The Best Free Windows Backup Software, App, Program, XCopy Command

Authored by Ion Saliu on April 5, 2011; later updates

• Backup Software ~ free-to-run backup software ~ the easiest backup ever. The ZIP package consists of:

• BackupXCopy.bas (the source code in BASIC programming language – PowerBasic);
• BackupXCopy (the compiled program);
• BackupXCopy.bat (the batch file based on the XCOPY command);
• BackupSoftware.pdf (the PDF file with a presentation based on this Web page);
• ReadBackup.txt (essential Command Prompt instructions).

Here is the situation. You install or uninstall a piece of terrible software. Next thing you know, your computer is no longer functional! It happened to me after installing and finally uninstalling a bad piece of software from a terrible software company: PC Tools. I faced the daunting task of reinstalling Windows! What a nightmare — for I also had to reinstall plenty of software applications! You don't want to hear from me the choice of words of that time...

I learned the lesson that I had neglected. I went to Walmart and bought an external hard drive to serve me as a backup device. Just US$ 50-80 (cheaper by the year!) for ingenious peace of mind!

Windows has a very good feature: Create a system image (in Control Panel, System and Security, Backup and Restore; unfortunately, Windows 8.x made things worse!) It will be much easier to deal with a nightmarish situation like the one I had with PC Tools. I just restore the most recent system image. I don't have to reinstall Windows and software (except for programs not included in the latest system image backup). I always create a system image soon after I installed new software or updated software on my PC.

Here is another situation. Like many, I create, add, edit, modify plenty of files. I swear, we must backup the most dynamic directories (folders) on our computers. Many invoke the need to back-up in a religious-like manner! The Ancient Greeks had a god for everything. If they still had been around, they would have designated a god of computers as well. Possible name: Bitser. The bits are far more important than the thieves, or merchants, or sailors, or warriors, or Olympus adulterers...

But that's one of my biggest complaints about Windows — Backup. The backup facility in Windows has been a source of complaining from the very beginning. For starters, it is not flexible. I have to accept what Windows decides to backup. Then, if I need just one file in the backup, I have to do a full restore. Then, hunt for the file I need!

That was the second situation I was referring to. I dramatically upgraded my lottery, gambling, and scientific software. No surprise, the overhaul was accompanied by quite a few errors. Fortunately, I did the backup my way. I had older source code files on various media. I knew exactly what BAS files I needed and where they were located. It was as easy as opening in the compiler both program versions, and then copy-and-paste.

Last time I used Windows Backup was in 1995. After that, I have always used my backup methods. All had in common the XCOPY command, which lies at the foundation of the Command Prompt. Windows Explorer uses a watered-down version of XCOPY. You'll never be able to do in Windows Explorer what you can do with XCOPY at the Command Prompt.

And here is the third situation. It relates to users of my software. Some really bother me by asking me to email or even snail-mail them pieces of my software. The reason: The computer-crash cliché! Their computers crashed and they lost programs and data — and the users did not have backups. Well, such situation (because of the number of requests) bothers me — and it must stop once and for all!

1. I created a special program to backup everything that's important on a user's PC. I created also a batch file to do the same. This is the best and easiest procedure of backing up files: XCOPY. The command has a plethora of options (via switches on the command line). I only applied a few switches. The following is a fragment from my batch file that creates a backup on a removable USB flash drive (J:, in this example):

XCOPY C:\BAS\*.bas J:\BAS\*.bas /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "C:\My Web Pages Code\*.*" "J:\My Web Pages Code\*.*" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Documents\*.*" "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Documents" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Favorites" "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Favorites" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Downloads" "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Downloads" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Music" "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Music" /S /D /I /Y
... etc.
PAUSE

The /D option (switch) is the keystone of easy backup via the XCOPY command. If the files do not exist, they are copied to the Destination. If the files are modified on the Source, they will replace the older files on the Destination. If no files were modified on the Source, XCOPY fires this benign message: 0 files copied.

2. I created then another batch file to restore the backup from the USB drive to the boot drive. The restore utility simply reverses the Source and Destination drives:

XCOPY J:\BAS\*.bas C:\BAS\*.bas /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "J:\My Web Pages Code\*.*" "C:\My Web Pages Code\*.*" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Documents\*.*" "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Documents" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Favorites" "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Favorites" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Downloads" "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Downloads" /S /D /I /Y
XCOPY "J:\Users\Parpaluck\Music" "C:\Users\Parpaluck\Music" /S /D /I /Y
... etc.
PAUSE

Yes, it is that simple, axiomatic one! Why ever pay for standalone backup software or cloud-based backup?!

• It is very important that you surround by quotation marks ("") folders/files with blank spaces in their file names.

Let's take a look at the menus of my backup software:

The menu suits my needs. That's how I backup the most important folders and files. If a folder did not exist on the Destination (the drive that hosts the backup), then one is created; all the files on Source are copied to the Destination. If the folder exists on the Destination, then only the modified files will be copied (replaced or updated). To avoid the Invalid number of parameters error of XCOPY, the software surrounds directory names by quotation marks, in case the directory name contains blank spaces.

As I said, this piece of backup software suits my needs. To suit other people's needs, I also make public the source code of the program: XC.BAS. Well, it can only serve the programmers! The BASIC source code can be converted to any language even by programming beginners. I even make public a batch file, which is much easier to edit even by non-programmers: BKUP.BAT.

The advantage of BKUP.BAT is scheduling. You can schedule the automatic running of my backup batch file. You do that via the Task Scheduler in Windows. Choose a day and time when you can surf the Internet, for example, while BKUP.BAT backs up your files in the background.

I added one function to XC thinking of the bluntest non-programming computer users:

The user can select the folder to backup, one by one. Maximum attention is required! Windows file names or folder names are case-insensitive. But more than one blank space triggers errors — the program will terminate. The same is true regarding the BKUP.BAT. As a non-programmer, take your time when adding backup folders. The good news is that you don't have to add files manually — the entire folder will be backed up, if that's what you want.

You can download XC and BKUP.BAT directly to the root directory (e.g. C:\). You don't even need to go to the Command Prompt. You can open Windows Explorer and (double-)click on XC (or BKUP.BAT). Even easier: Create a shortcut on your desktop. Right-click XC, then select Send to, then Desktop (Create Shortcut). You might want to right-click the shortcut icon, then choose Rename. Rename it something like MyBackup.

There is a great advantage for programmers, of course. They can edit XC.BAS to their hearts' delight. There are three additional menu screens, and lots more can be easily created.

Windows 7 has a great feature. Even an average computer user can copy files and folders to a CD/DVD — without the cumbersome Burn step. Also, XCOPY copies files directly to CD/DVD from the command prompt.

I easily created a secondary backup to a DVD. It took around 15 minutes to transfer over 2 GB of data from my hard drive to the DVD. Compare that to the inflexible and slow built-in backup service of Windows.

• Unfortunately, copying to a CD/DVD is not as complete as working with magnetic media (e.g. hard drives). This backup will always copy all files and folders to DVD — instead of only updating the modified/added files and folders.
• The good news: There is now a new type of DVD media named M-Disk. It is supposed to last 1000 years! Anyway, the United States Department of Defense tested M-disks thoroughly and they attest that M-disk outlast, by far, traditional CD/DVD as backup media. Traditional optical media (CD, DVD) are supposed to last reliably up to 8 years(?) I have floppies older than 20 years — and the data is still reliable! I've got CD-ROMs older than 10 years — they are still reliable in reading data!
• I undoubtedly prefer the USB drives and external drives. I use also a portable hard drive with 1 terabyte storage capacity!

I was appalled in the 1980s and 1990s. I saw advertising for expensive backup software. What for? XCOPY was there, since DOS, and then well preserved in Windows. There were also the batch processor and capable programming platforms (GWBASIC, QBasic). Yet, millions of computer users paid serious money for backup software! Not me! By the way — all those ads for backup software are defunct now. It's not only because Microsoft followed their notorious practice of “killing” competitors. I believe it's so primarily because more and more computer users have wised up...

If you are a registered member to download the SALIU.COM software, go directly here:

• Download XC;
  
• Download XC.bas;
  
• Download BKUP.BAT.
  

The applications are also absolutely free for any visitor reading this:

• Ion Saliu's Special Freeware.

You know, there is well-paying backup advertising on my Web site! Alas! You might never need any of that! Not even online backup (while paying some hundreds of dollars a year in subscription fees)! Just buy an 80 dollar external hard drive, 500 GB in capacity. 90% of computer entities (companies included please) will not run out of room any time soon. If capacity is exceeded — buy another 80 dollar external hard drive, 500 gigs in capacity… and another one… perhaps? Did I mention that in-house is millions of times safer than online? Privacy, anyone? How about frequent bankruptcy in the computer-Internet world?!

The online backup (the euphemistic cloud-computing of these days) claims better safety. The cloud backup firms claim they are safer than a home or a company building as far as disasters are concerned. Human disasters: fire or flooding; natural disasters: earthquakes, flooding, hurricanes, etc. Everything and everybody are equally prone to disasters. Furthermore, what's a backup worth if the owner is killed in an earthquake?!

As Microsoft puts it so eloquently in their Terms of Service, if you use the cloud backup you must always have… another backup… at home!

"We strive to keep the services up and running; however, all online services suffer occasional disruptions and outages, and Microsoft isn't liable for any disruption or loss you may suffer as a result. You should regularly backup the content that you store on the services. Having a regular backup plan and following it can help you prevent loss of your content."

Besides, online backup is out of question when recovery system images are at stakes. You can't afford to transfer over the Internet hundreds of gigabytes of data! Mission impossible!!

Complete System Backup

• To backup a master (boot, start-up) drive entirely to a slave drive, XCOPY comes to the rescue again:

  XCOPY C:\*.* D:\ /E /H /K /C /D /Y
  (C: is the master or boot drive, D: is the slave or secondary drive.)

• Yet another Command Prompt function can be used: ROBOCOPY. It has many more options and it is more efficient for networks:

  ROBOCOPY C:\ D:\ /MIR

  For the most comprehensive cloning of the boot (master) drive, use the command with these switches:

  ROBOCOPY C:\ D:\ /MIR /SEC /SECFIX

  /MIR will replicate data and security (as /SEC is specified) for changed files, and /SECFIX will update just the security for unchanged files. Add /V to the command line if you want to see which files are having their security “fixed” without having their data copied.

  This case applies to computers with two drives: A master and a slave. If the master fails, swap the drives, and make the “clone” (slave) drive bootable. It is faster and even better than the Create System Image program of Windows. Not to mention that the very useful Create System Image is, strangely, hidden beginning Windows 8!

• To see comprehensive lists of the features of the two commands, go to a Command Prompt and type:

  XCOPY /?|MORE
  ROBOCOPY /?|MORE

• Random Crashes to a Randomly Colored Screen, Computer Shuts Down Itself, Boot Errors.
• How to Run Software at the Command Prompt in Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7, 8, 10.
• Windows Vista: Dual Boot with Windows XP;
• Microsoft Windows 7: Computer Operating System Done Right.
• Microsoft Windows 8 IS Schizophrenic Computer Operating System.
• Microsoft Windows 10 Upgrade Ridden by Serious Problems, Errors, Issues, My Solutions.
• Inadvertent or Conscious Rotation of Display, Screen in Windows 7, 8, 10.

• Caveats:
• Worldwide Censorship on Basis of Ideology, Religion, Money; Plus Other Stupid Pretexts.

Comments:
: XCOPY Command: The Best Backup Procedure, Method, Software in Windows OS, All Versions. I learned the lesson that I had neglected. I went to Walmart and bought an external hard drive to serve me as a backup device. Just 50 dollars for ingenious peace of mind! Windows has a very good feature: Create a system image (in Control Panel, System and Security, Backup and Restore). It will be much easier to deal with a nightmarish situation like the one I had with PC Tools. I just restore the most recent system image. I don't have to reinstall Windows and software (except for programs not included in the latest system image backup). The backup facility in Windows has been a source of complaining from the very beginning. For starters, it is not flexible. I have to accept what Windows decides to backup. Then, if I need just one file in the backup, I have to do a full restore. Then, hunt for the file I need! What's the best free backup software program? There are plenty of free Windows utilities that can automate and simplify your backup efforts. Paragon Backup & Recover 2012 Free offers all the features most home users will need. You know you're supposed to make regular backups, yet you're just not doing it. If it's because you're not wild about the idea of spending money on backup software, here's good news: you don't have to. There are plenty of full-featured backup utilities (for Windows, anyway) that don't cost a dime. Indeed, your only out-of-pocket expense should be a USB or network hard drive--a place to hold your precious data in case your primary drive goes belly-up. Below I've rounded up five of the most popular and well-known backup programs for Windows, all of them capable, all of them free. Check the list, then meet me below for some thoughts and questions. • Cobian Backup • DriveImage XML • Easeus Todo Backup • Macrium Reflect Free • Paragon Backup & Recovery Free If you've tried any or all of these tools, which one do you like best? And if your favorite backup program isn't on this list, hit the comments and name it. I give the nod to Easeus Todo Backup, which combines a friendly interface with a versatile feature set. But Paragon Backup runs it a very close second. General Tags: backup software, backups, freeware, Windows backups, backup. The built in Windows backup works the best and is 100% free. If you have very large volumes then doing an image based backup rather than a file based (w/ incremental) backup will be much faster. It can tear through terabytes in minutes. If you just want a one-off image of your boot drive then use 'create a system image' in the GUI. The WBAdmin command will give a broad range of options including images for every drive in the system. Couple this with built in scheduling and you can wake from sleep and knockout a backup in minutes. It's FAST (seriously you should see it), free, and works perfectly with Windows Restore...just boot your windows CD to do a bare metal restore. Why pay? I couldn't get the Windows Backup to back-up to a network drive. Any hints? grant userID + permission \\server\location Just use something like Mozy so you can back them up off site. Backing up to a USB or network drive at home may feel like an accomplishment, but doesn't help at all if you have a fire or a flood. I tried a regular backup in Vista Home Premium x64,and it was the first time I've ever got Windows backup to work flawlessly. I hear, Win 7 has a better one. Windows Secrets said you didn't even have to have the command line. They are even giving it away with Home Premium, according to what I read. I hope I got that right! I know mine beats the OEM HP backup hands down! To be specific, this tool is called SyncToy. An excellent feature is its ability to backup just some folders you select, that is, it does not indistinctly backup everything from an entire drive. Download link here: //www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=15155 Paragon worked great for quite some time and the just got "wonky" and stopped backing things up. I also found the restore process very confusing (so much so that I printed out the instructions from the "Help" file and kept them in the safe with the backup DVDs and the rescue CD). I've set up Easeus Todo Backup for a friend as a free alternative to Acronis TrueImage after a near-fatal hard drive failure. I've only used the free version, and it seems to lack some crucial features such as the ability to place the backup to an external hard drive into a folder -- it always wants to overwrite the existing system backup. Have you tried moving that back-up image to a directory manually? This would trick it into thinking there is no backup file there next time and thus do a fresh back-up. For restore just copy the one you want to use back to where it was when made. I do this with W7 backup to NAS. Can't do it with W7 backup to external (USB) hard drive since it hides the file it a way that CANNOT be found or manipulated. Free to backup to a local destination, or another computer. Has a paid service that allows for online backup. Sports encryption, deduplication, and file by file restore. Totally free (as in 1000% free) backup software for Windows, even DOS: Just write a few text lines in a batch (.BAT) file using the comprehensive XCOPY command: XCOPY "C:\My Documents" "J:\My Documents" /S /D /I /Y saliu.com/best-backup RoboCopy is good and free from Microsoft as well. More descriptive, more options, handles files-in-use better, and nicer verbose output. Also for drive imaging I use Corporate level software. Symantec "Backup Exec System Recovery" Also have been using on Corporate servers and pc's with no troubles. I've been using EaseUS ToDo but I don't like it that the file format it backs up to is in a proprietary format. Now that I see the XCOPY option I plan to switch. Once I upgrade to Windows 7, I'll use ROBOCOPY with the /MIR switch. Brilliant! I USED to use the XCOPY method - but then I found TERACOPY - I use that now - I like it better. I WISH they made a "TERASYNC" so I could manage deletes as easily. The SYNC program I like best is IFOLDER - its free - BUT only runs on a SUSE server. It works well, automatically, and continuously to keep a mirror on the server and allows you to sync multiple machines - ie. work, home, laptop .... %windir%\system32\XCOPY C:\*.* %1:\ /E /H /K /C /Y This was in a batch file I had many years ago to sort of "clone" my master hard drive to a 2nd hard drive... where %1 was the parameter fot the 2nd Hard Drive Letter ( BACKUPALL D ) would backup everything, lock, stock, and barrel... if the first hard drive went down, all I would have to do was to swap the drives, and make the clone drive bootable. I suppose you could add a /M switch maybe to then backup only files that have changed... but I never did that... I'd just run the command and back up everything... it was a quick way to get back up and running after a major crash... As a computer tech way back when... I sold a lot of 2nd hard drives to people and gave them this command to run their backups. It was cheaper and easier than buying some kinda tape backup or complicated backup utility. Easeus Todo BackupPosted by brhermon (50 comments ) February 21, 2012 12:10 PM (PST)LikeReplyLinkFlagI have to say Acronis True Image.Posted by atomicfreeze (9 comments ) February 21, 2012 12:10 PM (PST)Like (1)ReplyLinkFlagI liked this program until I realized it did incremental backups until my drive was full. No matter which options or which style of backup I used it never stopped doing incremental backups so I had to remove it. I have to say Acronis True Image. Actually, there is a version of Acronis that's free if you have at least one Western Digital hard drive anywhere in your system, including external USB. The downside, of course, is that you might need to restore or access your backup in a context where no WD drive is present. //support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119&wdc_lang=en I've tried many free and pay backup software programs for the PC, backing up to an external hard drive usually. But with the new cloud options available I have moved my backups to the Cloud. I use SugarSync but there are others also. You do have to pay a reasonable fee for the service but I think off site backup is the way to go. No risk of fire, external disk failure, or theft. It would be great if you did a review of the new cloud backup solutions out there. They have really cool options such as constant sync and versioning plus access to your files from anywhere with the use of an internet browser. Most support multiple computers on the same account and even phone backups for Android and Iphones. Total Commander has that killer function "synchronize directories". Basically it does what it says (including all sub-directories) with important addition that it can also do asymmetric synchronization (e.g. left to right only). I know that it brakes a lot of rules of what constitutes a proper backup, but it works (I survived this way several "events"). It's kind of natural and no setup necessary! I just looked up Total Commander on CNET and it was indicated that it was a Trial Version 30 Days $38.00 after that. Is there a totally free version? The free backups usually leave out incremental/differential features. the free online backups definitely lack storage space. The paid-for disk backups gain obscure but useful features, and maybe more importantly, the increased chance of higher reliability. Easeus, paragon, and macrium give you surprisingly good products for $0. Cobian backup is very functional, more so than any other file backup I've tried. but I don't need file backup very often. If the free disk and online backup tools were good enough for me, I'd use them. but they're not. I use it to synchronize with Dropbox, where my “My Documents” folder is already a folder set to synchronize with my work network. I use Paragon's HD Manager 2011 Pro, but it isn't free for my Windows HD in my Mac Pro. Since OSX uses a GUID partition scheme, there's some quarks with Windows 7 that won't allow you to simply restore from a system image. If you've got some spare time, you can always try to restore from paragon's free stuff, I've never tried it, since I really do want support if something goes wrong. Have you tried Time Machine? It's saved one of my users twice now. I encourage all Mac users to back up their Macs with it. I've been using it for several years now and never had a problem. I back up my home PC and my wife's PC to an external drive at my office (after performing the initial backup locally since it's over 100 GB). It works perfectly and I love that the backup files are encrypted. I do not like back-up software that encrypts and/or compresses the backed up data because (1) it is not easy for me to see what are inside those scrambled data, (2) It is not easy for me to access and to use those scrambled data, and (3) If I do not have the original back up software, then those backed up scrambled mess is totally useless. The capacity backup external hard disks are now very large and the cost is inexpensive. It makes no sense to me to compress the backed up data to try to save the very inexpensive storage space. I prefer to use a simple back up software program that keeps the backed up data in simple and transparent format so that (1) I can use Windows Explorer to see what are in the backed up data without going through a decompression or decrypt process, (2) I can use Windows Explorer to access and to use the backed up data easily without having to go through a decompress or decrypt process, (3) I can take the backed up external hard disk to any other PC and access the backed data without the original back up program. I use FBackup as well. Simple, easy to set up with various automated routines. I swap the output to 2 different external hard drives weekly (mirror copies of my C drive files), so I have 2 reasonably close back-ups in case I should have a catastrophic failure on my C drive. Paragon free internet backup was a disaster for me!!! It added so much bloatware to my PC. And even after I decided I didn't like it, I couldn't get one of its programs to stop running on my pc AFTER I uninstalled it. It wouldn't let me delete the file and msconfig wouldn't let me not run it on start up. After several hours of working on this problem . Today I only use the backup software in Windows and it seems to work the best especially on Windows 7. Very important stuff such as my photos I have additionally backed up on an extra external hard drive and an online back up as well - as far as I am concerned those are about the only thing i am not going to risk and I have experienced two hard drives failing more or less simultaneously before now.