Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Keepin' to the Bright Side of Life with Sunnysoft Backup Manager 4.0
Posted by Don Tolson in "SOFTWARE" @ 09:00 AM
Scheduled Backups
Known as 'Planning' in BM4, this option is available from Advanced mode only. As seen from the screens below, backups can be scheduled daily or weekly or any combination of days within the week for any time of the day. I didn't see an option for multiple times during the day or for different times on different days, but that might be creating too much flexibility :smile:.
Figure 16: Selecting the type of scheduled backup you'd like to establish.
Figure 17: Scheduling a backup at a regular day/time.
What was new (to me) was the ability to have a backup initiated when battery levels dropped below a certain level, and to specify the interval at which the backup program checks the current battery level. I'm not sure this is a problem with WM5 systems, since the memory management is different and most everything is saved in non-volatile RAM anyway, but for PPC 2003 and SE, it would be most useful.
Figure 18: Automatically scheduling backups when battery power is running low.
Resets
I'm not exactly sure why, but almost all Backup programs I've dealt with seem to require soft resets either before they begin, after they finish a backup or after they finish a restore – or any combination of the above. When I questioned the people at Sprite Software about this, they said it was necessary in order to establish a common, known state of the environment. I guess I can understand that after a restore, but I'm not exactly sure why you need it before a backup and again after the backup has completed. Anyway, Backup Manager 4 does both. You can however, via the Settings, tell it not to reset after completion of the backup.
Manual
Sunnysoft provides a complete user manual with the installation package and on their website. The English used suffers a little from its translation, but it gets the idea across. There are lots of screen prints which are, thankfully, from the current version of the software. I'm not sure why Sunnysoft selected the landscape format for presentation, as it does waste a good deal of paper. No help text is provided within the application itself.
Conclusions
I have to admit that after testing and using Sprite and Spb's backup applications, I was surprised by Sunnysoft's ease of use and capability. The simple, straightforward interface belies the features and flexibility of the product, especially in Advanced mode. I looked at the user manual only fleetingly and never missed the lack of Help screens. This is certainly a testament to good overall program structure. I would certainly recommend it as a solid, PPC-based solution.
Don is an Associate Director with Fujitsu Consulting and a member of its Enterprise Mobility Community. Unfortunately, due to a few too many 'burns', one of his soapboxes with clients is “TAKE A BACKUP” :smile:
