Hardware & Technical Can anyone recommend a good backup program?

[CMDR MAIN SEQUENCE]

Looking for recommendations for a Windows backup program. Needs to be able to backup to a network (shared folder on a Synology NAS). Can't use the built-in Windows backup as using Windows 7 Home (only Windows 7 Professional can backup to a network). This is for a laptop over wi-fi. So these are the requirements:

- needs to be able to backup to a network location
- ideally should be incremental backup
- need to be able to restore a single file
- needs to run on a schedule
- needs to run in the background [laptop is usually used by the wife so don't want command prompts popping up etc.]
- need to be able to choose which folders (i.e. not just whole Libraries)
- would prefer backup files to not be in a proprietary format - compressed (i.e. Zip etc.) is fine
- no need for anything fancy like encryption, SSH etc.
- the Synology supports rsync so this is an option
- simple interface (I'm computer-literate I just like to prioritize how I spend my time LOL)
- no need for image backup
- obviously would prefer something cheap (£20) or free

Previously I'd used MS SyncToy which was fine but since a Windows re-install it refuses to do anything when run on a schedule and I've given up trying to diagnose it. Have also tried Auslogics BitReplica (I like their stuff) but it didn't quite fit the bill.

On a related note, I'm considering updating said laptop to Windows 10 Home. I've tried researching the built-in backup options and I'm getting inconclusive results as to whether or not it can backup to a network location - so if anyone can answer this with absolute surety then I would be grateful as that could be problem solved (though there is one program my wife uses which apparently has some issues with Win10 which is the main reason I've avoided the update so far).

 

[GammaZ]

The best bet IMO is try to figure ot what's wrong with SyncToy. It may be just an issue with user it is ran from in scheduler.
There is also robocopy, but it is commandline only.
rsync in cygwin may be an option too...

And regarding third-party backup software, like acronis and many others - be carefull, a lot of them install drivers which act as intermidiate layer between OS and storage devices to be able to support some fancy backup functionality. When/if those drivers malfunction it causes severe issues from just inoperable OS to data loss/corruption. Generally it is additional point of failure, and very likely more probable one then just HDD failure or something like that. IMO it is a good idea to avoid installing such software.

 

[CMDR MAIN SEQUENCE]

Thanks for your reply.

The best bet IMO is try to figure ot what's wrong with SyncToy. It may be just an issue with user it is ran from in scheduler.

I suspect a permissions issue or somesuch but I've spent so long doing trial-and-error pulling my hair out I just don't have the time (or patience) to spend on it. It's frustrating for me as I like to get things fixed myself but this one has me stumped.

There is also robocopy, but it is commandline only.

Yeah I guess I could do a batch file but there's no way to hide the resulting cmd window or is there?

rsync in cygwin may be an option too...

I'm going to try Deltacopy but it's quite old, though it looks like it ticks all the boxes.

 

[GammaZ]

...
Yeah I guess I could do a batch file but there's no way to hide the resulting cmd window or is there?

If you run it through windows scheduler it should not pop up any windows, it should run in background.
There is also a possibility to make small vbs script that runs batch files in background, without visible windows, like this:

Spoiler

Set objShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
strFile = "1.cmd"
objShell.Run strFile, 0, True