Karen’s Replicator is a free backup and synchronization utility which will backup files, directories, drives from one drive/folder to another, including network drives. It also does scheduled backups, without the need of you remembering to do a backup again!

Here’s what you need to know about Karen’s Replicator and how you should be able to use it once you have installed it. (Click here to download)

For the purpose of this article I tried backing up a folder and it did what I was exactly looking for. Once you open the Application click on “New Job” as shown below.

Karen’s Replicator will allow you to choose the source and backup destinations as shown in the image.

Next you can click on the Change Schedule and set it as per your requirements or how and when you need the application to back your files up as shown below.

Karen’s replicator can be scheduled to run at a certain time each day or each hour or week or month (you can even go down to minute level). Typically the first backups takes a while, but after that it’s a quick process because the program only looks at files that have been changed.

Karen’s Replicator also gives you the option of setting up filters for the type of files that you do NOT want to back up. For example, shortcuts (.lnk ) or temp (.tmp) files. You can set these rules per folder or across the board.

The program is set by default to copy changed files (will compare sizes and dates of last modification), but you could easily change these settings for each folder/group of folders if you want to.
Global Exclusion is another feature of the program which allows you to skip the entire drives, folders, or specific files while replicating.

Karen’s Replicator will not backup your files online to an FTP nor is it a zip backup utility.

I’ve been looking for a good free backup utility for some time now, and I have definitely found it. I highly recommend this program. Click here to download.

But when it actually happened I realized I actually lost some data that was important to me. So, since the last crash, I am making sure I don’t lose ANY of my important information, not a single file!

It’s not rocket science its simple. Using few “Free” software’s to make it happen.

Ok, here is how you do it…

Step 1: Hard disk should be partitioned, Primary(C:) and Logical (D:). Makes sure partition/drive D: has more storage space then drive C:. Why? Because most of the information we save will be saved on the D: drive.

Step 2: Change the storage path of “My Documents” folder to save all the “My Document” files on D: drive.

Step 3: Sync important directories with directories on D: drive. I’ve synchronized “Desktop” and my Firefox profile directory.

The basic idea is to save everything on the second drive so that even if the system crashes you can just re-install the OS and it wouldn’t affect drive D: at all.

The reason why we are changing the path of just “My Documents” and not other important files, like Desktop or Firefox profile path is because that could affect the performance of the applications.

Now here are a few more details.

Step 1: Creating partitions is important part of the solution. If partitions are not already created you can use utilities like Partition Magic (Paid) or EASEUS Partition Manager (Free) to create new partitions.

Though this software is easy to use and creating partition is a fairly simple procedure be careful and know what you are doing when using this software. You could lose your data if things go wrong.

Like I mentioned earlier, space on drive D: should be more than C:. I’d suggest 40% – 60%, for example if the total storage is 100GB’s then drive C: gets 40GB and D: gets 60GB.

Step 2: Follow the steps below to change the path of My Documents directory to save everything on D: drive.

Right click on “My Documents” directory and click on “Properties”

Click on “Move”, create a new directory on your D: drive and Click “Ok”

Going forward save everything in the My Documents directory which will save everything on D: drive so that it safe.

Step 3: Sync all the directories that are placed on drive C: and hold important information. I synchronized “Desktop” and “Mozilla” directory with the directories on drive D:

Follow the steps below to setup a sync for “Mozilla” directory so that even if your computer crashes, you don’t lose your Firefox settings, extensions, passwords, etc..

Before you start click on the following link to download an open source based Sync software called DirSync Pro.

Click here to visit the DirSync Pro site and download it. (http://directorysync.sourceforge.net/)

• First create a directory called “Mozilla Backup” on drive D:
• Now launch the DirSync Pro software and setup the sync settings under “Dir Settings” tab.
• Setup one way sync from A to B, A being the original Mozilla directory found here (C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\Mozilla) and B being the backup directory.

Once you set the sync up, just run the DirSync Pro software once every week so that updated information is synchronized.

That’s all, now even if your computer crashes due to virus or some screw up it will not affect the D: drive. Hope this will minimize the troubles that come with a system crash.