Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 00:22
HERE ARE A COUPLE OF REVIEWS
For most users, having a hard disk failure or a corrupted operating system that renders a system unbootable is among the most dreaded possible occurrences. In such a situation, a disk utility can make the difference between enduring a disaster and managing to maintain the integrity of the operating system environment and data.
Future Systems Solutions' Casper XP disk utility is geared to Windows 2000 and XP home users. Available now, Casper XP is designed for upgrading a system's hard disk or making a bootable copy of the main hard drive. Casper works with any attached hard disk recognized by Windows, including ATA/IDE, SCSI, USB, FireWire, and Serial ATA and hardware RAID arrays.
My tests showed that Casper XP is an excellent disk utility for home users. Casper can perform any of its disk utility operations in the background, allowing users to work without interruption. Casper XP also is excellent for use when upgrading to a larger and bootable hard drive, or for keeping a backup copy of a primary hard drive.
Casper XP copied a 40GB Maxtor drive to an 80GB Western Digital drive in less than 45 minutes on my test system, which comprised an AMD Athlon processor and 256MB of DDR PC 2100 RAM. Casper XP can schedule automated backups, so users can keep full bootable backups of their system.
At $44.95 per license, Casper XP is reasonably priced compared with other disk utilities that have similar capabilities. Casper's simplicity and reliability make it a good pick for home use. However, I would like to see Casper XP gain the ability to save backups to networked shared drives. This would allow it to accommodate the growing trend of home networks.
More information, pricing and a free trial download version can be found at www.fssdev.com.
Backing up your hard
drive is a crucial part
of day-to-day PC
maintenance. The trouble is,
it’s also extremely easy to
put off – by which point it
may already be too late.
The main discouraging
factor in creating backups is
that it can be a surprisingly
complex process. It’s easy
enough to copy the contents
of your My Documents folder
onto CD or DVD, but keeping
the backup up to date is an
entirely different matter. Add
other scattered files on your
hard drive, programsettings
and everything else you
might want to safeguard to
the equation, and it’s no
wonder that many computer
users simply don’t bother.
Casper XP 3 takes the
hard work out of backing up
by enabling you to clone your
entire hard drive in a few
easy steps. In order to use
the program you need to
REVIEW BACKUP UTILITY
Casper XP 3
Take the hard work out of backups with this easy-to-use disk-cloning tool
have two or more hard drives
installed, or a single hard
drive partitioned into a
number of drives. Simply
select the drive or partition
you want to back up, choose
where the backup should be
stored and you’re done.
You can opt to perform the
backup immediately or
schedule it for a later time; if
you decide to schedule for
the end of the day, Casper
XP can automatically turn off
your computer when the
process is complete.
But just creating a backup
isn’t enough – as you
continue to create and edit
files on your computer, it’s
important to keep your
backups up to date. This is
made even faster thanks to
the use of SmartClone
technology, which ensures
that Casper XP only copies
data that’s changed or been
created since the last
backup, dramatically
reducing processing time.
These backup updates can
be automated using the
scheduling option, or you
can create a desktop
shortcut to perform the
update whenever you want.
This is not only a great
backup tool, it’s ideal if you
buy a new hard drive and
don’t fancy the ideal of
having to reinstall all of your
favourite programs. And best
of all, there’s no chance of
forgetting any important
files, as everything is backed
up for you automatically.
Possibly the most easy-touse
automated backup
program ever released.
NOWYOU CAN…
Back up everything on your
hard drive with ease
Restore a corrupt hard drive
Transfer your files and settings
to a new drive
Windows XP:
FollowupID:
846929
