06/27/2007 Utilities

To start using Backup Platinum first of all you need to create one or several items. Each item contains information about a backup operation with a set of files and folders. All existing items are listed in the top view of the main program window. For each item, you specify:
Item name;
Type of operation (backup or synchronization);
Folders and files to process;
Where to store backup files;
Compression, encryption and other options;
Scheduling options (when and how often to backup your data);
Other advanced options.

You can create new items, delete any item or modify its properties as described below.

How to Backup Data

To backup your data, you need to create one or several backup items. You can backup many files and folders using one item, however if you want to backup different files to different locations or at different time, you will need to create several items with different properties.

To create a new item, click the "New Item" button on the toolbar. The New Item Wizard will appear. Enter a name for the item and select "Backup" as its type.

1. Specify What to Backup

At this step you specify files and folders you want to backup.

You can include as many files and folders as you need to a single backup item. If you want to exclude a file or a subfolder, remove the checkmark from it. You can also specify include/exclude masks using the "Filter Settings" button.




Adding Drives and Folders. Click the "Add..." button and choose the "Folder..." option.
In the "Browse For Folder" dialog select a drive or a folder that you want to add to backup.
Repeat this procedure if you want to select more folders.
The list of selected folders will be displayed in the upper box of the page.

Adding Files. Click the "Add..." button and choose the "Files..." option. In the "Select File" dialog, select one or several files and click "Open".
Repeat this procedure if you want to select more files. The list of selected files will be displayed in the upper box of the page.

Adding Outlook/Outlook Express Files. Click the "Add..." button and select "MS Outlook Files" option. The folder with your Outlook data will be added to backup set.
Click the "Add..." button and select "Outlook Express Files" option. The folder with your Outlook Express data will be added to backup set.

Adding Registry Keys. Click the "Add..." button and select the "Registry Key" option. In the "Select Registry Key" dialog, choose required key and click "OK". Repeat this procedure if you want to select more keys.

To remove Folders or Files select a folder or a file in the upper box and click the "Remove" button. You can use this method only for root folders or files. If you want to exclude a subfolder or a file inside a folder, remove the checkmark from it.

Checkmarks. Black checkmarks near files and folders indicate that they are included in the backup set. Grey checkmark near a folder shows that some files or subfolders in this folder are excluded.

Filter Settings. Click the "Filter Settings" button to specify masks for files to be processed and masks for files to be ignored during backup.



Backup Platinum will process only files that match at least one of include masks, but do not match any of exclude masks. When you specify masks, you should separate them by commas or semicolons. By default, "*.*" is used as include mask and no exclude masks are specified. This means that all files selected for the item will be included.

Apply these masks to folders as well as to files. Use this option to apply specified masks to folders as well as to files. If this option is not selected, masks are applied only to files.
Skip read-only files. The program will ignore all read-only files and folders.
Skip hidden files. The program will ignore all hidden files.
Skip system files. The program will ignore all system files.

2. Specify Where to Backup

At this step you select the destination folder where backup copies of your files will be stored. You can choose to backup to a local drive, LAN, FTP server, or a CD-R/W, DVD-R/W, DVD+R/W device. Note that all external drives connected via USB should be specified as local drives by choosing "Local/LAN" option.

Local/LAN
Click the "Browse for folder" button . In the "Browse For Folder" dialog select a folder or create a new one.



If the selected folder can be accessed only under some specific user account, you can check the "Authenticate" option and specify username and password.


FTP
Select the "FTP" option if you want to backup your files to a remote FTP server.

Host. Enter FTP server name.
Port. Enter FTP port number. Default port number is 21.
User. Enter your FTP username.
Password. Enter your FTP password.
Passive mode. In passive mode, FTP data connection is established by your computer. This may be necessary if firewalls do not allow establishing connection from outside. By default, this option is enabled.
Folder. To choose a remote directory where to backup your data, click the "Select FTP folder" button . The "Select FTP folder" dialog will appear.

Upon establishing FTP connection, the list of remote directories is displayed in the upper window of the dialog.
Select a directory by clicking on it, then click the "Select" button. If you want to create a new directory, click the "New folder" button.
The bottom view of the window shows FTP session log messages.

Proxy. Click this button to choose your proxy settings. Proxy server settings dialog will be displayed. It allows you to configure your FTP and SOCKS proxy. By default no proxy are used.


CD/DVD
Select the "CD/DVD" option, if you want to backup onto CD or DVD media.

Device. Choose your CD-R/W, DVD-R/W or DVD+R/W device.
Folder. Type the name of a folder where to backup your data. Note that the path to this folder should not contain any components ("componentcomponent...") with the names longer than 64 characters, as well as any of the following characters: * ? : ;.
Speed. Choose the speed that will be used to burn CD/DVD discs.

Erase disc. Choose this option to erase CD-RW/DVD-RW/DVD+RW disc before writing on it.

Enable spanning (split large backups). You can use this option to split large backups and place data on several discs. If your backup set contains large files with size exceeding free space available on a single disc, the program will split such files into several parts and place them on several discs. Their names will look like (XXXX)name, where XXXX is a exadecimal number.

Perform CRC checking. If this option is checked, Backup Platinum will perform additional validity check after storing data on a CD/DVD. You can either use blank (brand-new) CD-R/W, DVD-R/W, DVD+R/W disc, or you should erase discs, if they were previously formatted with a 3rd party program like DirectCD.

Note: If "CD/DVD" option is disabled on your system, you may need to download ASPI driver from Adaptec, Inc. This driver is required under MS Windows 95/98/ME. For details on installation of this driver, read the next topic "Installation Instruction for ASPI Driver".


Installation Instruction for ASPI Driver
Please follow the steps listed below to install Adaptec ASPI driver on your system.
This driver is required to use CD and DVD writing devices for backup under MS Windows 95/98/ME.
1. Click the following link to download the ASPI Driver. http://download.adaptec.com/software_pc/aspi/aspi_v471.exe
2. Run the downloaded file aspi_v471.exe on your system. You will see the following dialog box.
Select the folder where you want to extract the files to (C:adaptecaspi in this example) and click the "Unzip" button. The following files will be available after you have unzipped files in aspi_v471.exe.
3. Run aspiinst.exe file to install the ASPI layer. When the installation is finished, reboot the system in order to enable the ASPI driver.

3. Specify Storage Options

At this step you can specify various storage options.



You should select one of the storage methods. The following options are available.
Store each file as is. All files will be backed up "as is", i.e. without compression and encryption.
ZIP each file. Each file will be compressed to a separate ZIP archive. Note that the size of each individual compressed file should not exceed 4 Gb. If you backup onto DVD, the size of each individual compressed file should not exceed 2 Gb.

You can specify password to create standard password-protected ZIP files. Note that Blowfish encryption is not used in this case, but you will be able to extract data using any ZIP client.

Encrypt each file with blowfish. Each file will be stored separately and your data will be protected using strong 128-bit Blowfish encryption. This encryption is stronger than standard ZIP password protection, however only Backup Platinum can restore files encrypted this way.
ZIP and encrypt each file. This is a combination of two previous options. Each file will be compressed to a separate ZIP archive and then encrypted with Blowfish.

Put all files into a single ZIP archive. A single ZIP file with all your data will be created. Note that the whole archive size should not exceed 4 Gb. If you backup onto DVD, the whole archive size should not exceed 2 Gb. If you use disc spanning to store data on several discs, a single ZIP file is created for each span.

You can specify password to create standard password-protected ZIP file. Note that Blowfish encryption is not used in this case, but you will be able to extract data using any ZIP client.

Put all files into a single encrypted ZIP archive. This is similar to the previous option, but in addition the data is encrypted with Blowfish. As a result, you will have a single file with compressed and encrypted data. If you use disc spanning to store data on several discs, a single file is created for each span.

If you want to perform incremental backup adding only new and changed files every time, it is not recommended to use last two options, because it is impossible to insert new data to an old ZIP archive. So in this case, the backup will be fully rebuilt every time.

4. Scheduling

At this step you can schedule backup operation so that Backup Platinum would perform and repeat it automatically at a specified time.

Enable scheduler. Select this option to enable scheduling. If an item is not scheduled, you can execute it manually at any convenient time. To do this, select the item in the Items View and click the "Backup" button on the toolbar.

5. Ready To Create Item

The last window of the New Item Wizard shows a brief resume with the basic parameters of the new item.

You can change most of these parameters later in the "Item Properties" dialog box. To open it, select the item in Items View and click the "Properties" button on the toolbar.

Now click the "Finish" button. The newly created item will appear in the Items View. All included files will appear in the Files View.

You can click the "Refresh" button to refresh their statuses.

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Backup Platinum

Backup Platinum is an easy-to-use yet powerful backup program to make a reserve copy of your critical data virtually to any type of storage media: hard or USB drives, CD-R/W or DVD/RW media, FTP server or Local Area Network.

128-bit encryption with Blowfish and multichoice ZIP compression on the fly are available to keep your backups small and secure. Built-in CD/DVD engine allows you to erase a rewritable disk before burning and automatically split large backups to several parts using disk spanning.

Backup Platinum is designed for MS Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/ XP/2003. The program comes with a flexible scheduler to provide automatic backups. It can also run in service mode under NT/2000/XP/2003 to execute scheduled tasks even when nobody is logged in. Free to try it.