Scheduled Backups Overview

Scheduled backups enable you to automatically run your backups at a predetermined day and time.

With Scheduled Tasks, you can:

• Schedule a task to run daily, weekly, monthly, or at certain times (such as system startup & shutdown).

• Change the schedule for a task.

• Stop a scheduled task.

• Missed backups can be run the next time your computer starts.

• Space can be automatically managed on the destination disk.

• Incremental and Differential backups can be automatically appended to the most recent full backup in the destination directory.

• Backup execution and completion statuses will be logged for easy reference.

Backup Cycle

A good backup cycle is essential to optimize use of available storage space and protect your computer from sudden failure as well as giving you the ability to recover historical data.

Example 1.

A standard incremental back up routine could follow a seven-day cycle, starting on a Monday at 18.00.

• The specified partition or disk could be fully imaged on Monday evening.

• On Tuesday evening at 18.00 a scheduled task would run and backup any sectors on disk changed since the previous day's backup.

• The same procedure would then follow for Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings.

• At the beginning of the next week, the preceding Monday's image will be deleted along with all the increments (which are now invalid)  and a new full image added to the destination directory.

• The cycle is then repeated.

This example is quickest to execute from Tuesday to Sunday and uses less storage on these day’s as only changes since the previous day are saved. There is however, an increased exposure on Tuesday, as at that point only one day’s backup can be restored. If you need to go back to the previous Friday, for example, then unfortunately this isn’t possible.

You could, of course, modify this routine to only backup every 30 Days using a thirty-day-cycle. You would still have the same degree of exposure at the beginning of each cycle though.

Example 2.

Example 1 could be modified not to delete the previous full image but to delete the full image from the Monday before that. Therefore this would keep a minimum of 7 Days of data and a maximum of 14 Days (or 30 and 60 days for a thirty-day-cycle).

The obvious disadvantage of this method is that double the amount of disk storage is required. But, if the storage is available, then this is a more comprehensive option.

Disk Space Management

The above examples rely on the destination directory being purged of old images before adding the most recent backup Image. This is achieved by using 'Disk Space Management.'.

For this dialog see the Advanced Settings when creating an image or file backup.

Example 1 would require you to click 'Enable disk space management' and enter any value less than 7 days.

Example 2 would require you to click 'Enable disk space management' and enter any value between 7 and 14 days.