

As it turns out, V2i does not offer a "differential" option. It offers
"incremental" or "full" only.

That said, your comments do make sense. I have seen that the tree is
complete, but also displays the archive bit label. So, for each
incremental backup all the files are listed but a handful have the "A"
designation. Those apparently are the files backed up in that
incremental run.

Thanks again,

--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."